Tech builds case to Moulton for new machines

LYNN – Lynn Vocational Technical Institute needs modern equipment to train future machinists and, although U.S. Rep.-elect Seth W. Moulton cannot deliver any federal money to buy the machines yet, he made his feelings on the subject clear during a tour of the school Friday.”I’m a big believer in technical education. It is good for assisting workers and – if done well – it can attract businesses to a community,” he said.Moulton spent more than an hour in Tech’s machine and metal shops with state Housing and Economic Development Secretary Greg Bialecki, listening as lead machine shop teacher Michael Pickering outlined the shop’s need for modernized computer numerical control (CNC) equipment.Machine-shop students need to be training on that equipment or their prospects of employment in a machine shop after graduation are limited, Pickering said.Pickering said machine shops use CNC machines even as they prepare to invest in even more sophisticated computerized equipment. Tech graduates need to know how to use the machines if they want to compete for work.”My goal is to make these kids employable,” he said.Good jobs are part of Moulton’s goal to help Lynn transform its vacant waterfront land into business locations.”I believe Lynn has more potential than any city in Massachusetts right now,” he said.Tech’s machine shop is back on its feet after closing from 2008 to 2011 under a scenario Bialecki said plagues many high school machine-shop programs.”These shops train someone for a middle-class job but they are probably the most expensive programs to run,” he said.Thirty-two Tech students are currently studying to be machinists, and the first class of seniors to graduate as machinists since the shop reopened will receive diplomas in 2016. The shop also hosts the E-Team machinist training program, started in 1997 and sending graduates such as Mike Griffin of Lynn into good jobs.Griffin enrolled in the E-Team program in 2009, waited out cuts in state money that sidelined the program temporarily, and graduated to take a machinist’s job working third shift at the GE River Works plant.”It changed my life. I was 23, making 10 dollars an hour. I can’t thank the guys who trained me enough,” Griffin said.E-Team training lasts 35 weeks and includes machine training and academic preparation with more than 350 workers trained since 1997 in manufacturing skills. Bialecki came to Tech last December to announce an increase in state money to pay for E-Team training.Tech teacher Patrick McGovern said machinists can earn $70,000 or more a year, and Bialecki said good-paying machine jobs fit into a state goal to boost Massachusetts’ manufacturing.