4.0 training, hands-on experience

Offer students a concrete and all-inclusive training experience, allowing them to come into contact with skills and technologies that are powering the digitalisation of industry. This the objective of Accademia Industria 4.0, a project that combines schooling and work experience, devised and implemented by Schneider Electric.

The Accademia Industria 4.0 program was started up in March in an experimental phase with the participation of a group of students from the 4th and 5th year of the Aldini Valeriani, Bologna,  and Fermo Corni, Modena, technical institutes. During the five days of intensive training, organised at Schneider Electric’s Stezzano HQ (BG), attendees were put through an interactive work program, accompanied by a reflection on future industrial scenarios and an in-depth study of digitalisation technologies and solutions.
More than 30 Schneider Electric managers and specialists alternated as teachers, following a program organized with the schools, ranging from the engineering design base of industrial automation to the attainment of evermore innovative and smart solutions, machines and software, mainstay of the revolution that production processes are currently undergoing.
Hence,  having become acquainted with professional figures present in the company, figures who operate in the principal sectors that are part of their study program, once the week in the company was over, the students themselves turned into teachers, sharing with their fellow students what they learnt during their training period. Lastly, with the aid of Schneider Electric, by implementing a study carried out in their local area, the students themselves become part of the process of change underway in the local industrial fabric. The study aims to find out how much is known and how ready people are for Industry 4.0 and the associated Italian government plan to foster investment and innovation. Lastly, the students’ company work experience could constitute a basis for their school-leaving paper.

A project liable to grow
Hence, turning both to teaching establishments and companies, Schneider Electric offers itself as a promoter of information and skills associated with Industry 4.0.
As Gianfranco Mereu, Head of Schneider Electric’s Schools and University program explained «our objective, in cooperation with MIUR (the Ministry of Education, University and Research), is to involve 5,000 students over the next 5 years in the Alternating School and Work program, while going ahead with all the other school initiatives fielded by the company: since the year 2000 over 300 institutes, including  over 20,000 persons comprising students and teachers, have been involved in general Schneider Electric educational job training initiatives».
The Accademia Industria 4.0 program will continue in November, with the students of another two institutes from Udine, and other editions are scheduled, given the good results attained so far.
Also scheduled,  a series of workshops that will take place in Italian universities, associated with engineering and energy; as well as that the company is keeping a keen eye on developments involving the setting up of local competence centres as established in the Italian Government Industry 4.0. plan.