Roane State: Training Future Machinists in Oak Ridge

Community college in Oak Ridge is helping to fill dire need for highly skilled workers.

By Kevin Litwin on June 7, 2023

Roane State Community College

In Oak Ridge, area colleges and universities work with public schools to create a workforce pipeline. One strong example of that is at Roane State, a community college in Oak Ridge that has entered into a workforce training partnership with the Institute for Advanced Composites Manufacturing Innovation (IACMI) to introduce area high school and middle school students to the world of skilled machining.

Knoxville-based IACMI is receiving funds from the U.S. Department of Defense and the U.S. Department of Energy through a program called America’s Cutting Edge (ACE), which is working to advance U.S.  leadership in the machining sector.

The industry is in dire need of additional skilled machinists. According to Zippia.com, machinists in Oak Ridge and around the nation earn an average salary of about $50,000 per year, while the top 25% of machinists earn more than $60,000. No formal degree is required to become a machinist.

Teresa Duncan, Roane State vice president of workforce and community development, says Roane State is using some of its ACE funds in 2023 to conduct machining boot camps at high schools and middle schools in Roane and Anderson counties.

“We want to ‘skill-up’ machining – talk to students about designing parts, operating mills and lathes, running computers, understanding the language of manufacturing,” she says.

“Almost everything made in America is somehow touched by machines, and our nation is losing that skillset. That’s why our ACE grant is going toward providing an introduction to machining to as many students in this region as possible.”