Ramping Up Manufacturing Education
The Weekly Report – Sept. 9, 2024
With help from business leaders, two of Minnesota’s technical colleges are upgrading to teach advanced manufacturing.
Students at St. Cloud Technical & Community College were recently greeted with eye-popping changes in the school’s manufacturing education facilities and equipment.
St. Cloud Tech’s upgrades came largely because of the community-wide response to a major employer leaving the area. When Electrolux announced it would close its 700-employee freezer manufacturing plant in 2018, the city of St. Cloud went to work to help the community pivot to expand other industries.
To get it done, the city’s economic development team targeted industries already in the area, or those that could complement existing manufacturers. Essential to attracting those companies is a strong pipeline of workers to meet companies’ needs, says Cathy Mehelich, St. Cloud’s economic development director.
The team received a $2.5 million federal Economic Development Administration (EDA) grant which helped create training programs and spaces to help employees join or transition to different industries. The funding, matched by $2 million from the college, paved the way for St. Cloud Tech’s Advanced Manufacturing Center, filled with state-of-the-art equipment. The EDA expects the grant to lead to the creation or retention of 1,290 jobs and generate nearly $38 million in private investment in the area.
The new center includes a metal 3D printer, robot cells for teaching tool operation and programming, and a water jet cutter that can slice through glass, granite, titanium, and steel plate. It also has instrumentation and process control trainers and industrial standard manufacturing system training cells, both of which help students prepare for careers in industrial automation and assembly.
Similar upgrades are just around the corner for Pine Technical and Community College in Pine City, where demand for programs in advanced manufacturing, particularly welding, has the school bursting at the seams. Pine Tech students have been learning welding in a semitrailer, a less-than-ideal situation that also hampers the school’s ability to teach fabrication skills.
In 2020 the state legislature awarded Pine Tech $635,000 to develop plans for an expansion. Lawmakers followed up with $21.4 million in the 2023 bonding bill to help construct new spaces by fall 2025. The expansion will feature a 25,000-square-foot addition and a 15,025-square-foot renovation.
The upgrades will include new space for technical and trade labs, including welding, automotive, gunsmithing, and nursing. The welding lab will be 10 times larger than the current space – a nod to the persistent demand for welders in the labor marketplace. In the new manufacturing space, the layout will mimic how companies typically set up their production floors, giving students highly transferable skill development, says Joe Mulford, Pine Tech’s president.
The Minnesota State Colleges and Universities system succeeded with its bonding request for Pine Tech because legislators recognized a pressing need for expanded workforce training, Mulford says, adding that lawmakers regularly heard from manufacturers about how vital it is to their growth to have a well-trained workforce.
The common theme with both colleges’ major upgrades is the cooperation among local leaders, manufacturers, and the colleges themselves to secure funding for the projects. Local leaders clearly recognize the value of manufacturing to their communities, and they understand that well-trained employees are vital to its survival and growth. In both cases, manufacturers have played key roles, advising on needed programs and equipment to ensure the skills taught match the market’s needs.
In our mission to help Minnesota manufacturers grow profitably, we couldn’t be more thankful for the collaboration among community leaders, the technical colleges, and the industry partners in their regions.
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