St Mike's receives donation of CNC milling machine | The Stratford Beacon Herald

Nearly $100,000 worth of equipment donated from Canadian Tooling and Machining Association and Ontario Council for Technology Education.

St. Mike’s students will now have even more opportunities to learn manufacturing skills with a donation the school received of a new Computer Numerical Control (CNC) industrial milling machine and five desktop training units valued at $92,000.

The machine, donated by the Canadian Tooling and Machining Association (CTMA) and Ontario Council for Technology Education (OCTE) with additional funding by Ontario’s Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development. uses pre-programed computer software to allow for more precise cutting.

Kathleen Von Euw, department head of technical education at St. Mike’s, said that while technology is always changing, the base skills students learn with the CNC machine will carry forward.

“It’s like math,” she said. “Math is very static. As long as they can understand the principles of what they’re doing, they’ll be able to take it on this machine.”

Fellow teacher Rob Ingram, who demonstrated the machine for those gathered, agreed that adding the CNC machine is the end result of what students learn in class.

“There’s a lot of work that goes into it beforehand, and there’s a lot of work in class before you actually get out here and you start cutting material,” he said. “Nobody sees the part where we take it, we design it, then we actually transfer it. Once you learn that program, it’s not even a transferable skill. That is the only skill you need to design and create the tool pass for all of those machines.”

Dave Lewis, a former teacher and past chair of OTCE, which supports and represents technical education teachers and students, said that since they partnered with CTMA more than four years ago they have funded new equipment at 137 schools across the province.

“It’s so encouraging to see the quality of our technological education teachers and the passion that they have to make change in our community,” he said, adding that around 1,500 teachers take their courses. “This investment is in our youth and our future, (using) our technology. They now have skills to be innovative, to design, to be transferable to many different careers and technical high-end skills.”

Karen Tigani, the Huron Perth Catholic District school board’s director of education, said the board graduates about twice the provincial average number of students who participate in specialized high school major programs.

“It’s a big goal of the Ministry of Education and of our board and of the school community to ensure that students have opportunities and experiential learning, and our results are outstanding,” she said.

This type of work requires a huge investment of resources and skilled professionals to make it happen, Tigani added.

“It’s a huge source of pride for us, and it happens because of this kind of investment and support. We know that our students are graduating and going into many pathways, very skilled, very prepared and making a huge difference today and into the future.”

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