KC Business Journal: BTC's Tom Wheeler Talks about Manufacuring Trends and Worker Skills

Tom Wheeler is dean of instruction at Metropolitan Community College's Business & Technology Campus. MCC is beginning to examine revising its curriculum to coordinate with a national certification system.

Check out the article here.

SkillsUSA Brings 1,000s to KC June 21-23 - MCC Intends to say "Hello"

The SkillsUSA Championship showcases the best career and technical students in the nation.  Students compete against the clock and each other, proving their expertise in occupations like electronics, computer-aided drafting, crime scene investigation, medical assisting, photography, robotics and culinary arts.


This multi-million dollar event requires a space larger than 16 football fields.  Last year, there were more than 5,600 contestants in 96 separate events.  This year, more than 15,000 students, parents, teachers, judges and industry representatives will attend SkillsUSA Championship between June 21 and 23.  This national competition creates an economic impact of around $15 million for the Kansas City area, according to Kansas City Business Journal.

While Bartle hall is the main location for competition, CNC Milling, CNC Turning, and Precicsion Machining Technology contests will be held in MCC-BTC's 8,800 sq. ft. Precision Machining lab.

MCC plans to welcome every single guest!  Or, at least parade amongst them wearing MCC t-shirts.

Farewell to Dennis DeLong

Pictured are BTC President Debbie Goodall, Retiree Dennis DeLong and Lab Tech Jennifer Dec.

Dennis DeLong was recognized Monday for his 25 years of service as an MCC Public Safety officer. He retired at the end of November, and was honored at a reception at MCC-Business & Technology.

A special farewell "card" was designed and created by Jennifer Dec, using a laser engraver on a cork surface to reproduce farewell wishes from MCC-BTC co-workers.

Precision Machining Career Exploration Dec. 14

A Precision Machining Career Exploration has been scheduled for Tuesday, Dec. 14, at Metropolitan Community College-Business & Technology. This event begins at 6 p.m. and runs for about one and a half hours, beginning in Technology Center Room 101A.

MCC’s Precision Machining program features a state-of-the-art, 8,800 sq. ft. laboratory full of manual machining tools and computer numerically controlled (CNC) machines. MCC-BTC is a HAAS Technical Education Center, Mastercam software training facility, and a NIMS testing center.

Visitors will meet academic and financial aid advisors who can help them get started in college. They’ll also tour the lab with the program coordinator, learning how to prepare for a career in Precision Machining, and what the daily work is like.

Programs range from a one-semester job-ready CNC certificate to two-year Associate in Applied Science degree in Precision Machining, with a manual or CNC focus. Many Kansas City employers are looking for graduates with these skills. Learn more about this field at mcckc.edu/precisionmachining and at the local chapter of the National Tooling & Machining Association website, www.kcntma.org.

Individuals may register online at mcckc.edu/visitbtc, call 816.604.5200 or e-mail btc.admissions@mcckc.edu. Walk-ins are also welcome. MCC-BTC is located at 1775 Universal Ave. Kansas City, MO, and on the web at mcckc.edu/btc.

MCC-BTC attends RapidTech workshop to learn about Advanced Manufacturing

Kansas City and the surrounding community are home to hundreds of manufacturers and thousands of manufacturing jobs. MCC-Business & Technology is committed to preparing its students for the manufacturing jobs of the future.

Whereas manufacturing 50 years ago required massive amounts of unskilled manual laborers, manufacturing of the present and future require skilled technicians who understand the process, software and hardware involved in stereolithography, selective laser sintering, laser scanning, and 3D printing to name a few.

Last week, in beautiful Irvine, Calif. (while the rest of us sweltered in the summer heat), Tom Wheeler, Penny Tepesch, David Hawkins, Jen Dec, Chris Page and Steve Dowell attended the 2010 RapidTech workshop at Saddleback Community College to learn about the latest manufacturing technologies.

RapidTech is an educational entity designed to offer learning opportunities for students to learn and use these advanced manufacturing technologies. The key to RapidTech’s success is its continual collaboration on projects with national businesses in the aerospace, medical device, automotive, consumer products and art animation industries.

MCC's goal is to also be an expert resource, partner, consultant and learning facility to students, businesses, and educational institutions. The trip to Rapidtech's workshop was aimed at attendees learning how RapidTech has partnered and affiliated themselves with over 80 other institutions to achieve these goals.

“Our group worked alongside approximately 50 other attendees learning how many of these technologies in our own school can be utilized to better achieve our goals here at the BTC,” said manufacturing instructor Steve Dowell. “From 8 a.m. until approximately 5:30 p.m., the agenda was packed with instructor workshops, dealer demos, and very informative presentations from other colleges from around the country. Our goal now is to take what was presented to us at the workshop and apply these processes to better utilize the BTC's labs, classrooms, and instructors.”

MCC-BTC continues to build its 3D prototyping lab. We now have the ability to concept a product or part, create the design using 3D software, print the prototype design on 3D printers and finally create the part in our manufacturing lab.

According to Tom Wheeler, dean of instruction, “the next step is to continue reaching out to local manufacturers to create a consortium that fosters learning, collaboration and provides value to our students, these manufacturers and our community.”

“We are a community college," said Wheeler. "We are here to serve the community and prepare the workforce our industry partners need. The better we understand the current and and developing technologies, the better we are able to meet that mission. community the better we are able to deliver.”

For more information or to schedule a tour of BTC’s 3D prototyping lab, contact William Allyn at 816.604.5647 or Chris Page at 816.604.5438

For more information about the RapidTech workshop click here.

To view pictures from the RapidTech workshop click here.

MCC-BTC to host First Robotics team

MCC-Business & Technology campus has begun recruiting home-schooled high school students from the KC area for a FIRST Robotics team. FIRST Robotics is an organization that develops technical, career and business skills in young students. BTC already has a mentor team (Joe Roche, Gene Giarratano, Dave Hawkins, and Andy Brewer) in place with over 60 year of industry experience behind them.

The student members will have the actual responsibility of raising the funds for the project (aprox $6,000-10,000), as well as designing and building the robot. The team will compete in the Greater Kansas City regional competition starting March 4, after only six weeks to design and build a working robot.

For more information about FIRST Robotics - http://www.kcfirst.org/ For more information about the MCC-BTC team contact Joe Roche – 816.604.5417

SkillsUSA Precision Machining Championship Competition

The 46th annual Skills USA Conference returns to KC's Bartle Hall and MCC-BTC this week. More than 5,000 outstanding career and technical education students have competed in 96 different trade, technical and leadership fields.

Again this year, MCC-BTC hosted a portion of the competition in its state-of-the-art Precision Machining lab. This video, shot in the Manufacturing Technology lab, shows some of the action.