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TSouth Texas College’s Advanced Manufacturing Technology (AMT) program is set to launch a course on artificial intelligence (AI) in manufacturing, equipping students with the skills needed for the future of AI in the marketplace of work.
The STC course is made possible through a partnership with Intel in providing resources and materials for the program, which will begin next spring.
AMT Program Chair Erika Guerra said the AI course is the first at STC.
The process behind the course took almost two years.
“Since there’s no code for this specific class because it’s a brand new class coming in and it’s not in the database or inventory, we had to find the codes,” he said. Guerra said.
The program’s efforts earned it an invitation to a national summit at the nation’s Capitol by the American Association of Community Colleges’ Artificial Intelligence Incubator Network, which focuses on integrating AI into curricula manufacturing.
STC was among five community colleges from across the country to discuss approaches to AI programming and shared practices.
“We were invited to come to Washington, D.C. in October and that’s when I realized we’re really leading the way here,” Guerra said. “And it’s not just in our region, in our state, but, you know, nationally. We are one of the few with AI-specific courses and manpower to help the community.
Guerra said she received hundreds of hours of training through the Intel Artificial Intelligence for Workforce program to bring the AI course.
The course has three main themes which are predictive maintenance, quality control and computer vision.
“Students who take this course will learn skills that will allow them to help local manufacturers,” she said. “This is really targeting more small and medium manufacturing businesses…students are able to repair, install, troubleshoot machines and with this AI manufacturing course, they are now going to be able to collect data on a machine with different sensors , model that data, and then be able to do data analysis so that we can do something, for example, like predictive maintenance… so that we can get to the point where we know before (a machine) breaks down.
Students also learn ethics in AI, programming, and coding.
Hector Cuevas, a student in the Robotics and Mechatronics program at STC, is enrolled in the AI course next spring.
“AI is just emerging and many industries are starting to use it,” Cuevas said. “So I think there will be a lot of opportunities in the future for people with those kinds of skills.”
The Donna resident said he wanted to get into technology maintenance and the AI course would help him gain the skills needed to use AI in his future career.
“(Students) are excited about what they’re going to learn so they can put it into practice,” Guerra said. “For our part, we are excited to teach this for the first time on the academic side. On the technical side, our certificates and our associate degrees, our students who take these courses know that they are going into industry. They want to go out and work.