State Tech Center Partnership Building Jobs 

The Tennessee Technology Center at Jacksboro has in place through the Oak Manufacturing Skills Campus at the Oak Ridge Centers for Manufacturing Technology a cooperative program to train tool and die makers to meet a growing demand from local manufacturers. 

Coy Gibson, director of the center, which is part of the State University and Community College System of Tennessee, said that about three years ago several small to medium-sized companies in the Technology Center's service area, were having difficulty finding or training tool and die makers. 

One company, Gibson said, wanted to increase its production capacity and double its employment, from 150 people to 300 people. The company had to delay its production increase and employment boost until three tool and die makers could be trained. Another company also wanted to increase production and had an opening for a tool and die maker for two years and could not fill the position. 

Gibson said that it was becoming evident that without an adequate number of tool and die makers, industries in the area were having difficulty adding production workers because, as Gibson points out, one tool and die maker can effect the production of 50 to 100 line workers in keeping stamping presses running. 

To meet this need, the Technology Center, in conjunction with local industry, started a program to train tool and die makers. The program was put in place, but lacked certain equipment and technical skills necessary to provide a full-scale training program. 

That's where the Skills Campus came into the picture. 

"The bottom line is" Gibson said, "that our facility did not have all the training tools necessary. The Skills Campus in Oak Ridge provided us with the machines and technical expertise we needed to train the tool and die makers," Gibson reports. 

Through its program with the Manufacturing Skills Campus, the Technology Center was able to avoid the cost of buying new equipment thereby saving as much as $500,000 in fiscal 1994 and another in FY 1995 a total savings of $1 million. 

As a direct result of the partnership, 11 companies in the area have to increased their tool and die making capacity and the number of production employees, according to Gibson. 

Gibson estimated that the program has created 20 jobs and helped prevent to loss of another 20 in 1994. Potential also exists to add 85 jobs in 1995 and prevent the loss of another 85 jobs. 

"The Manufacturing Skills Campus has provided about 20 percent of the training in three areas that require expensive equipment and technical expertise that we do not have at the Technology Center. Those areas are electric-discharge machining, cylindrical grinding, and coordinate measuring machine operation. Without the Manufacturing Skills Campus, we could not provide the remaining 80 percent of the training to make the program work," Gibson said. And without the 20 percent provided at the Manufacturing Skills Campus, the 80 percent provided by the Technology Center is diminished. 

Gibson added that informal surveys confirm that employers involved in the program are extremely pleased with the results of the training that allows trainees to work full shifts during the day while attending classes at the Skills Campus at night. 
  
 

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