News about Plastics & Polymer

School counselors, along with career and technical educators, included Penn College on a Monday tour of the area’s industrial assets. The guests began their afternoon with lunch in the new welding addition before exploring new and existing welding labs in the Lycoming Engines Metal Trades Center, then moved to the Breuder Advanced Technology & Health Sciences Center for stopovers in nursing and plastics. The groups visited several businesses in the region prior to arriving on main campus, including Lycoming Engines, Halliburton and Savoy Contract Furniture. Eyewitness News’ Morgan Parrish was along for the tours, which were facilitated by the Williamsport/Lycoming Chamber of Commerce.

A global accreditation leader has given its stamp of approval to five Pennsylvania College of Technology majors.

The ABET Engineering Technology Accreditation Commission has reaccredited the college’s associate degrees in civil engineering technology, plastics and polymer technology, and surveying technology, as well as baccalaureate degrees in civil engineering technology and plastics and polymer engineering technology.

Graduates of those majors who have responded to recent surveys administered by the college report a 100% placement rate.

Read more

A Pennsylvania College of Technology plastics student is one of just six individuals nationwide to receive a $5,000 PACK EXPO scholarship.

Lucas S. Poche, of Lewistown, a senior majoring in plastics and polymer engineering technology, earned the scholarship from The Association for Packaging and Processing Technologies. PMMI is a trade association consisting of companies involved in various aspects of packaging throughout the United States, Canada and Mexico.

Read more

The Shell Polymers Rotational Molding Center of Excellence was unveiled Sept. 24, and Shell was honored for its generous support for facilities that aid in the instruction of aspiring plastics professionals at Pennsylvania College of Technology.

In a dedication ceremony attended by representatives of the college and Shell and a host of industry partners and stakeholders, participants celebrated the enhanced and upgraded academic and research lab, located in the Advanced Technology & Health Sciences Center at Penn College.

The Shell Polymers Rotational Molding Center of Excellence will boost the college’s efforts to produce highly skilled graduates for the plastics industry while helping to ease the skills gap in plastics manufacturing. It also enables the college – which operates the Plastics Innovation & Resource Center – to assist plastics companies with research and development and the training of incumbent workers.

Read more

A plastics organization comprising industry leaders has awarded a $3,000 scholarship to a Pennsylvania College of Technology student.

Nathan A. Rader-Edkin, of Williamsport, majoring in plastics and polymer engineering technology, earned the scholarship from the Plastics Pioneers Association.

Read more

Two Pennsylvania College of Technology plastics students were among five nationwide to receive scholarships from the Society of Plastics Engineers Thermoforming Division.

Haven K. Bontz, of Cooperstown, and Nathan A. Rader-Edkin, of Williamsport, both majoring in plastics and polymer engineering technology, earned the scholarships from the professional society dedicated to advancing thermoforming technologies. Bontz’s scholarship was for $2,000, and Rader-Edkin received $2,500.

Read more

The Society of Plastics Engineers Foundation recognized the excellence of two Pennsylvania College of Technology students by awarding them scholarships.

Shawnee M. Mills, of Martinsburg, West Virginia, and Lucas S. Poche, of Lewistown, both majoring in plastics and polymer engineering technology, earned the scholarships from the society dedicated to advancing the plastics profession worldwide.

Read more

State Rep. Bryan Cutler (R-Lancaster), the second-highest ranking member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, visited Penn College on Thursday. Cutler, serving his first term as majority leader, was accompanied on the tour – which took in a number of instructional areas of main campus – by Jacob G. Smeltz, his chief of staff, as well as two members of the college’s board of directors: Sen. Gene Yaw, chair, and Rep. Garth Everett. President Davie Jane Gilmour and other members of the college administration (including Michael J. Reed, vice president for academic affairs and provost, and Patrick Marty, chief of staff) welcomed the guests, and various deans and faculty members led Cutler through The Victorian House, welding and metal fabrication, advanced manufacturing, automotive restoration, culinary arts and hospitality, plastics and polymer engineering, and several majors in the School of Nursing & Health Sciences. Cutler started his career in radiography, earning a certificate from Lancaster General School of Radiology. He worked as an X-ray technologist before earning a health care management degree from Lebanon Valley College and working as an administrator in his local hospital’s radiology department. He later earned a law degree, focused on health care law, from Widener Law School and has served in the Legislature since 2007. The day’s itinerary also included lunch at Le Jeune Chef Restaurant and a chance to see the Gold Rush Excavator on a nearby parking lot.

Site selectors for business and industry, who arrived in Williamsport late last week for a four-day assessment of the region’s educational, health care and recreational attributes, visited Penn College on Monday. Led by a contingent of campus leaders, the guests toured plastics, automated manufacturing, welding, collision repair and automotive restoration labs, and enjoyed lunch at Le Jeune Chef Restaurant. Eyewitness News’ Morgan Parrish was among those accompanying the group, and – in a piece that led the evening’s 5:30 newscasts on WBRE/WYOU – interviewed Michael Quint, managing director at Newmark Knight Frank; Jared Grissinger, project manager for the Governor’s Action Team; and Jason Fink, president/CEO of the Williamsport/Lycoming Chamber of Commerce, for their perspective. Also included in the broadcast was footage of Elizabeth A. Biddle, director of corporate relations; David R. Cotner, dean of industrial, computing and engineering technologies; Shannon M. Munro, vice president for workforce development; and Spencer L. Cotner, of Muncy, a plastics and polymer engineering technology major and research assistant at the college’s Plastics Innovation & Resource Center. The visit, which began at the Little League Baseball World Series over the weekend, concludes with Tuesday stops at UPMC Susquehanna and Lycoming College.

Two weeks of the Injection Molding Processing Workshop offered by Pennsylvania College of Technology and its acclaimed Plastics Innovation & Resource Center attracted a variety of industry professionals to campus.

Twenty-eight individuals representing seven states and Puerto Rico attended the workshops that were delivered in separate five-day sessions. The sessions consisted of two sections: Decoupled Molding Setup and Operation and the Science of Injection Molding With Troubleshooting.

Timothy E. Weston, associate professor of plastics and polymer technology, taught the sessions with assistance from Spencer L. Cotner, of Muncy, a plastics and polymer engineering technology major and a PIRC research assistant.

Read more

The expertise offered by Pennsylvania College of Technology and its acclaimed Plastics Innovation & Resource Center attracted an array of plastics professionals to campus for the recent Extrusion Seminar and Hands-On Workshop.

Individuals representing 22 companies from 10 states, Canada and Italy attended the 21st annual event that featured extrusion experts Chris Rauwendaal, president of Rauwendaal Extrusion Engineering Inc., and Kirk M. Cantor, professor of plastics and polymer technology.

Read more

Nearly two dozen registrants from eight companies in Illinois, New York and Pennsylvania attended the recent Plastics Materials, Processing and Testing workshop hosted by Pennsylvania College of Technology’s world-renowned Plastics Innovation & Resource Center.

The May 20-22 workshop, one of many that attract industry professionals to campus each summer, provided participants with a fundamental knowledge of polymers and how they are processed, tested and characterized.

Read more

Plastics professionals representing 17 companies, 12 states and Canada gave rave reviews for the recent Rotational Molding & Advanced Materials Workshop hosted by Pennsylvania College of Technology and its acclaimed Plastics Innovation & Resource Center.

“I feel like I am at Disneyland. I loved it that much,” said David Sharp of Acrylon Plastics in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.

“A great course. The presenters took complex subject matter and broke it down to an elementary level that was practical and easy to understand,” said Mark Eberhardt of The Metal Ware Corp. in Two Rivers, Wisconsin.

Read more

A pair of first-term state senators visited Penn College on Thursday, stopping by several academic areas in the School of Nursing & Health Sciences and the School of Industrial, Engineering & Computing Technologies. The tour, abbreviated by a stormy forecast (but no less valuable), took Sens. Kristin Phillips-Hill (R-York) and Judy Ward (R-Altoona) to nursing, dental hygiene and three labs in the college’s ABET-accredited plastics program. The tour covered substantial ground: In addition to curricular information on all six schools, the legislators were apprised of the college’s integral corporate advisers, the focused global experiences of students traveling abroad, high-profile internship opportunities, and the essential contributions of equipment and expertise by business and industry. Also on the tour were President Davie Jane Gilmour; state Sen. Gene Yaw, chairman of the college’s board of directors; Michael J. Reed, vice president for academic operations/associate provost; Patrick Marty, chief of staff and assistant to the president for college relations; Zack Moore, vice president for government and community relations at Penn State; Jon Hopcraft, chief of staff to Phillips-Hill; and Senate photographer Christopher J. Guerrisi.

Pennsylvania College of Technology celebrated the contributions and commitment of its staff and faculty during an Employee Recognition Week gathering on May 16.

As part of an all-college meeting to end the spring semester, President Davie Jane Gilmour presented Distinguished Staff, Excellence in Academic Advising and Outstanding Assessment awards, as well as recognizing retirees, members of the Quarter Century Club, and employees hitting the 30- and 35-year plateaus during the 2018-19 academic year.

Read more