I was asked to represent our company in a project with
elementary school aged kids to teach them about manufacturing and show them the
many career options that are out there within the industry. I guess because I am a kid at heart, I was
the best person for the job. The
following story is a synopsis of that experience. One that I won’t soon forget.
After touring M.R. Mold & Engineering, the Brea School
District superintendent asked the company to participate in a program with Laurel
Magnet elementary school where local businesses would introduce students to
their industry. The fire department,
waste management, restaurants, veterinarians and hotels were all among the
different businesses participating in the project. The goal was to give kids a glimpse inside the
world of local companies in their community and to their industries. The students and business partners would then
collaborate on a project that involved problem solving, critical thinking and
presented a challenge to the students. The
projects were timed for completion towards the end of the school year that
would culminate in a Career Exploration celebration. The students would make displays and exhibits
illustrating their experience working with the different local business.
Miss Chang’s 4th grade class was our assigned student
partners. I wasn’t sure what kind of
collaboration we would do with this young group, but I knew when I first met
the class, I had to bring something to keep their attention long enough to introduce
them to the world of manufacturing and
what we do at M.R. Mold in a short period of time. Gift bags containing tradeshow giveaways like
cupcake pans, magnifying glasses and the ever popular pointy stress ball were
all I needed to hold a captive audience long enough to show them how much
manufacturing is a part of their everyday lives and opened their eyes to new
kinds of tools they never knew existed.
Once the introductions and presentations were made, we
set up a tour of our facility for the kids.
They could catch a personal glimpse of all the different operations and
processes that go into building injection molds. I’ll never forget their awestruck faces, the “oohs”
and “aahs” as they filed in to our shop for the first time. Their heads were on swivels as they tried to
take it all in. They had never
experienced the type machinery we used on a daily basis. The kids visited each department and learned of
their roles in the mold building process, the different machinery used and the
different skill sets needed. They were
very inquisitive and the scope of their questions ran the gamut from “what is
an end mill?” to “how much do you make?” and you could see in their expressions
they never knew shops like ours existed.
As we progressed through the shop tour, the idea for our collaboration
came to me. Let’s have the kids come up
with an idea for a tradeshow giveaway.
At the end of the tour, Miss Chang and I agreed on the
idea and we then presented the challenge to the kids. We asked them to develop a product for a trade
show giveaway that would draw the interest of visitors to our booth so we could
initiate a conversation about the expertise and services our company
offers. We suggested their
product/giveaway include our company name and logo and be something people
would want to use over and over. We told
them they were only limited by their imagination and a fictitious budget that
they had to meet.
Going into the last quarter of their school year, I got
to participate in the “Read Across America” program where adults read to
kids. This coincided with Dr Seuss’s
birthday so I donned my best Cat in the Hat costume and read “Oh, the Places
You’ll Go” to the class. Afterwards I
worked with the kids on their ideas.
There were eight groups and each one had a different product they were
going to pitch to the company to be the next giveaway. They used their laptops to create
presentations and used computer aided drafting software to draw up their ideas. They also made parts based on their models
using their 3D printer. Stress-ball type
products were the special of the day as was the word “squishy”.
The big day finally arrived when the kids would pitch
their ideas to the M.R. Mold hierarchy.
The AMBA’s 2019 Mold Builder of the Year, Rick Finnie, and marketing
director Geri Anderson sat on the judges’ panel as one by one the groups would
give their presentations as to why their entry should be considered for
manufacturing. The presentations were projected
onto the big screen TV in the classroom as each group member read their part of
their pitch. They responded well to the
questions asked by the judging panel after their presentations.
After much deliberation, a silicone bottle stopper caught
the eye of the judges and was the winner of the contest. The winning part featured a hollow cork like
structure topped with a metal bottle cap looking top. The company name and website information were
to be featured on the part as well.
With the kids’ part of the program complete except for
the exhibit at the Career Exploration celebration, we designed and manufactured
a mold based on the winning part presentation so we could show the kids the
finality of their hard work. We
manufactured a single cavity tool and molded sample parts for them to have and
take home to their parents to show what they learned. The class created a story board, tabletop
presentation set up for the Career Exploration celebration explaining their journey
and the parameter set before them. The
winning team manned the table and explained how the mold was built and how it
made the sample parts to the different visitors who came by and asked about
their project. They were so proud of
their accomplishment and were in awe we were able to produce parts for them to
have as a reminder of this project.
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