Southwire Engineering Academy
The Southwire Engineering Academy (SWEA) is a cooperative internship program for 11th- and 12th-grade Carrollton High School STEM program students. Developed by Southwire Company and Carrollton City Schools, SWEA promotes achievement in science, technology, engineering and mathematics while enabling students to apply these disciplines in a real-world manufacturing setting.
At Southwire's state-of-the-art production facility in Carrollton, Georgia, junior SWEA engineers develop and sharpen valuable hands-on experience, while working with one of the largest wire and cable manufacturers in the world. In addition to learning about a variety of engineering disciplines – including industrial, mechanical and electrical engineering – the team's experience how these disciplines are applied every day to meet modern manufacturing and product development objectives. |
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SWEA teams learn to look at challenges differently. Working alongside the industry's brightest engineering minds, they are given either manufacturing or product development tasks to complete using traditional engineering principles.
From using root-cause analysis to detect production line inefficiencies to identifying the right mathematical formulas to calculate the footage of wire on a partial reel to reduce waste, SWEA students are solving real-world challenges. Along the way, they gain critical workplace skills, such as project management, decision-making, and teamwork. Today's demand for engineering, science, technology and mathematics — plus a constant supply of real-world business challenges — make SWEA a uniquely effective and sustainable model for both businesses and schools.
SWEA hosts several engineer-to-engineer, or E2E, workshops throughout the semester. These two-and-a–half-hour events offer the opportunity for students to meet with Southwire engineers, from recent college graduates to senior professionals, who discuss their careers, college paths and various types of engineering. This direct access to working engineers gives the teams key insights as they begin planning their futures.
The real fun begins with the E2E Challenge events, which include hands-on engineering exercises like those typically found in college-level engineering classes. In these competition-style exercises, the teams have two hours to apply creative problem-solving skills, teamwork and engineering principles to complete tasks related to a specific engineering discipline, such as creating and managing an efficient paper airplane assembly line to demonstrate how industrial engineering is used to solve production challenges.
From using root-cause analysis to detect production line inefficiencies to identifying the right mathematical formulas to calculate the footage of wire on a partial reel to reduce waste, SWEA students are solving real-world challenges. Along the way, they gain critical workplace skills, such as project management, decision-making, and teamwork. Today's demand for engineering, science, technology and mathematics — plus a constant supply of real-world business challenges — make SWEA a uniquely effective and sustainable model for both businesses and schools.
SWEA hosts several engineer-to-engineer, or E2E, workshops throughout the semester. These two-and-a–half-hour events offer the opportunity for students to meet with Southwire engineers, from recent college graduates to senior professionals, who discuss their careers, college paths and various types of engineering. This direct access to working engineers gives the teams key insights as they begin planning their futures.
The real fun begins with the E2E Challenge events, which include hands-on engineering exercises like those typically found in college-level engineering classes. In these competition-style exercises, the teams have two hours to apply creative problem-solving skills, teamwork and engineering principles to complete tasks related to a specific engineering discipline, such as creating and managing an efficient paper airplane assembly line to demonstrate how industrial engineering is used to solve production challenges.
SWEA Application for 2020-2021:
swea_application.docx.pdf | |
File Size: | 317 kb |
File Type: |
SWEA Student Testimonials:
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Video Clip from Southwire E2E 2015
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Artifacts:
Artifacts:
- View the 2015-2016 SWEA Calendar
- 2015 SWEA Open House Presentation
- 2015 Southwire Engineering Academy Projects
- 2015 Southwire Engineering Academy Project Descriptions
- 2015 Southwire Engineering Academy Marketing Project
- View SWEA Projects from 2011-2014
- 2014 E2E Presentation 1 | 2015 E2E Airplane Simulation Presentation 2
Creating Tomorrows Engineers:
Above is our 2019/2020 SWEA class for Carrollton High School.
Since the fall of 2011, over 200 students have participated in the internship program. Today's demand for engineering, science, technology and mathematics — plus a constant supply of real-world business challenges — make SWEA a uniquely effective and sustainable model for both businesses and schools.
Since the fall of 2011, over 200 students have participated in the internship program. Today's demand for engineering, science, technology and mathematics — plus a constant supply of real-world business challenges — make SWEA a uniquely effective and sustainable model for both businesses and schools.