Professional Development to Enhance Skills of Manufacturing Instructors

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The need for skilled manufacturing technicians has led to expansion of quality manufacturing technology programs in community colleges. State funding and a US Department of Labor Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College Career Training Grant provided Connecticut Community Colleges with the facilities and equipment to expand their manufacturing programs and serve more students. The ATE Regional Center for Next Generation Manufacturing has supported program and curriculum development in this area. In addition, it has supported professional development opportunities for current faculty and instructors across the state and New England. However, the rate of expansion industry's need for skilled technicians has exceeded the ability of the community colleges to find qualified instructors who have both industry and educational experience. Many potential instructors have over twenty years of industry experience but lack the skills associated with different methodologies used in classroom teaching and course management, including assessment. Faculty need expertise on methods that integrate professional skills into classrooms and laboratories. This Skills for Manufacturing Instructors project will address these needs for professional development for community college manufacturing technology instructors.The project will engage all twelve Connecticut public community colleges and their Advanced Manufacturing Technology Centers. The project will develop modules and a new course that will provide faculty with the skills needed to enhance their teaching effectiveness, improve classroom management, develop high quality student assessments of learning, and strategies to increase student persistence. The proposed course and modules will assist newly hired manufacturing technicians from industry as well as provide opportunities for current instructors to learn new teaching methodologies in a higher education academic environment. Additionally, the project will organize two workshops annually on essential technical skills for the manufacturing instructors and faculty, as well as provide opportunities for certification in widely used technologies. Examples of certifications that would be supported are the National Institute for Metalworking Skills, SolidWorks Computer-Aided Design software, and SME's Additive Manufacturing Certification. Additional workshops will be offered that provide strategies for increasing the persistence of underrepresented populations in the manufacturing programs.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.