Westmoreland County Community College holds Women in Manufacturing Day Events

October 18, 2019 Mt. Pleasant, Pa.

In celebration of national Manufacturing Day, Westmoreland County Community College-Advanced Technology Center (ATC) conducted the first of two programs for middle and high school female students to showcase manufacturing careers for women.

Students representing seven high schools, middle schools and career and technology centers attended the half day event. Students participated in three 40-minute sessions selected from 10 activities that covered topics such as solid modeling using Inventor; virtual welding; WaterJet; computer numerical control (CNC) plasma cutters; machining a nametag with CNC; how electronic circuits work; designing a house with Revit; control electricity for heating, ventilation, air-conditioning and refrigeration; making a robot do your virtual bidding; and 3-D printing.

Speakers for the event included comments from Emily McLaughlin, president/owner of EMB Machining Services, Inc. in Whitney, PA; Becky Parker, director/Advanced Technology Center. The program also included a panel discussion with current Westmoreland welding student Brianna Denton and Westmoreland electronics engineering graduate Chelsi Bartlow who is now employed at Siemens.

Each student received a T-shirt acknowledging national Manufacturing Day and breast cancer awareness for October, which is national breast cancer awareness month.

Students in attendance represented Apollo-Ridge, Blairsville-Saltsburg, Derry, Dr. Robert Ketterer Charter School (Adelphoi), Franklin Regional, Hempfield and Jeannette.

A second Women in Manufacturing Day event is scheduled for Friday, October 25 with students scheduled to attend from Central Westmoreland Career and Technical Center, Connellsvile Career and Technical Center, Homer-Center, Jefferson-Morgan, Norwin, Penns Manor, Penn Trafford and Propel Northside.