Advanced manufacturing and technology center opens in North Carolina

The Bosch Rexroth Advanced Manufacturing and Technology Center at the Olympic Community of Schools in Southwest Charlotte is designed to generate interest in high school students into possible STEM careers.

By Bosch Rexroth April 17, 2015

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg public school system in North Carolina officially dedicated the Bosch Rexroth Advanced Manufacturing and Technology Center at the Olympic Community of Schools in Southwest Charlotte, North Carolina. The opening of the center took place on the first day of NC Advanced Manufacturing and STEM Career Awareness Week.

The 2,839-sq-ft center was initiated by a founding grant of $80,000 by Bosch Rexroth Corporation and the Bosch Community Fund, with additional time and resources supplied by Bosch Rexroth, the Olympic Foundation, CMS, and other
manufacturing firms in the greater Charlotte area.

The facility will support a new Advanced Manufacturing Hub at the Olympic Community of Schools and provide OCS students with hands-on experience using state-of-the-art manufacturing technologies. The new center includes the latest in metal-cutting and finishing technology, with multiple lathes, milling machines, saws, and grinders, along with metrology and quality-control stations.

The center represents the collaborative efforts of industry leaders, public school officials, and teachers to create opportunities in STEM-oriented careers in the greater Charlotte region. It is an effort to build a local supply of highly-skilled employees for technical positions that have had shortages due to an aging workforce.

According to Bosch Rexroth’s Erwin Wieckowski, executive vice president, factory automation, the center is part of a strategy to get young people excited about opportunities in manufacturing. Wieckowski said, "Our investment in the new Advanced Manufacturing and Technology Center will help us to build the technically skilled workforce that we need locally. That’s something that all of us in the manufacturing community can rally around."

The Bosch Rexroth Advanced Manufacturing and Technology Center will be available to OCS students for the 2015-16 school year.

Bosch Rexroth

www.boschrexroth-us.com 

– Edited by CFE Media. See more Control Engineering motor and drive stories.