Remember the Sector Skills Strategy in Additive Manufacturing project short for SAM project? A 16-plus partners’ European initiative, led by the European Welding Federation (EWF),that seeks to accelerate the development of the AM workforce through targeted education.
Amid the various issues that the partners will address to achieve this mission, there is a lack of necessary skills and knowledge to take one’s first steps into the AM world. Such skills are often given during design and engineering courses at the education level.
To address this issue, SAM has established several validation and identification of skills and training programs, following a collaborative skills strategy with main industrial partners. An open platform has thereafter been created to enable organizations to provide their inputs on necessary Additive Manufacturing (AM) skills and requirements.
Several pilots have been conducted between November 2020 and February 2021 as part of this initiative. 13 Additive Manufacturing courses have been carried out virtually and 4 courses have been carried out on-site in compliance with COVID-19 sanitary measures.
Those pilots aim to provide students with advanced knowledge and skills on AM processes, materials, pre and post processing methods, as well as design for AM, among others.
Information shared by the EWF reveal that the training activities comprised virtual and in-person lectures, assessment of participants, the collection of feedbacks from students and trainers and the issue of certificates for participants. These include the piloting for the guidelines and competence units and the Quality Assurance System of the International Additive Manufacturing Qualifications System (IAMQS), which is fully aligned with industrial requirements.
According to EWF, most attendees had several years of experience in the AM field. A small number had no direct experience in the field and a couple of people had only recently graduated. The attendees were, mostly men between 26-55, and they came from various industrial backgrounds, such as aerospace, defence, automotive.
As a reminder, in a recent media coverage, we reported on the key verticals that will benefit from collaborative skill solutions in the Additive Manufacturing sector.
Testimonies from attendees reveal a high level of satisfaction and an interest in pursuing a career in AM. These pilots have been made possible thanks to the support of partners such as, AITIIP, EC Nantes, EPMA, EWF, FA, Granta, Idonial, IMR, ISQ, LMS, Lortek, MTC, POLIMI, UBRUN and of course CECIMO, that coordinates all the outreach activities related to the courses.
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