Medina third-graders tour Brunswick tool and die facility

 

Automation Tool and Die co-owner Randy Bennett shows students from Sidney Fenn Elementary School in Medina what the pieces look like after they come out of a machine at his Brunswick plant. The machine behind him makes 6 million parts per year for a Chrysler engine. (LOREN GENSON / GAZETTE)

Third-graders from Sidney Fenn Elementary School in Medina had the opportunity to make history and social studies come alive Thursday while spending the day at Automation Tool and Die in Brunswick.

“It’s a real-life example of what happens in Medina businesses every day,” school Principal Craig Komar said.

Pam Downey, a third-grade teacher, said students recently learned about Henry Ford and the industrial assembly line, and now they’re getting a glimpse of modern manufacturing.

“They learned about the assembly line, and how mass production added jobs and made products more widely available,” Downey said. “This isn’t an assembly line, but they can see the role of manufacturing and supply and demand.”

Automation Tool and Die employee Josh Young demonstrations how a punch press takes coiled metal and punches out parts. He stands at the computer and showed students how he programmed the computer to produce the specific required part. (LOREN GENSON / GAZETTE)

Automation Tool and Die is a metal stamping and tool and die facility that uses computer-aided design and manufacturing to make a variety of products, many of which are used in the automotive industry.

Students toured the facility, learning how machines work and the usage of parts to make cars. Each student received a T-shirt and name badge.

Automation Tool and Die co-owner Randy Bennett said he hosted the students to foster an interest in engineering and manufacturing trades.

“We want to rebuild the manufacturing sector,” Bennett said. “Right now the skills gap is killing us.”

Bennett said he may have to turn down jobs because he doesn’t have enough skilled employees to perform the work. He said he recently lost out on gaining two employees who were candidates for an apprenticeship because there are no local places to train workers. His company employs more than 70 people.

“We hired them, wanted to put them through an apprenticeship program, but they were the only two interested in the classes they need. There wasn’t enough interest in a class, so it didn’t happen,” he said.

Bennett said studies show students who aren’t exposed to a trade before seventh or eighth grade can’t envision themselves in the field.

Mike Batman, a quality engineer at Automation Tool and Die, shows students from Sidney Fenn Elementary School in Medina the ruby tip of a machine used to take measurements of parts produced at the Brunswick facility. Batman takes precise measurements to ensure all parts meet the exact specifications requested by clients. (LOREN GENSON / GAZETTE)

“We are all for college, but we want students exposed to manufacturing so they can decide if it’s something they want to do,” he said. “We have students with thousands of dollars of student loan debt for jobs that no longer exist.”

Bennett said many people have a negative view of manufacturing because of the downturn in jobs in that sector since the 1970s.

“Manufacturing took a hit, and so understandably the older generation’s experience is not good and they’re not encouraging their children to look at it as a career,” Bennett said. “We have a wave of manufacturing coming and we have to engage generation Y in a way they understand.”

As students became engaged in the visit, they asked a number of questions. Many were related to how the computers work in designing and operating machinery.

“To run this punch press, you need to be good at computers and how things work together,” Bennett explained. “We use computers to run nearly everything here.”

At the end of the day, every student tried metal stamping and made an ear bud holder to take home for their music headphones.