After a year or two of taking potshots at the Society of Engineering’s “Manufacturing Is Cool” initiative, I’ve finally put my finger on an alternative.
My beef with the SME’s campaign, which aims to lure youngsters into careers in manufacturing and engineering, is that it’s a bald-faced attempt to make kids believe that something they would normally not think twice about is actually cool and worth their attention.
Now, there’s a pretty good argument that says we need to pump up the manufacturing ranks (at least long term, since a recession isn’t the best time to broach the concept of workforce additions). But the answer isn’t to tell kids that manufacturing’s cool. They know cool when they see it. The trick is to hoodwink them into realizing it.
I’ve never put my finger on an alternative, though, until a few weekends ago. To get kids interested in manufacturing and engineering, we need to … show them Iron Man.
I’m no longer a youngster, but when mad scientist Robert Downey Jr. called up a 3D, holographic image of his supersuit, and with a few swipes of his hand reconfigured the glowing, levitating model, I felt like Ralphie staring at the official Red Rider BB gun through the corner store window.
It’s not as simple as pressing Play, however. Kids won’t naturally make the link between what they see Iron Man doing and what could be in store for them in the manufacturing careers of the future. This is where teachers come in. Here’s the plan: Pop in the Iron Man DVD, watch their faces light up, and then tell them, “You can do that when you grow up. Just become an engineer.”
The word will sound exotic and alluring, and it will dance around their brains for years to come, inextricably linked to the magic of Hollywood and the wonderment of cool.
—Chris Chiappinelli, Editor, ManagingAutomation.com
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Posted by Diane Himes at 12/05/2008 04:44:51 PM |
I think this is a great suggestion - kids don't learn enough about what real people do in the world in their real jobs. I bet there are a lot of kids who'd like to aim at being engineers, but who don't know what an engineer is when they're in 4th grade or 6th grade. They also need to be advised on what they'll have to learn in order to become engineers, and maybe given some guidance on what that educational career will look like (take a lot of math and science, go to college, study engineering, decide if you want to build bridges or cars or computers).
Posted by: Nils Davis ( Email: | Visit ) at 12/8/2008 8:02 PM
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