Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1330321
46 PCB007 MAGAZINE I JANUARY 2021 want to do. For example, in the mechanical en- gineering program, you might see courses like "strength of materials" and "physics 4"—which was an electromagnetic physics program—and the university may say, "Well, that was man- datory 10 or 20 years ago, but now we're mak- ing that an elective because you might want to take a machine course or you may want to take a lab course." The universities are offer- ing more of these changes in their syllabi to get the students more accustomed to working in teams and becoming well-rounded. At UMass, the students have these Capstone programs and are mentored by people from the industry. The professors are involved and con- nected with the local industry, and when the students need something, they can go to local industry and get assistance with designing a program or a piece of equipment. If they have to cut something or make something, they have use of the machine shop or the comput- er labs that develop the computer programs. These programs must define the whole system, and when they do that, they're working dif- ferent pieces of the program. They could be working the software piece, or maybe the me- chanical piece, and it's very similar to cross training employees working in a manufactur- ing environment. With these efforts, the students graduate with a lot of knowledge. They might not know the best of all the things, but at least they have some idea of the process and products, and that's the thing. Training and educa- tion have to create that interest. The students need to see the need. They need to see and be able to answer the question, "What am I going to get out of this?" You're not going to come out of college and be at the top of a company. You're going to step in and you're going to find out that you have to get your hands dirty, especially in engineering. It's not all book work; it's getting involved and coming up with something, seeing it work and piquing their interest. The vocational schools do the same thing, but they're starting at a technician level. much of the academic education to include in their program. Is it important for those stu- dents to know some of the basics of what's go- ing on in the chemistry, even if they're not get- ting a four-year chemical engineering degree? Or is it better to put together a program that re- ally teaches them how to work on a manufac- turing floor, how to work the machinery that they're going to find on the line, how to trou- bleshoot that, and really focus on the specific details of doing the job? I ask this because, in doing this research over the past couple of months, I've seen vo- cational programs that take both approaches. For some, the focus is, "We're going to put you in the lab. We're going to teach you about the machinery. We're going to give you lab time where we inject problems and you're going to figure out how to diagnose them, triage them, fix them, put the line back running and that's going to be the basis of your degree." And, you also have more of the academic learning in- volved. Do you see one program that seems to be a better approach than the other? Lambert: I think the students coming out of col- leges have been changing some of the man- datory courses that we used to have and sub- stituting those with specific electives that are more conducive to the work environment. The students have a better chance of success be- cause now schools are letting the students take more courses that are related to what they