When Larry Banks speaks with schoolchildren across New Jersey’s 21 counties during the Future Makers and Creators Tour, he asks his young audiences to guess how many manufacturers call The Garden State home.
“The answers I get are: ‘Two?’ ‘Four?’ ‘Seven?’ And then I’ll tell them ‘Yeah, you’re close—we have over 9,000 manufacturers operating throughout the state.’ The kids are shocked, until I start telling them about all the products that are being made right in their backyard,” says Banks, manager of New Jersey Manufacturing Extension Program’s (NJMEP’s) Pro-Action Education Network & Workforce Development.
He and the NJMEP team are keenly aware of how much education is still needed to spread awareness about the vast potential and possibilities the statewide manufacturing industry possesses, driving the training and consulting firm to constantly expand and refine its programming that celebrates, empowers and supports today’s manufacturers while positioning them for an even stronger future.
NJMEP’s annual Made in New Jersey Manufacturing Day strives to do all that and more, and its 2024 installment—scheduled for Oct. 4 in Freehold—is the first one to “focus on engaging and bringing out those South Jersey manufacturers who are so often overlooked,” according to Senior Marketing & Communications Manager Michael Womack.
“It’s a very industry-focused event,” he continues. “There’s going to be suppliers, customers and buyers, and they have massive access to the trade room floor. And they’ll have the opportunity to nominate themselves or friends’ businesses to become Made in New Jersey Manufacturer of the Year award winners.”
South Jersey’s manufacturers are invited to get involved with the annual event, which Womack says brought together nearly 1,000 people representing 600 different manufacturing companies last year. He adds that discount programs for not only tickets but also booth space for those wishing to publicize their services onsite are some of the perks available to the region’s manufacturing professionals.
“If they want to showcase, they’ll have special inclusion in the Made in New Jersey program and during that display that gets covered by so many media outlets,” says Womack. “They’ll also have the option to join the South Jersey Manufacturing Council, which is going to be an industry-focused initiative bringing in the businesses in those local areas to create a think tank to drive their ideas of what they need in terms of support, and how the state—and also the industry—can come out to support those South Jersey manufacturers. … This isn’t an event where everyone’s trying to talk to manufacturers: This is an event built around that base so they can meet and network with each other, and the opportunity to be a real inspiration to the next generation is there, too.”
NJMEP nurtures the future of manufacturing year-round, with youth outreach happening at places like the NJ State Fair this summer and the ongoing Future Makers and Creators Tour, which partners with the likes of the New Jersey Economic Development Authority. Since December, the tour has been met with boundless enthusiasm, energetic participation and tons of questions from the nearly 2,500 middle schoolers in Pleasantville, Plainfield, Piscataway and Orange the tour has visited so far, with the Camden area, Mercer County and Toms River up next.
Those students have been introduced to the likes of interactive robots, 3D printers, welding tools and the NJMEP training RV, a specially converted Winnebago that can be configured in an array of ways to make education even more accessible by going directly into communities anywhere in the state. Combining a mix of approaches like presentations, education and hands-on demonstrations yielding tangible products allows Banks and the rest of the tour team to inspire as many students as possible to see themselves in a manufacturing career—one where the average full-time employee makes over $75,000 annually.
And just like it takes a village to nurture a youngster’s career aspirations, it also takes a collective to make a program like this a reality. NJMEP is quick to credit partners like New Jersey’s Economic Development Authority and Business Action Center for their financial assistance and general support, as well as emphasize the importance of grant awards.
“We offer free training programs using our grant money to help cover [students’] ongoing education,” Banks adds. “We’ll come to these schools and say, ‘Hey, your students fell in love with the virtual-reality welding and now it’s something they’re considering. We’ll run a course for your students at no cost.’ That way, they can get involved and, when they’re done, we provide a scholarship that helps them get their welding certification—or, I’ll find an entity that can do the certification and we’ll do the training that way.”
Banks notes that he came into the Future Makers and Creators Tour with lofty and optimistic expectations, and those high hopes have been wildly exceeded already.
“It’s been amazing!” he says. “What I really love about it is, yes, we’re talking to the kids and we’re getting them engaged, but it’s really about having this support system in place that believes in them, their parents and teachers seeing them engaged. At every single stop, we’ve seen parents, grandparents, guidance counselors and teachers watch a student become engaged and excited in a way they’ve never seen.”
NJMEP invites local schools and manufacturers to get involved by visiting NJMEP.org/MakersAndCreators. There, manufacturing businesses can ask to join the tour and connect with students by showing them the human side of New Jersey manufacturing, while schools can request to be a stop on the tour.
New Jersey Manufacturing Extension Program
Bellmawr, Cedar Knolls
(973) 998-9801
NJMEP.org
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Published (and copyrighted) in South Jersey Biz, Volume 14, Issue 8 (August 2024).
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