The William Moore College of Technology (Moore Tech) debuted its new state-of-the-art workforce training facility last week with a ribbon-cutting ceremony that included prominent local officials like
Tennessee Senator Reginald Tate and
Shelby County Mayor Mark Luttrell Jr.
The updated facility now features six new CNC machines, which are multi-axis machines used to cut metals such as titanium and cobalt chrome.
"With the Memphis area being the second-largest producer of orthopedic implants, there's an abundance of jobs at places like
Smith & Nephew,
Wright Medical and
Microport, and many of those jobs center around the use of the CNC machines," said Moore Tech President Skip Redmond, who actually has two replacement hips himself. "No longer are the manual lays and mills able to produce the kind of technology that is required to produce a medical implant."
Moore Tech used grants totaling $450,000 from the
Plough Foundation and
The Assisi Foundation of Memphis to purchase three machines (priced at around $100,000 each) from the
Haas Automation Inc. and the
Fanuc Corporation, and two companies then donated three additional machines to the school.
The remaining grant money was used to renovate the school’s 75-year-old facilities.
Linkous Construction completed the rehab work,
DeSoto County Electric was called in to handle the electricity and
Ewing Kesssler and
Roy May Heating and Air Conditioning handled the heating and air conditioning needs.
Redmond plans to grow the machining program at Moore Tech.
"We're looking to expand, since we have now doubled our capacity from around 50 students to closer to 100," says Redmond. "We've split the program into two years and now have two shops, so we are hoping to attract more students and more instructors."
He hopes to find instructors who have possibly retired from one of the machining companies in Memphis and are looking for a second income.
By Michael Waddell
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