West central Georgia has become a burgeoning center for advanced manufacturing and logistics. With facilities for global brands across automotive, agriculture, tech, and biotech industries, the region (which includes Carroll, Coweta, Douglas, Haralson, Heard, Meriwether, and Troup counties) has experienced a 100+ percent surge in job demand for…

We present a case-based role-play exercise that effectively simulates a crisis students must manage. In the exercise, a farm equipment manufacturing company has decided to redirect its product line, and this change requires laying off a significant portion of its workforce. Students must grapple with the fact that a local news report will be…

Leading organizational change is a daunting aspect of leadership. However, effectively leading change enables positive individual and organizational outcomes. Herein, we present a case-based classroom exercise to teach students about organizational change, demonstrate different aspects of the change process, and teach how to overcome resistance to…

The provision of meaningful experiential learning opportunities for undergraduate students in natural resources-based programs is particularly important. In 2017, the Department of Wood Science at the University of British Columbia reintroduced a dormant, 1-week tour of manufacturing operations for students in the Wood Products Processing…

This chapter describes how Clark State Community College used its TAACCCT grant in manufacturing to help drive organizational changes in the college to better serve local workforce needs.

DeLand Crayon Company (DCC) is a large manufacturer of molded wax crayons. DCC sells three sizes of crayons, namely standard, large and jumbo. Standard-sized crayons, which account for most of the demand, include nine basic colors (red, blue, green, yellow, orange, violet, brown, black, and white), seven popular combination colors (red-orange,…

This article describes the organization of a one-day ChemEd Summit that brought together 73 participants from academic, industrial, government, and nonprofit chemical sciences organizations with the aim to guide future initiatives and collaborative strategies to enhance student readiness for the workforce. Registered participants were asked to…

This paper describes an experiential learning project for students enrolled in a Marketing Channels course. Students conducted small scale research studies involving manufacturers and their channel members by investigating behavior related to electronic marketing channels and pricing practices. Students developed hypotheses based on their channel…

The world is shrinking now more than ever due to new scientific and technological breakthroughs that expand the boundaries of human knowledge, resulting in improvements in transportation, communication, space exploration and educational technologies. Today's students will compete in a technological, diverse, multi-cultural world and must be…

Youth want workforce policies and programs that reflect their unique needs. If policymakers listen, they will create more inclusive opportunities that benefit communities, local businesses, and youth themselves. Jobs for the Future (JFF) held a series of focus groups with young people ages 16 to 24 focused on their career aspirations and…

The Teaching Factory is an emerging paradigm aiming to enforce skills and competencies of engineers and operators working in the field of manufacturing, through an alignment of the teaching and training activities to the needs of modern factories. In this research work, the Teaching Factory principles are applied to envision ManuLearning, a new…

The use of augmented reality (AR) in vocational education and training can still be considered as being in its infancy, although interest in it is growing in response both to its potential for teaching and its adoption as a practical tool in various industry sectors. One example of early-stage AR use is illustrated from a practicum for training…

The Century Foundation (TCF) and the Urban Manufacturing Alliance (UMA) announced the convening of the second cohort of their Industry and Inclusion project to develop solutions to advance racial equity in manufacturing. The second Industry and Inclusion Cohort includes representatives from twelve community colleges who will participate in a…

NP-complete problems such as the traveling salesman problem (TSP) play a prominent role in most advanced undergrad/graduate courses in discrete optimization modeling. Teaching such an important topic from a purely mathematical perspective without discussing specific applications may result in reduced student interest and motivation. The DeLand…

Industrial engineering (IE) involves the design and improvement of integrated systems, such as materials, equipment, or human resources to maximize production of goods and services. In 2011, the Career Cornerstone Center (CCC) found that industrial engineering ranked third among the 17 different engineering fields in jobs filled. That same year,…