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1. Board 313: Industry 4.0 Engineering Technology Skill Integration into Florida’s Technical Workforce Environment

   https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--46892  

   Barger, Marilyn; Eaglin, Ron; Ajlani, Sam; Toosi, Mori; Martin, Sidney; Gilbert, Richard; Frandsen, Susan (June 2024, ASEE Conferences)

   "Industry 4.0-based systems and subsystems are replacing current process and process control equipment in Florida’s manufacturing environment. The Florida State College System Engineering Technology (ET) degree pathway for developing engineering technology professionals is responding to this reality at the ET two-year associate degree, the 4-year ET B.S. degree, and post-graduate degrees as well as a statewide recognized path to the Professional Engineers license in Engineering Technology. The National Science Foundation Advanced Technological Education program (NSF-ATE) supports this effort. NSF-ATE assets provided to FLATE and five partner colleges are directed to the formation of a statewide advisory board for the 20 colleges that offer ET degrees as well as supporting six overarching Florida ET education system target goals: (1) Adjust Florida Department of Education Standards and Benchmarks to include criteria that address Florida manufacturer-identified Industry 4.0 skills gap in its technical workforce. (2) Create a statewide streamlined seamless articulation environment from the Engineering Technology A.S. to B.S. degree programs. (3) Provide Professional Development that up-skills Engineering Technology Degree faculty as related to identified Industry 4.0 technician skill needs. (4) Create a short-term ET College Credit Certificate to prepare current and future technicians to apply these new skills in the manufacturing workspace. (5) Amplify the manufacturer's involvement with college engineering technology certificates and A.S.ET degree programs. (6) Create Post-A.S. Curriculum Advanced Technology Certificate (ATC) to facilitate skilled technician professional advancement. Statewide implementation of the curriculum changes is key to more robust programs and more work-ready technician graduates. This paper and presentation poster will share the strategies the project team is using to achieve its goals and objectives. It will also share the feedback received from the industry relative to industry 4.0 skills needed in their facilities." 

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2. What’s Next? The Future of Work for Manufacturing Technicians

   Barger, Marilyn; Gilbert, Richard; Ajlani, Sam; Centonze, Phil (July 2021, ASEE annual conference)

   ASEE Manufacturing Division (Ed.)

   The manufacturing workspace and the technician workforce that supports that space tomorrow is an important issue to deal with today. As Industry 4.0 is absorbed into manufacturing facilities around the country, engineering technicians working in these facilities adjust to make tomorrow today. The National Science Foundation has supported the Florida Advanced Technological Education Center (FLATE) contiguously since 2004. FLATE's intent is to craft a manufacturing workforce that makes Florida manufacturers globally competitive. FLATE crafted and the Florida Department of Education now supported two-year Engineering Technology degree (A.S. ET) is the vehicle for manufacturing education in Florida. The degree is offered in over 85% of the colleges in the Florida College System (FCS) and has over 2,000 students enrolled statewide. The current NSF-supported project is to conduct an I4.0-focused Caucus of manufacturers and ET degree college faculty to collectively identify skill issues that will affect manufacturing production efficiency and product reliability. The project team initially used the nine Industry 4.0 (I4.0) technology areas identified by the Boston Consulting Group and selected four that will directly impact starting technicians working in companies that are already implementing Industry 4.0 technologies: (1) Autonomous Robots, (2) Simulation, (3) Industrial Internet of Things and (4) Additive/Subtractive Manufacturing and Advanced Materials. Technician skills are defined as those needed to set up, operate, troubleshoot, and maintain production and process equipment. Specific skills that fall in the I4.0 technologies identified as relevant for starting technicians were defined to be those that will be needed in the next 3-5 years. Initial questionnaire responses and subsequent data analysis detail are provided. Identified skills gaps as recognized by the manufacturers and faculty are provided and discussed. 

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3. Education in a Remote World: Focus on Workforce Readiness

   Delahanty, C.; Genis, V.; Herring, S.; & Timby, T.A (July 2021, 2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access)

   Bucks County Community College (Bucks) in collaboration with Drexel University (Drexel) is committed to increasing the number of workforce ready engineers and engineering technicians and to creating a blueprint for 2+2 engineering education programs nationally. Recently, educational reform took an unexpected turn to remote teaching due to the world-wide COVID-19 pandemic. Within our NSF ATE grant to enhance our present engineering technology curriculum we modified and enhanced instructional and student engagement methods to assure workforce readiness of our students in a remote world. Curriculum enhancements within the engineering technology (ET) occupational major at Bucks and the B.S. in ET degree program at Drexel, modifications to delivery of workforce development certification programs through the Bucks Center for Workforce Development (CWD), and college-wide student engagement strategies were implemented to assure quality education and student engagement. Modifications to credit courses included asynchronous online courses, synchronous remote courses, and hybrid courses, which combined remote and on campus laboratory instruction. Our CWD implemented hybrid instruction that included necessary resources for students such as tool kits and borrowed laptop computers. In addition, a college wide program called Bucks+ was implemented through the Bucks Business and Innovation Department to increase enrollment, retention, and workforce readiness of students. The Bucks+ program focuses on student engagement through competition within curriculum, and extracurricular endeavors that prepare students for industry. We will share our successes and challenges within our call to action to engage students in a remote world and to enhance their educational experience through innovative instructional techniques. 

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4. Highlighting and examining the importance of authentic industry examples in a workforce development certificate program

   https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--27896  

   Johnson, M.D. (January 2017, ASEE annual conference)

   The importance of authenticity has been examined in various aspects of education; this is especially true in the area of engineering education where most graduates will matriculate to industry. However, the importance of applied and authentic examples could be even more critical in workforce development programs. In these cases, students are often enrolled with a goal of using their acquired knowledge to advance their career or move into a new role. Purely theoretical or stylized examples would not be aligned with the educational goals of these students. As part of a National Science Foundation Advanced Technological Education grant, a certificate program in high value manufacturing (HVM) has been developed. The certificate program is a collaboration between a research intensive four-year institution and an urban community college. In this certificate program students will be taking courses in manufacturing processes, design, and other business-related subjects that are pertinent to the manufacture of low volume components that have high materials costs, stringent quality requirements, and critical project timelines. This unique content area requires example that comprise these pertinent aspects of HVM. This is particularly true of the five newly developed courses covering materials, project management, quality, logistics, and computer-aided design. While the analogous courses at a four-year degree granting institution would likely use stylized examples in these courses, this would not be preferable in an applied certificate program. This work discusses the acquisition and refinement of authentic and applied examples that are applicable to the HVM environment. Specifically, the use of industry contacts and the translation of examples into useable and appropriate examples are examined. These examples are detailed and compared to traditional stylized academic content. A methodology for examining student perceptions of these examples is also proposed. A discussion of the importance of authenticity in applied certificate programs is also presented. 

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5. Work in Progress: Creating Alternative Learning Strategies for Transfer Engineering Programs

   https://doi.org/10.18260/p.25085  

   Enriquez, Amelito; Dunmire, Erik; Rebold, Tom; Langhoff, Nick; Schiorring, Eva (June 2015, 2015 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition)

   The 2012 President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) report “Engage to Excel: Producing One Million Additional College Graduates with Degrees in Science,Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics” indicated that addressing the retention problem in the first two years of college is the most promising and cost-effective strategy to produce the STEM professionals needed in order to retain US historical preeminence in science and technology. The California Community College System, with its 112 community colleges and 71 off-campus centers enrolling approximately 2.3 million students (roughly a third of all US community college students) is in a prime position to grow the future STEM workforce.However, in the face of shrinking resources and increasing costs and other barriers, an effective approach is needed in order to capitalize on this opportunity. One prong in this approach is to more fully exploit modern technological capabilities to reduce costs, broaden access, and improve educational productivity. This paper presents preliminary results of a collaborative project, Creating Alternative Learning Strategies for Transfer Engineering Programs (CALSTEP), which aims to strengthen community college engineering programs using distance education and other alternative delivery strategies that will enable small-to-medium community college engineering programs to provide their students access to lower-division engineering courses needed to be competitive for transfer to four-year engineering programs. Funded by a three-year grant through the National Science Foundation Improving Undergraduate STEM Education (NSF IUSE) program, CALSTEP will leverage existing educational resources and develop new ones for online lecture courses, as well as core engineering laboratory courses that are delivered either completely online, or with limited face-to-face interactions. The initial areas of focus for laboratory course development are: Introduction to Engineering, Engineering Graphics, Materials Science, and Circuit Analysis. CALSTEP will also develop alternative models of flipped classroom instruction to improve student success and enhance student access to engineering courses that otherwise could not be supported in traditional delivery modes due to low enrollment. The project will iteratively evaluate and refine the curriculum over the three-year grant period, as well as train other community college engineering faculty in the effective use of the curriculum and resources developed. 

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