Delaware Tech cuts ribbon on electromechanical program

Delaware Technical Community College cut the ribbon at its Innovation and Technology Center facility May 20. Located on the Woodbridge Middle School campus in Bridgeville, the center will train students in the theoretical knowledge and hands-on skills required to maintain and repair robots, production equipment and motor-control circuits.

Students will learn to test and evaluate pneumatic/hydraulic circuits and build electrical, electronic, and mechanical devices. Through a grant from the DART Foundation and the Arthur W. Perdue Foundation, the college installed a FANUC robot and all of the maintenance, electrical and repair equipment needed for the robot. 

FANUC has a long history of providing world-class training programs featuring a skills-based training curriculum that develops a stackable set of skills and knowledge, including safety, terminology, basic robot operations, setup procedures, programming, and file manipulation. Each course of study consists of lectures, demonstrations, lab-based and project-based exercises, testing, and assessment. Students receive hands-on training with a FANUC robot as well as training using FANUC HandlingPRO robotic simulation software.

The need for skilled workers with automation training certifications is growing. According to the Manufacturing Institute, there are over 600,000 unfilled manufacturing positions in the U.S. In the next ten years, this gap is expected to grow to as many as 2 million, as the number of highly skilled manufacturing jobs continues to outpace the pool of trained candidates.