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  Expo Highlights Manufacturing's "Leaner, Greener" Side

           "Lean and Green: Next Generation Careers in Technology"

               Manchester Community College, February 11, 2011          

by Lesia Winiarskyj, CBIA

Nearly 300 high school students attended a day of workshops and exhibits highlighting job opportunities in high-tech manufacturing and green technology. Lean and Green: Next Generation Careers in Technology was held on Feb. 11 at Manchester Community College.

            

                     

Richard DeNicolo, human resources administrator at Kaman Precision Products, shows Glastonbury students a cutaway model of a safe arming device his company developed for the U.S. Air Force. Behind them is a model of Kaman’s KMAX helicopter. Click here to see photos of the expo.

"Manufacturing has evolved into a lean, clean, high-tech work environment," says Dr. Karen Wosczyna-Birch, executive director of the CT Community Colleges, College of Technology's Regional Center for Next Generation Manufacturing, which sponsored the expo through funding from the National Science Foundation. "This evolution not only demands more sophisticated skills from workers," says Wosczyna-Birch, "but it also brings greater career opportunities."

The Connecticut Business and Industry Association's Education
Foundation administered the event.

Old School Is Out

 

Dr. Robert Emiliani, author of numerous books and peer-reviewed papers on lean management, delivered the keynote address. Emiliani, who heads up the Technology Management Master’s degree program at Central Connecticut State University, noted that lean concepts were developed by industry leaders, not academics.

The ingredients for successful lean management, he said, include “dry stuff” (technology, tools, methods, and formulas) and “wet stuff” (people, ideas, energy, and enthusiasm). He urged the audience to continue exploring lean principles beyond their academic careers and pointed out that most students today are schooled in conventional leadership principles rather than a more holistic, progressive approach that considers the needs of all stakeholders including customers, community, suppliers, investors, and employees.  

Following the keynote address, students, teachers, and college faculty toured the expo’s exhibits and chose from 16 workshops in three breakout sessions. Topics included fuel cell, geothermal, solar, and laser technologies; green building; forging processes in aerospace manufacturing; sustainable products for the office environment; sustainability and the greening of manufacturing; workplace efficiencies and employee engagement; and lean strategies for small businesses.

Lean and Green: A Way of Doing Business

 

"Sustainability is not perceived as a cost of doing business but a way of doing business," said workshop presenter Yvonne Hickey, of Xerox Corp. “Businesses have to be relevant to what customers want in the marketplace, and customers want to protect the environment."

Customers also expect quality products at reasonable prices, which requires that businesses not only green up but lean up. Mark Toussaint, of Kaman Precision Products, led an interactive two-part workshop, Lean 101, in which students experimented with lean processes firsthand. Under strict time limits and other conditions, they were charged with assembling airplanes from batches of Lego blocks. Observers, including fellow students and industry experts, documented product defects, scrap material, idle time, and other inefficiencies and pointed out opportunities for improvement. By the end of the session, the class had revamped its entire delivery and assembly system to maximize flow and minimize waste.  

Attending the expo were students from Hartford’s Academy of Engineering and Green Technology, Bacon Academy in Colchester, Great Path Academy in Manchester, East Hartford High School, Glastonbury High School, Manchester High School, New Britain High School, Rockville High School, and South Windsor High School.

Click here to see more photos.

 


The Regional Center for Next Generation Manufacturing is funded through a grant from the National Science Foundation Advanced Technology Education program. Copyright 2011. All rights reserved.