Madisonville Community College (MCC), in partnership with Ivy Tech Community College of Indiana-Bloomington Region and Jackson State Community College in Tennessee, are enhancing and extending previous and very successful projects that will increase the rigor of an Advanced Integrated Technology (AIT) program. The project is responding to the needs of modern manufacturers' expressed need for employees with a deeper understanding of manufacturing and problem solving. This project is addressing two barriers identified in previous work: (1) the limited availability of a rigorous curriculum and, (2) the inability of manufacturing programs to attract students. These problems are addressed by developing a curriculum that increases the focus on problem solving skills.
The curriculum is being developed with contributions from all the partner schools and collaborating industries. The courses developed in the project will incorporate Siemens' internationally recognized integrated systems approach and spiral design. These principles have been shown to help students grasp key concepts and increase conceptual understanding. To help sustain the project, faculty and high school teacher development activities are being conducted.
By investigating high school student motivation, the project will identify factors that dissuade students from selecting manufacturing as a career and then develop strategies to address student concerns. One strategy already being implemented is the development of a dual credit course that allows high school students to get started early in their technical education. The project is targeting this course to females and other groups underrepresented in STEM.
All of the materials developed by this project are publicly available and are being disseminated via national conferences and publication.
