Students sign up for the UK’s first ‘faculty on the factory floor’

The Institute for Advanced Manufacturing and Engineering (AME), a £32 million joint collaboration between Coventry University and Unipart Manufacturing, has exceeded the number of applications it had expected with interest coming from all over the country for its three-year BEng and four-year MEng courses. Senior management at the UK's first 'faculty on the factory floor' said they have passed their first year target and believe it's a further indicator of the sector's growing popularity and the desire from undergraduates to participate in activity-led learning that gives them real-world manufacturing experience. "This is a fantastic first response to what we are looking to achieve at AME and shows that we've certainly got the student world excited," said Wendy Garner, associate head of mechanical, automotive and manufacturing at Coventry University. She added: "External construction work on the new 1700 sq m manufacturing hub is nearly complete and this will provide the focus for a lot of the activity and will house more than £2m of robotics, CNC tube manipulation machinery, metrology equipment and simulation software. "The undergraduates will be learning on cutting-edge technology, not to mention working with Unipart engineers who have years of experience. It's a real win-win situation for them." Studying at AME will be split into two 16-week semesters per academic year, with students focusing on specific industry disciplines and then working in teams to apply what they have learned to commercial shopfloor projects. Over the course of the three years this will include manufacturing processes and materials, quality and metrology, advanced manufacturing and automation, design and sustainability and strategic management. In the final year, they will have the choice to specialise in lean systems and production control or engineering materials and manufacturing technology. AME, which has received £7.9m of Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE), is also recruiting for 10 postgraduates as part of its first year of activity.