NFPA Educator Partners Are Looking for Project Ideas

When we talk to our education partners at the high school, technical college, and university levels, we often hear that they are looking for ideas for hands-on projects that allow the students to get some real-world experiences. Beyond their direct feedback to us, an article that was recently published in Inside Higher Ed quotes a Wiley report that states” a whopping 81 percent of students also said that it’s important or very important for institutions to incorporate company-led projects to mimic real-world work. Yet only 30 percent of institutions currently offer such projects, according to the report.”

One of NFPA’s Power Partner Universities, Northern Illinois University (NIU) is looking to industry representatives for project ideas for their Senior Design Program. This is an excellent opportunity to not only utilize student talent for projects, but to also engage with NIU engineering students and faculty. Please find the attached document with further information.

The NFPA can connect you with students and instructors to conduct the project through the relationships we have built with our education partners and our Fluid Power Club program, but we need your input on the types of hands on-activities would be benefit students seeking knowledge and careers in the fluid power industry.

Projects could involve any of the following, or more:

1. Data acquisition and data interpretations
2. Integration
3. Testing
4. Functional systems that can be run in a lab or on a field
5. Troubleshooting