Creators Wanted exhibit extolls manufacturing careers.

By Christina Lee Knauss

Students from around the Midlands are learning about career opportunities in manufacturing this week through a special event taking place on the campus of Nephron Pharmaceuticals Corp. in West Columbia.

The Creators Wanted workforce development exhibition is making its only South Carolina stop at the West Columbia plant. It is the brainchild of The National Association of Manufacturers and its workforce development and education partner The Manufacturing Institute. The touring exhibit was developed as a way to both showcase careers in manufacturing and inspire future creators.

One goal, organizers say, is for young people inspired by the exhibit to eventually help ease the ever-increasing national shortage of employees needed to fill a growing number of manufacturing jobs.

"We're out here to inspire, educate and empower young people about choosing careers in manufacturing," said Chrys Kefalas, vice president of brand strategy for the National Association of Manufacturers. "There are currently 900,000 open jobs in manufacturing in the U.S. a record and there's going to be a need for 4 million manufacturing jobs here between now and 2030, and we want to show the students what these careers have to offer them."

Representatives from area manufacturers such as Trane Technologies, Honda and Nephron will be on hand through Friday with information about their products and career opportunities. PTC, a software developer, also has a display that shows how augmented reality can be used to help workers in the field access information to fix a wide variety of products.

The biggest feature of the exhibit is an RV set up with a series of "escape room"-type features centered around manufacturing. It works just like the popular attractions of the same name that require participants to solve a riddle or mystery before they can leave a locked room, only in this case students must use math, science and logic skills to solve manufacturing-related problems.

On Wednesday, the exhibit's first day, more than 250 area students toured the exhibit. Gov. Henry McMaster joined with Nephron owner and CEO Lou Kennedy to take the tour with a group of students from Brookland-Cayce and Airport high schools who study at the Innovation Center in Lexington School District 2.Many...