A nearly $350,000 National Science Foundation grant collaboration between Middle Tennessee State University and Columbia State Community College will assist the Midstate region in certifying future technicians and engineers in robotics and automation systems.
It is a three-year research and development award that continues until May 31, 2027. It was awarded to Columbia State, but MTSU’s Jorge Vargas, Engineering Technology associate professor, is principal investigator for the university.
The grant comes a year before MTSU’s engineering programs — including mechatronics engineering, robotics and others — move into the new, $74.8 million, 90,000-square-foot Applied Engineering Building, scheduled to open by the fall 2025 semester with greater space and state-of-the-art equipment to better train current students and attract more prospective ones.
“We’re extremely excited to work on this robotics certification project,” Vargas said.
“It’s a matter of developing different modules for this certification mapping. There
are different topics or subjects for students to do in the field after they get certified.”
The goal of this project, which was started in 2022 by Vargas, is to get certifications
to technicians and engineers so they can be competitive in the work field, he said.
Vargas was joined in the effort by Daniel Garrett, a Columbia State adjunct faculty
member and former MTSU Engineering Technology graduate student to establish a
one-year robotics certificate at Columbia State.
MTSU faculty will bring their extensive knowledge in robotics and automation
through the partnership with Columbia State. Vargas and Mehran Mostajir, dean of
the Department of Business and Technology at Columbia State, hope their students
earn an associate degree and transfer to MTSU to pursue their bachelor’s.
Vargas said MTSU’s portion of the grant, around $100,000, will be used to prepare
modules and “help me build the curriculum.”
The proposal by Garrett, who is now at Northwest Florida State College in Niceville,
Fla., indicates the first group of students “will enter the program in spring 2025 and
graduate by the end of the year with nationally recognized industry certifications
and 16 hours of college coursework.
“Hands-on methods and classroom instruction will ensure that each student can
perform programming, maintenance, setup, safety evaluations and operations with
different robotic systems. As a result, Columbia State graduates can go directly into
workplace settings with confidence.”
As for the impact, Vargas said “we have 500 students in Engineering Technology. It
could impact 500 people. … It is open for everybody as long as you have an interest
and background.
“We haven’t advertised or promoted it yet. We plan to do it in the spring when we
get the modules set. I’ll talk about it in my classes and other professors will do the
same. We’ll reach out to the sophomore and junior classes for sure.”
When asked how much growth is anticipated in the use of robotics in industry —
auto (General Motors) and automation companies like UPS, FedEx, UPS, Amazon and
others — Vargas said, “That’s a tough question. For sure, it will have a major impact
in industry in our state. We’ll have more people certified in robotics and everything
is moving to automated.”
Vargas said the MTSU-Columbia State collaboration will benefit these companies
because their future employees can get certified without going out of state and
promoting it to people in the field.
To learn more about the potential for certification at MTSU, email Vargas at
[email protected] or call 615-494-7615. At Columbia State, email Mostajir at
[email protected] or call 931-540-2670.
Engineering Technology is one of 11 College of Basic and Applied Sciences
departments.
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