VDOE :: Career Clusters - Manufacturing

CTE Career Clusters

Data Snapshot
The Data Snapshot for Manufacturing (PDF) helps educators, students and parents see connections between the Plans of Study and career opportunities in high-skill, high wage, in-demand fields.

Dwayne Roes

Machinist Apprentice, Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Newport News Shipbuilding, Newport News, Virginia

Robert E. Lee High School/Valley Vocational Technical Center, Staunton City Public Schools
CTE studies: Introduction to Machining

Hands-on experience

When it came time to choose between college and an apprenticeship, Dwayne Roes chose the latter.

“I’m not one of the best students to sit down all day and listen to lectures,” Dwayne says. “I was just good at working with my hands and, mostly, I didn’t want to go into debt.”

Dwayne, a machinist apprentice for Huntington Ingalls Industries’ Newport News Shipbuilding, liked that he could get paid full time during his 4-year apprenticeship as opposed to having to spend money to go to college. The Newport News Shipbuilding Apprentice School was established in 1919 and has more than 700 apprentices. There are more than a dozen focus areas including molding, welding, and insulating.

David Revere

Vice President, Operations, Master Machine and Tool Co.

Bethel High School/New Horizons Regional Educational Center, Hampton City Public Schools
CTE studies: Electronics
Additional studies: A+ Certification in Electronics, associate’s degree in Engineering, Thomas Nelson Community College; B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, Old Dominion University

Earning degrees with the help of company reimbursements
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Earning degrees with the help of company reimbursements

The skills learned in electronics classes in high school give David Revere an edge in his role today as vice president of operations for Master Machine and Tool in Newport News. “If I’m working with an electrical engineer, it helps me get a better understanding of what he or she is trying to do and makes the process more efficient,” says David, who later earned higher education degrees in engineering.

As a child, David had always loved tinkering with tools, so in high school, he took electronics classes at New Horizons Regional Education Center. He got a job doing CNC repair after graduation. “I became familiar with manufacturing and really enjoyed it,” he says.

He began working as an entry-level machinist at Master Machine in 2001. When he began to become interested in engineering, he used educational reimbursements his company offered to help pay for engineering degrees at Thomas Nelson Community College and Old Dominion University.

He then became more involved with the design, engineering and project management at Master Machine, which provides a wide range of manufacturing, including high-vacuum components for accelerator facilities and aerospace parts. The company has about 25 employees and is expanding rapidly.

“I like being able to be a part of all the processes, from product development through designing it, to building it, to testing it, and releasing it,” David says of his current role at the manufacturing company. “It’s nice to be a part of all of it.”

Manufacturing logo

The Manufacturing cluster is about planning, managing and performing the processing of materials into intermediate or final products and related professional and technical support activities such as production planning and control, maintenance and manufacturing/process engineering. In many regions of the U.S. there is great demand for highly skilled technicians. Manufacturing is still a large segment of the U.S. economy; companies are becoming more specialized and high-tech. Careers related to quality, logistics and health, safety and environmental assurance will continue to grow as these issues gain importance to the American public.

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Produced by: Stuart’s Draft High School, Augusta County Public Schools

Employment Projections: 2010-2020

The Manufacturing career cluster is projected to grow slowly, by about seven percent, between 2010 and 2020. Even though slow, this growth represents a big change in Manufacturing. This cluster has been losing jobs for decades, and took a huge hit in the recession, but employment has already begun to recover and continued growth is predicted. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects that employment in occupations in this cluster will grow from about 10.7 million in 2010 to around 11.4 million in 2020. The Manufacturing cluster is expected to create over 720,000 new jobs and have almost 3 million job openings between 2010 and 2020.

The report Employment Projections for Manufacturing, 2010-2020 includes data on occupations growing faster that the nation average, pathways employment overview, occupations with the most job openings, and employment projections.

Occupations in this cluster and what they make in Virginia
Occupation	Employed in VA	Typical salary	Education level**
Industrial engineering technicians	1,080	$32K – $75K	HS/CC
Industrial engineers	4,300	$50K – $115K	4C
Industrial machinery mechanics	7,950	$30K – $69K	HS
Industrial production managers	2,260	$53K – $148K	HS /4C
Maintenance workers, machinery	2,210	$24K – $59K	HS
Machinists	7,680	$24K – $59K	HS
Materials engineers	420	$52K – $127K	4C
Millwrights	660	$31K – $72K	HS
Packaging, filling machine operators	7,350	$17K – $42K	HS
Production, expediting clerks	7,580	$25K – $67K	HS/4C
Sheet metal workers	4,920	$25K – $74K	HS
Structural metal fabricators, fitters	1,520	$24K – $52K	HS
Team assemblers	9,720	$18K – $46K	HS
Tool and die makers	780	$31K – $69K	HS
Welders, cutters, solderers, and brazers	7,300	$24K – $55K	HS

Career Cluster Planning

A resource for counselors, administrators, and educators
CTE Administrative Planning Guide (APG) – includes information to help local school divisions plan and schedule instructional programs. The APG is organized by career clusters, with a complete listing of courses, concentration sequences, and credentials available to students as they plan for career entry and continuing education. Users may access course information by cluster or by searching for specific courses or certifications.

A resource for students and counselors
Career Planning Guide – includes an easy way for students and counselors to look for courses to further career goals. One can search for occupations, browse by Career Clusters or favorite academic subjects.

Academic and Career Plans of Study

Development Information

Information and tips for instructional leaders, administrators, counselors and teachers/faculty for creating a career pathway academic and career plan of study.

Sample Academic and Career Plans of Study

School divisions are asked to develop sample plans of study based on the courses offered within their schools, the employment needs of the region, and the post-high school educational opportunities needed for these careers. Once these sample plans are developed, they can be customized to the needs of individual students so that all students have the opportunity to have an individualized academic and career plan of study.

Sample Pathway Plans of Study for Manufacturing:

Health, Safety & Environmental Assurance (Word)
Logistics Inventory Control (Word)
Maintenance, Installation & Repair (Word)
Manufacturing Production Process Development (Word)
Production (Word)
Quality Assurance (Word)
Blank Plan of Study (with fields) (Word)

Also see Sample Plans of Study for all clusters and pathways.

Resources

The Career Clusters logo and its extensions are the property of the National Career Technical Foundation, as managed by NASDCTEc. Some content on this page is from the publication, R U College & Career Ready? - 2013 Edition; and is used here with permission from the Virginia Business Publications LLC and Trailblazers in the Demographics and Workforce Section of the Weldon Cooper Center for Public Service at the University of Virginia.

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