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As space exploration becomes more of a commercial enterprise in the U.S., the need for well-qualified aerospace technicians may be even greater than it was when NASA and its contractors were the primary employers in this field.

Working as an aerospace technician requires "a broad skill set, a particular level of attention to detail and a thorough understanding of safety,” said Steve Kane, managing director and program manager for SpaceTEC^?. Kane explained that aerospace technicians must be constantly aware of the fact they deal with things that can harm them and that the products they build must work properly to avoid endangering the public.

The SpaceTEC ATE National Resource Center links community and technical college aerospace technician education programs together in a national infrastructure. Its partners, since it was first funded by NSF in 2002, include NASA, the large companies with which NASA has contracted, the Federal Aviation Administration, and the U.S. military.

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Bellevue College’s Life Science Informatics Center meshed an Advanced Technological Education project grant with two large federal grants to create an industry-recognized credential, preparatory curriculum, and set of career pathways for people who want to become health information technology (IT) technicians.

The three grants—totaling nearly $20 million since 2010—build on the expertise that the college gained by operating the National Workforce Center in Emerging Technologies, which was funded by the National Science Foundation from 1995 to 2002 as a national ATE center.

“All of our efforts were informed by that center. It was a huge stimulus to our college and for our learners,” said Patricia Dombrowski, director of the Life Science Informatics Center at the Washington state college. “It’s been almost astounding how all these pieces have fit together,” she added.

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Thanks to the National Science Foundation's Advanced Technological Education program, Mike Rudibuagh 's high-level collaborations with educators appear on a map like a giant spider web stretched across the country and with geospatial industry leaders in Illinois.

For Lake Land College students, Rudibaugh's professional network puts the most current geospatial technologies in their hands. It also keeps the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) program up-to-date in ways that help students get jobs—often directly from internships that are part of the college's GIS certificate program—or transfer smoothly to four-year degree programs. That's a big change since 2002 when Rudibaugh's one GIS course had few students and he struggled to show colleagues in other departments how helpful GIS knowledge could be for them and their students.

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Conor Delaney sure is glad his aunt read the newspaper on July 27, 2009, when it ran an article about the College of Lake County launching a Lasers, Photonics, and Optics program with ATE grant support.

The certificate program taught Delaney how to use his hands-on aptitude in cutting-edge science.

In 2009 Delaney had changed majors a couple times at Harper College, the community college near his home in Illinois. He had landed there after struggling with the pace and theoretical focus of courses at the Milwaukee School of Engineering. During a mechanical engineering internship in the summer after his freshman year at Milwaukee, he had found himself much more interested in the work going on in the machine shop than in checking designs at his desk.

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The SC ATE National Resource Center for Expanding Excellence in Technician Education launched a searchable Compendium of Research on Technician Education in mid-July.

The compendium is the first phase of a Proven and Promising Practices database at www.TeachingTechnicians.org (menu choice, lower right-hand corner of Homepage).

The compendium currently contains 332 entries of published research on technician education and related topics of interest to the Advanced Technological Education (ATE) community, its stakeholders, and other educators. Relevant content from peer-reviewed scholarly journals and other sources will be added as they come to the team’s attention.

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This month, Annette Parker began her duties as the new president of South Central College, a Minnesota State Community and Technical College (MnSCU) with campuses in Mankato and Faribault. The college emphasizes globalization and has partnerships with regional businesses and industries to offer students internships and employment.

As principal investigator and executive director of the Automotive Manufacturing Technical Education Collaborative (AMTEC) from 2007 until May, Parker brought competing automakers together with the United Autoworkers in collaborative relationships with community colleges in 12 states for the center that is part of the National Science Foundation's Advanced Technological Education program. AMTEC and its partners have developed a modularized, hybrid online lecture and in-person lab curriculum designed to teach both students and incumbent workers the technical skills and critical-thinking skills required to succeed as a maintenance technician in advanced manufacturing.

The AMTEC partnership and the products it has developed have placed the AMTEC partner colleges at the forefront of mechatronics education.

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Partnerships built to meet Advanced Technological Education grant requirements have helped Austin Community College's biotechnology teacher education program continue long after National Science Foundation funding for it ended.

"I took very seriously the part of the grant application that said it had to be sustainable because I didn't want it to go away," said Linnea Fletcher, principal investigator of the ATE grant and chair of the Biotechnology Department at Austin Community College.

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Thirteen years after Austin Community College's Biotechnology Department used an ATE grant to adapt its introductory biotechnology course as professional development for high school teachers, the course is firmly embedded in Texas' curriculum for students as well as teachers.

Austin Community College's (ACC) Introduction to Biotechnology was adopted four years ago as the standard curriculum for Texas high schools to use for a year-long elective that counts toward the state's four-year science requirement for graduation.

More recently the Texas Education Agency (TEA) awarded ACC's Biotechnology Department a grant to develop an online biotechnology certification program for high school teachers. Linnea Fletcher, chair of the Biotechnology Department at Austin Community College, used the grant to hire four biotechnology teachers who participated years ago in her ATE-supported faculty development program to create the podcasts, videos, and iBook for the online certification program.

Fletcher is thrilled that the professional development initiative started with ATE support has been sustained in ways that she did not anticipate in 2000. "It's reaching a second generation of teachers," she pointed out.

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Shaun Vester transitioned immediately from intern to full-time geographic information systems (GIS) analyst in a regional planning office this spring.

The internship was part of the 15-credit Geospatial Certificate Program that Lake Land College Geography and GIS Instructor Michael Rudibaugh developed with support from the National Science Foundation's Advanced Technological Education program.

The 25-year-old Vester is glad that the certificate program is making it possible for him to earn more money.

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Florida engineering technology students who studied in Spain with support from the National Science Foundation gained new perspectives on energy systems and conservation efforts through their classroom lessons and cultural experiences.

"Over there, everywhere we went they made sure we turned the lights off," said Danielly Orozco-Cole, Curriculum Coordinator of the Florida Advanced Technological Education Center for Excellence (FLATE). Walking long distances and taking public transportation— the most common modes of transportation in Spain—showed the students that energy conservation is a way of life in Europe.