In February 2018, Tim Shinbara, vice president of Technology at AMT, invited me to attend a meeting with him at the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense, Industrial Base Analysis & Sustainment (OSD IBAS). The team at OSD IBAS was working on a new skills competition designed to change perceptions about careers in manufacturing and elevate the level of technology currently taught in schools in CNC machining and welding classes.
Pat McGibbon’s group of analysts at AMT had already provided OSD IBAS with the data that eventually would help support Presidential Executive Order 13806: “Assessing and Strengthening the Manufacturing and Defense Industrial Base and Supply Chain Resiliency of the United States.” Workforce development is a key component of that strength and resiliency.
OSD IBAS began working with AMT to develop the competition project with 50-50 matching funding from the public-private partnership. AMT was tasked with bringing together “a coalition of the willing” made up of members and others who normally devote a great amount of attention to the education market in the United States in STEM, Career & Technical Education (CTE), community colleges, and universities alike.
For some time in 2018, the project was stuck in neutral awaiting federal funding to be channeled through NASA to support the initiative. The funding came through at the very end of October. After that, industry partners came together quickly. A plan was set in motion during the holidays for NIMS to develop three things: an industry-recognized Five-Axis Machining Technical Standard, the design of a new five-axis machining + welding skills competition, and a part design for the event.
The “surprise” part design for the proof-of-concept rounds was a DNA strand, symbolizing that manufacturing is part of our DNA in the United States.
In January 2019, the initiative shifted from neutral into overdrive, and by late April, ProjectMFG was born. The first competition was held near Auburn University with four teams from four different Alabama community colleges competing. The winning team walked away with a check for $5,000. Many of the team competitors qualify for SME Education Foundation scholarships and additional cash prizes were awarded to teams as well.
How is it possible to go from concept to execution in under four months? We have a tremendous number of AMT member companies and others to thank for that.
The Competition Partners for ProjectMFG include OSD IBAS, NASA, The Gene Haas Foundation, Haas Automation, and The Lincoln Electric Company.
The Technical Standards Partners include NIMS, Autodesk, Boeing, DMG MORI, Jergens, Inc., Fanuc, Mastercam, Vincennes University, and Sandvik Coromant.
The Technology Partners, companies that provided equipment, tooling, materials and application engineering include: BIG Kaiser, Blaser Swisslube, Carl Zeiss Industrial Metrology, Haas Factory Outlet (HFO) Phillips, HFO Trident, Hoffmann Group, Hexagon Manufacturing Intelligence, Jergens, Inc., Jorgensen Conveyors, Mastercam, and TCI Precision Metals.
The Education and Industry Partners include AMT, IMTS, SkillsUSA, SME, SME Education Foundation, Auburn University, Mississippi State University, and Louisiana State University.
In May, a second ProjectMFG competition was held at Meridian Community College in Mississippi, and a third was hosted by LSU in Lafayette, La. Additional ProjectMFG competitions will be held in specific regions around the country in the fall of 2019, building off of the bench strength of the SkillsUSA National CNC Machining Championships in June, and then again in the spring of 2020. The “main event” for ProjectMFG will happen at the Smartforce Student Summit at IMTS 2020.
For more information, visit www.ProjectMFG.com, follow @ProjectMFG on Twitter, and use the hashtag #ProjectMFG.
For more information about Smartforce Development and additional videos and photos from ProjectMFG, follow @GregoryAJones on Twitter or email me at gjones@amtonline.org.
