Northwestern CT Community College manufacturing new workers

The program has been in place for a couple of years, but its funding has changed and more local manufacturers have gotten involved in an effort to promote the idea that manufacturing careers can be rewarding and lucrative.

The pay for a manufacturing job tends to be about 9 percent higher than the average pay of workers overall, and in Connecticut such jobs pay an average of $52,000 a year, according to state labor data.

Northwestern is one of six state community colleges sharing in a $2.7 million grant from the U.S. Department of Labor's Employment & Training Administration. The grant funds the CT-MET program, which offers training in manufacturing, energy and transportation, said Kevin Canady, Northwestern's CT-MET coordinator.

In addition to Northwestern, the community colleges sharing the grant are Gateway in New Haven, which provides training in transportation-related jobs; Norwalk, which provides training in energy-related careers; and Manchester, Quinebaug Valley in Danielson and Three Rivers in Norwich, which also offer manufacturing training.

Other schools offering a pre-manufacturing certificate program include Naugatuck Valley Community College in Waterbury and Asnuntuck Community College in Enfield.

"This program is unbelievable," Menard said Thursday while standing amid manufacturing machines at Oliver Wolcott Technical High School, where the class was completing individual testing to show competency on a computer numeric controlled milling machine. Wolcott Tech allows Northwestern to use its machinery for the program.

Menard had previously worked in manufacturing, like several people in this class, but didn't have many of the skills he picked up at Northwestern -- such as manufacturing math, blueprint reading, computer literacy and lean manufacturing.

"The old saying is 'you can't teach an old dog new tricks,' but this program proved that wrong," he said.

Like Menard, Craig Suttmeier of Wolcott also has worked in manufacturing before. He was laid off in 2011 from I2S LLC, a manufacturer of rolling mills in Wallingford.

"I never had a GED or a high school diploma," Suttmeier said. "So they tied in my GED with this program, and I got my GED at Northwestern."

That, combined with his certification, makes him much more optimistic about finding a job, he said.

"We used to fix CNC machines in the shop" in Wallingford, he said. "But I didn't have the ability to run them. Now I have a little more depth into how to do that."

The school is working to tailor its curriculum to better meet the needs of local manufacturers, with help from the Northwest Connecticut Manufacturing Coalition and the Northwest Connecticut Chamber of Commerce, Canady said.

"Some of the manufacturers in the coalition, some of their actual work engineers, are teaching some of our courses," he said.

Lewis Chappel, director of operations at Becton, Dickinson and Co. in Canaan, chairs the coalition's steering committee. He said more of the region's 400-plus manufacturers now realize they have to be proactive to find replacements for their aging workforce -- the average age of a machinist in Connecticut is about 55.