Yaskawa Motoman and RAMTEC have announced the formation of the Ohio Manufacturing Workforce Partnership. This strategic partnership aims to support the State of Ohio in creating a sustainable workforce development model and will provide Ohio educators and students with STEM-aligned curriculum and training in order to become proficient in Industry 4.0 technologies.
"Data reveals that within ten years nearly 3.5 million manufacturing jobs will sit empty, with the skills gap being responsible for 2 million of those jobs going unfilled," said Ritch Ramey, RAMTEC coordinator and engineering instructor. "Forming mutually-beneficial relationships with manufacturers through the Ohio Manufacturing Workforce Partnership will create the foundation needed to move Ohio’s workforce forward."
Press conference of the announcement included Ritch Ramey, Jon Husted and Bob Graff
According to the two, their core mission is to partner with real-world manufacturing facilities to help identify and supply the needs of the manufacturing industry. The entire project development funding is earmarked for $400,000 to provide a comprehensive training and application development model that will reach thousands of incumbent workers and students.
The partnership will include the creation of in-lab and classroom instructional strategies, the development of advanced industry-recognized robotic certifications, the utilization of augmented and virtual reality (VR) technologies to develop a new class of training tools and curriculum and the incorporation of industry-utilized robotic equipment aligned to the industrial manufacturing base.
The on-going identification and creation of new training models to support the robotics manufacturing pipeline will also continue.
