20 Minutes with STLE Canton Section
By Kuldeep Mistry, Chair, and Rohit Voothaluru, Education Chair | TLT Local Section Report October 2016
How STLE’s Small Section of the Year partnered with a corporate member and others to run a STEM Camp for Ohio high school students.
STLE CANTON SECTION - The Quick File
If you’re looking for an inspirational story, look no further than STLE Canton. This local section was essentially dormant until it was revived just over a year ago. And recently, at STLE’s 71st Annual Meeting & Exhibition in Las Vegas, the group received the society’s Outstanding Small Section of the Year award (Philadelphia won the honor for large section and partnered with Quaker Chemical on its own STEM Camp).
The Canton Section held five technical meetings in 2015, including a joint meeting with the Cleveland Section, and co-sponsored a golf outing with the ASM Canton Massillon Chapter. It also held an education course in mid-March.
Now Canton ranks as one of STLE’s most innovative and enthusiastic local groups. Section leaders use LinkedIn to recruit new members and PayPal to make it faster and easier to lock into meetings and educational courses.
Perhaps the group’s top achievement, however, came this April when it participated in a STEM Camp for high school students. STEM—which stands for science, technology, engineering and mathematics—is a program that originally started with the national organization four years ago. STLE has now run high school STEM Camps in Detroit, Orlando, Dallas and Las Vegas.
TLT interviewed the Canton Section to discover what other local groups can learn from its innovative programs and approaches.
At STLE’s 71st Annual Meeting & Exhibition in Las Vegas, the STLE Canton Section received the society’s Outstanding Small Section of the Year award. (Photo courtesy of David Braun Photography.)
TLT: What motivated the section to lead activities for a STEM Camp?
Canton Section: A primary goal was to expose students—those already in the field of tribology and those in school representing the future generation of engineers—to the myriad applications within the fields of tribology and lubrication.
In order to lay a pathway for future events, the Canton Section actively identified ways to be part of a STEM Camp for young students in the area, and we hoped to inspire them by presenting a variety of opportunities that would make tribology interesting and exciting. We decided to join with the Goodyear STEM Career Day, organized with the University of Akron, on April 30. This local event—which attracted more than 2,000 students along with parents and teachers—was an excellent opportunity for section members to showcase the fields of tribology and lubrication by presenting simple (but captivating!) demonstrations on friction, lubrication and wear. Nearly 200 students took the opportunity to learn about engineering concepts via activities led by our section. The event was not only a great success but also an immensely gratifying experience for section members, who cherished the opportunity to flash their skills and show their zeal for solving real-life problems with science.
Excitement of middle and high school students doing interactive experiments in STEM activities. (Photo courtesy of Young Sup Kang.)
TLT: How did you plan the event?
Canton Section: We coordinated with authorities at the University of Akron/ Goodyear to set up simple tasks that actively involved the students and simultaneously kept them engrossed in the physics at work. Planning was particularly easy due to the active involvement of section members, who volunteered to build the activity setups used to demonstrate the importance of tribology in day-to-day applications.
THE TIMKEN CO. ENDORSES STEM TRAINING AS IMPORTANT ‘FIRST STEP’
“Rekindling interest in technical careers is vital to the future of the U.S. industry, and hence the prosperity of our economy. There is already a shortage of engineers, and this situation will only worsen as more of the space race workforce retires.
“Making students and their parents aware of the opportunities during middle school is critical to enabling educated choices during high school and college. Engineering is now such a diverse field; there is literally something for everyone, but it starts with a solid foundation of math and science.
“Using focused STEM education opportunities to ensure students understand what technical careers look like now, as well as how to pursue those careers, is the first step in inspiring the next generation of engineers. I applaud those who show the initiative and take action to reach out to young people and give them insights into potential career choices through interactive, hands-on activities.”
—Dr. Stephen P. Johnson, Director – R&D, The Timken Co.
TLT: Did you work with companies serving our industry—perhaps an STLE Corporate Member?
Canton Section: To ensure the success of our ideas and simultaneously invite support, we actively pursued major organizations in the Akron and Canton, Ohio area to sponsor our participation in the event.
We approached The Timken Co. R&D team, who agreed to completely support the Canton Section and even allocated resources to aid in planning and execution. A group was formed that was led by our section and mentored by one of the Timken senior management professionals.
TLT: What were the logistics?
Canton Section: For the STEM Career Day, Goodyear wanted various engaging activities for middle and high school students that would expose them to exciting opportunities in science and engineering. We wanted to energize attendees and express our passion for STEM disciplines.
Among the planned activities were networking discussions on our engineering displays (different types of bearings and chains, examples of damaged bearings, bearings with low-friction seal designs) as well as interactive kits to teach the basic concepts of tribology. These were created to present (1.) the effect of materials, surface finishes, contact area, cycles and lubricant on sliding friction and (2.) the effect of load and friction on motion and speed.
Additionally, we worked in fun, topic-oriented trivia to reaffirm the tribology concepts learned during the activities.
Students learn about bearings through STEM activities. (Photo courtesy of Babak LotfizadehDehkordi.)
TLT: What are your plans for next year? Do you have any new ideas to add to the program?
Canton Section: Our focus will shift to the execution of section activities in the year ahead rather than just establishing them as we did last year. Moving forward, the Canton Section will work hard to reach even greater levels of member participation and will explore new ways to pull in new members from our local community.
Our section is also looking at creating stronger connections with local graduate and undergraduate students by providing them conference/senior project scholarships and opportunities to be more actively involved in section activities. Additional interactions with the University of Akron’s engineering department would be certain to benefit the students, as it would be a valuable experience for these young people to network with experts within their future career fields.
In addition, the Canton Section looks forward to actively collaborating and working with other professional societies and local sections within STLE. This will grow our footprint and help to foster social networking opportunities for the tribologists and lubrication engineers living in northeast Ohio.
Middle and high school students having fun doing experiments during STEM activities. (Photo courtesy of Young Sup Kang.)
TLT: How are you revitalizing your local section?
Canton Section: The Canton Section was rebooted in 2015, essentially starting fresh after four years of dormancy. The major drive was to ensure that the local community of students and professionals have an opportunity to stay abreast of the advances in tribology and lubrication, while simultaneously providing them an opportunity to engage in a technical discourse that can benefit the next generation of tribologists. With this mission, we actively sought participation from students in section activities, particularly in the organizing session for planned activities.
The Canton Section partnered with The Timken Co., Goodyear and the University of Akron to help create a STEM Camp for Ohio students. (Photo courtesy of Babak LotfizadehDehkordi.)
TLT: What lessons did you learn that may be useful for other local sections?
Canton Section: During first-year planning, committee members identified that making meetings accessible for members was extremely important to keeping the section running smoothly. In order to do so, and to provide information without any hassles, a new Website (
www.stlecanton.org) was launched so members could access the latest calendar of events and information about past activities, too. To enhance the experience further, meeting locations were chosen based on a survey of members (determining the best/most accessible destinations). We also incorporated electronic payment that proved to be extremely helpful for large events such as the education course that was conducted in March.
This course serves as a pathway for both new and experienced professionals to stay abreast of the advances in tribology and lubrication in recent years. The course was an immense success for our local section and received rave reviews from those in attendance.
STLE Canton Section Leadership Team
Chair: Dr. Kuldeep Kishore Mistry, The Timken Co.
Vice Chair: Dr. Paul Shiller, University of Akron
Secretary: Dr. Young Sup Kang, The Timken Co.
Treasurer: Dr. Babak LotfizadehDehkordi, The Schaeffler Group
Education Chair: Dr. Rohit Voothaluru, The Timken Co.
Section Advisors: Peter Drechsler and Dr. Carl Hager, The Timken Co; Barry Williams, Predictive Maintenance Services.
STLE Canton Section/2016 Goodyear STEM Career Day volunteers: Kuldeep Kishore Mistry, Sarah Meyer, Shane Brammer, Rohit Voothaluru, Young Sup Kang, Mike Prengaman and Babak LotfizadehDehkordi.
Acknowledgements: The Executive Committee of the STLE Canton Section is very thankful to The Timken Co. R&D, The Schaeffler Group and the University of Akron for their generous support, as well as Peter Drechsler for his wonderful guidance in the section activities. Gina Cairo and the STLE headquarters staff are acknowledged for their great support, along with the STLE Cleveland Section for their partnership.
You can reach Kuldeep Mistry at kuldeep.mistry@timken.com.
You can reach Rohit Voothaluru at rohit.voothaluru@timken.com.