Philadelphia, PA – Today, Department of Community and Economic Development (DCED) Acting Secretary Neil Weaver highlighted the Wolf Administration’s continued investments in Pennsylvania’s manufacturing industry during a visit with teens learning valuable skills at a bioengineering Summer Manufacturing Camp at Temple University in Philadelphia. The camp was funded in part through a Manufacturing PA Training-to-Career Program (MTTC) grant received by Nuts, Bolts & Thingamajigs (NBT), a charitable foundation of the Fabricators & Manufacturers Association, International.

“There are many different facets to manufacturing and introducing students to the industry is so important,” said Sec. Weaver. “It is great to see these students exploring the ways bioengineering connects with manufacturing through this summer camp. The Wolf Administration remains committed to supporting the future of the manufacturing industry through opportunities such as this one.”

In May, Governor Tom Wolf announced $79,050 in MTTC funding for NBT to hold six Summer Manufacturing Camps in 2022 and 12 camps in 2023. Each summer camp is designed to increase public awareness of manufacturing careers in its region and provide a fun and enriching setting for students to engage in manufacturing.

Teens who participate in this summer camp learn how to make prosthetics, orthotics, and other adaptive devices using 3D printing and other manufacturing technologies. During the summer camp, these teens use their new skills to create affordable and functional devices to help improve the lives of people and animals with a limb loss or disability.

“The main goal of this workshop is to give students an introduction to the complexity and importance of a multi-faceted field like bioengineering,” said Jack Kraynak, Pre-College Instructor and Temple University senior bioengineering student. “3D printing is a captivating and consumable path for younger students to understand how a technology can be used in diverse ways within bioengineering, so this collaboration of fields, especially within prosthetics, was explored. The students in this workshop were given a hands-on 3D printing experience, a guest speaker involved in the field of bioprinting, and a field trip to the Jefferson Health Design Lab to demonstrate how additive manufacturing is an important engineering tool in the medical field. Students were given a pseudo-college experience in which they were given engineering design thinking tools, an introduction to 3D modeling in CAD, and database research skills to complete an engineering prototype of a prosthetic based on a problem while working collaboratively.”

Gov. Wolf’s Manufacturing PA initiative was launched in October 2017 and since then has funded 77 projects and invested more than $16.6 million through the MTTC program.

Training-to-Career grants support projects that result in short-term work-readiness, job placement, or the advancement of manufacturing. The Manufacturing PA Training-to-Career Grant program works collaboratively with local manufacturers to identify and teach missing essential skills for entry-level applicants seeking manufacturing employment, engage youth or those with barriers to career opportunities in manufacturing, and or advance capacity for local or regional manufacturers.

For more information about the Wolf Administration’s commitment to manufacturing, visit the DCED website, and be sure to stay up-to-date with all of our agency news on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

MEDIA CONTACT:
Penny Ickes, DCED, dcedpress@pa.gov

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