Six-Figure Grant to Fund Training of Next-Generation Diagnosticians

The Education Foundation of the Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME) has grant-funded $207,536 to Alexandria Technical College’s Center for Automation and Motion Control, Alexandria, Minn. The grant provided will be used to fund the instructing of basic manufacturing automation principles to 160 high school students, and to teach advanced automation and remote management principles to 120 post-secondary students and 180 incumbent technicians.

According to Dr. Kenneth Ryan, director of manufacturing automation research at the Technical College’s Center for Automation and Motion Control (CAMC), “Manufacturing worldwide will transition through an interim phase where an ever-increasing number of intelligent machines will be serviced by a shrinking supply of skilled diagnosticians. While the larger manufacturing enterprises will leverage economies of scale to provide the necessary expertise in-house, a significant number of small to medium enterprises will need to rely on third-party resources for this support.”