Bocholt – On Friday (July 6, 2018), North Rhine-Westphalia Minister of Labor Karl-Josef Laumann visited our company with two school classes, including an international special education class. As part of the NRW-wide initiative “Experience Mechanical Engineering – Technology That Fascinates,” the students and the minister, who serves as the initiative’s patron, gained deep insights into the manufacturing world at SPALECK, a machine and plant engineering company and supplier for metalworking and CNC machining. The goal of the day was to learn about modern and future-proof apprenticeship programs in the industry.
Trainees provide first-hand information
The young people received all the information they needed at first hand. The day was organized by our prospective construction mechanics, cutting machine operators and industrial mechanics. In varied and interactive short presentations and workshops, the 14 to 18-year-old participants exchanged ideas with our SPALECK trainees and the Minister during a tour of the company. Karl-Josef Laumann: “The campaign helps to awaken young people’s enthusiasm for technical professions. The campaign day also clearly demonstrates the wide range of career opportunities in mechanical engineering for qualified specialists. There is a career beyond university. We need academics, but we also need well-trained skilled workers to prevent a shortage of skilled workers.”
Excellent career opportunities in mechanical engineering
The young people from Bocholt Berufskolleg West and Gesamtschule Rhede also drew a consistently positive conclusion about the many impressions and the very good future prospects of technical professions. “These professions offer excellent prospects in terms of earnings and promotion opportunities,” emphasized Martin Jonetzko, Deputy Managing Director of the employers’ association and participant of the day. However, the so-called “MINT gap” is growing from year to year: companies are not only lacking programmers and engineers, but also industrial employees in production, such as electronics technicians or cutting machine operators. For this reason, the nationwide “Experience Mechanical Engineering” initiative has been in place since 2002. “With this campaign, we want to promote exchanges between schools and companies in order to close this gap,” explained Peter Stoverink from the Association of German Mechanical and Plant Engineering Companies.
The initiative, which is now in its 17th year, is organized by the North Rhine-Westphalia Chambers of Industry and Commerce, the NRW Metal Employers’ Association, IG Metall and VDMA NRW in cooperation with OWL Maschinenbau. Like SPALECK, more than 50 companies in NRW take part every year, reaching around 1,500 school students. All information can be found at https://nrw.vdma.org.
All photos of the event can be found at www.facebook.com/spaleckde. A video of the day is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hq6I4xFwnnI. You can find more information about training at SPALECK here under Training in Bocholt.
