DEVELOPING JOB SKILLS WHERE PEOPLE LIVE
More than 100 miles north of Pittsburgh in Crawford County, the University of Pittsburgh at Titusville offers education and training for students living within an often-struggling economy. Some of that training is also part of a research and workforce development project using a model first developed by the Swanson School of Engineering known as the Manufacturing Assistance Center (MAC) Initiative. Model programs are also being developed globally in Nigeria and India. The model is based using experiential and intensive training in skills that meet the needs of local economies, in part to battle the phenomenon of economic depression and depopulation in agricultural and old industrial areas.
In Titusville, that skill is machining—a fundamental industrial process for shaping metal. Students train in an intensive six- or 15-week course, attending daytime or evening classes, some while working for local manufacturers.
Bopaya Bidanda is the original principal investigator on the project, funded by grants from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, R.K. Mellon Foundation, The Heinz Endowments and Pitt internal funds. In August, Bidanda, Ernest Roth Professor in the Swanson School, traveled to India to help establish a MAC program in the small town of Pauri in the Garhwal foothills of the Himalayas.
The Indian MAC program is based on growing herbs used in the ancient Indian medicine system of Ayurveda.
“We encourage local people to grow medicinal herbs, a high-value crop, collaborating with a team of Indian medicine doctors,” Bidanda explains. “We hope this helps stem the urban migration that leads to overcrowded cities and empty countryside.”
“It is about workforce development for skills that can be used where people live,” Bidanda says. “Whether it is in India; Nigeria, where the focus is on 3D printing; or in Titusville.”
Students in the Titusville MAC can learn progressive levels of skills through three separate courses: basic machining, programming computerized machines, and computer-aided design and manufacturing (CAD/CAM).
Stephanie Fiely is executive director of the Education and Training Center at Pitt-Titusville. She explains that the northwestern region of Pennsylvania, while facing the economic challenges of a post-industrial economy, is still home to manufacturing, with many tool and die manufacturing jobs in small-scale shops and big industrial facilities. The summer 2024 MAC cohort included high school students who were starting an entrepreneurial program to make custom items for local businesses.
Similar to the program in India, the Pitt-Titusville MAC program hopes to help stop population loss in the region.
“The mission of the MAC and other programs at the Education and Training Center at Pitt-Titusville is to meet the workforce needs of Northwestern Pennsylvania,” Fiely explains. “All our programs are based on job opportunities that already exist here in our region. Students can get valuable training and education and not be forced to leave the area to find a job.”