New DOE Partnerships Support Manufacturing Job Training

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Washington, D.C., USA, has announced a series of new manufacturing job training partnerships using DOE's National Training and Education Resource (NTER). DOE will be partnering with the Manufacturing Institute, the Ford Partnership for Advanced Studies, and Macomb Community College outside of Detroit, Mich. The program will provide students with highly interactive and engaging materials in a variety of science, technology, engineering, and math areas, as well as virtual technician training. Partners can access resources available through NTER, an open-source, Web-based, interactive learning environment.

NTER is an integration platform that brings together information technologies to support education, training, and workforce development. By providing a central access point for educational resources, the tool will help lower the costs and reduce the time it takes to develop, share, customize, and update online learning materials. It also allows instructors to create interactive 3-D scenarios and virtual environments for training that can be customized for a particular lesson or skill. It is currently being used to deliver energy efficiency training.

DOE will provide information technology tools and technical support to each of the organizations, which will allow them to upgrade their existing curricula and create new immersive learning experiences. The partner organizations will leverage the NTER platform in a variety of ways. For example, the Manufacturing Institute will use NTER as a cutting-edge vehicle to earn manufacturing credentials that are accepted across state lines. The Ford Partnership for Advanced Studies is also exploring opportunities to integrate NTER into its programs nationwide. And on campus, Macomb Community College will use NTER to enhance several of its electric vehicle-oriented courses.

More information is available online.

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