Page 43 - 2021cnc12-1

OWhy manufacturing education needs to change
ver the last century, American industry was built on innovation and manufacturing. But
over the last 25 years, I believe we’ve lost our edge. Innovation in American manufacturing thrived while being pushed forward by the fledgling automotive industry, the defense and aerospace race, and most recently the tech boom. There are many indicators of a promising future for American manufacturing but there are equally as many concerning realities of unfilled jFobs and predictions of a growing skills gap.
orbes predicts the future of American manufacturing will provide more growth than we saw in
the tech sector over the past 20 years. In March of this year, Reuters reported manufacturing activity soaring to its highest level in more than 37 years. As encouraging as these reports may seem, Deloitte and the Manufacturing Institute project as many as 2.1 million American manufacturing jobs going unfilled by 2030 due to a manufacturing skills gap, costing the U.S. economy as much as $1 trillion in 2030 alone. How do we reconcile promising activity today with worrying predictions of the future? If we are willing to adapt and change what we teach and how we teach it when it comes to manufacturing, I believe we can ensure a bright future. Here are two areas that need to change.
1A. What We Teach
s a machinist, I ask, do we really need to
teach tool grinding, manual machining,
trigonometry, and G-Code to produce
productive machinists? When I started my
education journey in machining as a freshman
in high school, the very first thing I learned even
before making chips was how to grind a turning
tool from a high-speed steel blank. Before I
was able to sign up for G-Code classes at
Sierra College, I was supposed to learn
Trigonometry. Today? I can’t grind a
respectable turning tool, calculate
thesidelengthofatriangle,orwrite students
more than the simplest of G-Code programs without referencing a machineries handbook or G-Code manual. But I’m still capable of being a very productive and iTnnovative machinist.
he successful machinist of today
and tomorrow is a flexible learner
and a problem solver. To teach and promote these skills, we need to create a class environment that is less focused on following prescriptive steps and more focused on using resourcestosolveproblems.Icompletelyagree that there are many great lessons learned from grinding a tool or seeing and feeling how the chips are formed on a manual machine. I also won’t argue against the value of knowing
CNC WEST October/November 2021
CNC WEST December 2021/January 2022
get little hands- on time making things and
trig and being able to write G-Code programs by hand. But, in the limited amount of time teachers have with students and the reality of decreasing enrollment, learning material should be modern, engaging, and focused on teaching general machining knowledge, process
planning, measuring, and probleMm solving.
solving tangible problems while also facing highly theoretical, math intensive studies several semesters of advanced calculus. This builds the perception that mechanical engineers are always working towards a computationally intensive career. I won’t make any arguments that advanced calculus isn’t needed for many mechanical
www.CNC-West.com 2 www.CNC-West.com
w i t h
any
mechanical engineering
41