Quality is imperative for today’s manufacturing sector. Quality plays a role in everything from cost to manufacture to sales to reputation of the company. We all can think of any product and think of a company with excellent quality and a company with poor quality. With the importance of quality in manufacturing, how do we prepare the future workforce for the field?
At Mississippi State University, the Industrial Technology program strives to be a hands-on bachelor’s degree for students who want to enter any area of industry. The degree program offers a variety of opportunities to “specialize” in automation, coatings, machining, packaging design, and process technology. The degree is structured to allow students to be “pluggable” in any company they desire to work. Students are introduced to the basics of multiple skills commonly found in manufacturing: PLCs, CNCs, technical communication, and drafting. They have management courses to help them be leaders in industry: human relations, forecast and cost modeling, and an option of financial accounting or business law.