Young machinists graduate from joint county, industry program

Ten young adults graduated Wednesday from a training program put on by a partnership of Pima County and the manufacturing industry.

The program targeted high school seniors taking machining courses through career and technical education at Desert View, Tucson Magnet and Palo Verde high schools, said Gerri Brunson, the program’s coordinator.

The students interned with local manufacturers for 16 weeks, and went on to enroll at Pima Community College, where they worked toward getting machine-tool technology certificates, she said. So far this year, all the graduating students have been kept on to continue working at the companies they interned for, she added.

“It produces hands-on application work experience, along with the education at Pima,” she said. “That’s the important piece. A lot of students will go through college never getting that hands-on piece.”

The training program is part of the Southern Arizona Manufacturing Partners, which is a consortium of local manufacturing companies and partners, including the Pima County One-Stop Career Center.

It started three years ago when the county assembled a focus group to discuss the needs for machinists in Tucson, Brunson said.

Don Theriault, president of Industrial, Tool, Die & Engineering Inc., is a member of the partnership, and hosts interns through the training program.

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He said the manufacturing industry in Southern Arizona has been dealing with a shortage in machinists for a long time, but did little to address the issue.

“We all realized that our workforce is getting older along with us,” he said. “In another 10 years, we were really going to have an issue with the workforce, because we have waited so long to train people.”

The program has worked out very well so far, he said.

“This has slowly matured into something that is doing well and benefiting the employers,” he said. “For (the students), I think it’s an opportunity to have a career other than a four-year college degree.”

Graduate Emmanuel Calderon, 19, interned with AGM Container Controls Inc., and stayed on as a full-time employee. “I’ve been learning a lot about the trade,” he said. He came in barely knowing how to work the machines, but said he is now getting a certificate in machine tooling. Calderon will continue to pursue his education in machining.

“I want to be a machine programmer,” he said.