Using a unique apprenticeship program to help train underserved communities learn advanced manufacturing skills such as 3D printing, the Robert C. Byrd Institute for Advanced Flexible Manufacturing (RCBI) has just been given the opportunity to expand their approach even further. RCBI has just been awarded with a whopping $4.9 million grant from the U.S. Department of Labor to help expand their apprenticeship model. RCBI has already trained over 3,000 workers over the past five years, operating out of their home base, West Virginia’s Advanced Manufacturing Technology Center.
“This award recognizes a unique approach to apprenticeship building in West Virginia – praised by the DOL – that has the potential to be replicated across the nation and to address the growing skills gap in manufacturing,” said Charlotte Weber, Director and CEO of RBCI. By supporting manufacturing technology training, RCBI has been encouraging job creation, economic development, and innovation across West Virginia and, now, with help from this new grant, across the United States, too.
With the $4.9 million grant, RCBI plans to promote their apprenticeship program to disadvantaged students, military personnel, and women, giving these underserved groups access to online classes and on-the-job learning within partnering companies. Working in tandem with the automobile, aerospace, robotics, and other industries, RCBI is teaching the increasingly valuable process of additive manufacturing, helping those in their program to learn new technologies that will make them viable employment candidates. RCBI plans to induct over 1,000 new apprentices across the United States into their program, using the U.S. Department of Labor’s grant to educate and train these apprentices to utilize 3D printing to obtain successful careers in a relevant manufacturing field.
RCBI has partners in both the public and private sectors of the tech industry, including entities such as General Electric, America Makes, the ToolingU-Society of Manufacturing Engineers, and more. The grant will help spark this five year initiative, in which RCBI and their various partners will train people across fields, directly linking them to a promising career in 3D printing, robotics, or composites.
The U.S. Department of Labor decided that RCBI was the most deserving of the grant after a national study demonstrated a great need for skilled manufacturers in the workforce. Seeing the work RCBI has done across West Virginia, the grant is meant to aid the institute to further address the country’s need for skilled manufacturers. Not only will RCBI be giving unforeseen opportunities to these hopeful apprentices, they are also in turn helping to supply manufacturing employers with a much needed workforce. “Advanced manufacturing is growing exponentially across the country and in West Virginia, and I’m glad we will be able to provide more employers with people who have the skills required for the jobs of today and tomorrow,” said West Virginia Governor Earl Ray Tomblin. RCBI is single-handedly helping the underserved population become a valuable asset to the manufacturing industry, and, in turn, is promoting growth and expansion in an industry that could truly use some more innovators right about now.
