Last month, Alan Reid (Associate Dean) and Craig Brazil (Professor and Coordinator of the Industrial Mechanic Millwright program) from the School of Skilled Trades returned from the National Brazilian Technological Skills Competition in Belo Horizonte. This bi-annual event is one of the largest competitions of its kind in the world, with over 300,000 visitors over the four days of competition. The 105m² competition space houses 800 competitors who compete in 58 different skilled trade disciplines using over 900 tonnes. The scope of the competitions is vast ranging including such trades as: hairdressing, mold making, CNC machining, restaurant services, industrial mechanic millwrighting just to name a few. Alan and Craig were invited to the competition by the organization Senai, Brazil; this group oversees all vocational and technical training for over 2.3 million trainees per year from across Brazil.
A group from Senai visited Sheridan last fall as one of their stops on a fact finding mission across North America looking for “best practices” in Apprenticeship and Technical training.
During their stay in Brazil for the competition Alan, as a keynote speaker, gave a presentation on the “Challenges of Apprenticeship Training in Ontario Colleges and Possible Solutions”. Craig was an observer/judge for the Industrial Mechanic Millwright competition which will be, for the first time, part of the World Skills Competition that will be held in Sao Paulo, Brazil in August 2015. Both Alan and Craig were overwhelmed and humbled by the welcome they both received during their stay in Brazil. It was a very busy and rewarding experience for both of them. With many new friendships and partnerships forged this led to exchanges in ideas and methods in current and future practices. This will, in both the short and long term, lead to a better learning and teaching environment for the apprentices and students at the Skills Training Centre.
Professor Brazil (green vest, right) with the Judging team from the Industrial Mechanic Millwright competition.
Reid delivering a speech to over 100 industry and university leaders