ºÚÁÏÉçÇø Regionals Engineering Technology and Butler County: a history of successful collaboration
A partnership 50-plus years in the making continues, expands
ºÚÁÏÉçÇø Regionals Engineering Technology and Butler County: a history of successful collaboration
The year was 1966 and the United States was in the midst of its longest economic boom since World War II. Nowhere was that boom felt more than in areas related to engineering technology. The Cold War spurred significant developments in military technology and the "Space Race" with the Soviet Union amplified the demand for engineers across various disciplines.
1966 was also the year that the life of David Young, a research engineer with Armco Research Laboratories, changed.
“In early 1966 my father and I attended a Men's Club meeting at our local First United Methodist Church in Middletown. The speaker was Dean [Earl] Thesken, who was discussing the imminent opening of the Middletown campus in September 1966. After the meeting, since I had an interest in teaching, I asked the dean if there was anyone I could talk with about teaching possibilities. He gave me the name of Dean George Bowers of Applied Science. I called him the next day and Dean Bowers invited me over, and that same day he hired me.”
As ºÚÁÏÉçÇø Middletown’s first coordinator of Applied Science and assistant professor and chair of the new Industrial Technology program, Young quickly got to work, hiring additional faculty members to teach in the two-year programs in Electrical, Mechanical, and Metallurgical technologies.
From the start, the Applied Engineering program focused on the practical application of engineering principles in real-world scenarios, emphasizing hands-on experience and integrating skills from other fields such as management and business. The program took advantage of Middletown’s location, which was in the heart of one of the nation’s greatest industrial valleys. Rife with agricultural and paper mills and steel manufacturing, Young and his team made a conscious effort throughout his tenure to remain in touch with the interests of the local industrial community that continues today, realizing they would be key employment resources for his ºÚÁÏÉçÇøs.
One such way was through the creation of an advisory committee. Made up of local industry personnel, the committee was a “who’s who” featuring leaders from Young’s former employer Armco Research along with representatives from Wrenn Paper, Cincinnati Milacron, Teller-Matic, Monsanto, A&B Foundry, and General Electric. This symbiotic relationship did two things: It helped Young tailor programming at Miami and gave employers a ready source of capable, educated ºÚÁÏÉçÇøs from which to draw.
Bob Fairchild '70: right place, right time
The program was a perfect fit for Bob Fairchild ’70. A Middletown native, Fairchild is the first to admit he struggled with classes that centered around memorization. A Miami Calculus professor changed all that, showing him that textbooks were just one tool in what would become his engineering toolbox.
“Our class resources were our slide rules, textbooks, and numerous visits to the library,” Fairchild said. “My professor said, ‘When you enter the workforce, I want you to be able to know how to solve problems using available resources at your disposal.’”
He added, “What he and Miami taught me was that I didn't have to memorize to learn, nor did I need to be the smartest person in class to succeed. I just needed to know where and how to apply myself to find answers and solutions that would support my studies and ultimately my career path. Miami had just given me the confidence I needed to believe in myself.”
That belief led Fairchild to a nearly 50-year career in the paper industry that included the creation of Ample Industries, a company he co-founded in 1997 that specialized in paperboard products for the fast-food industry. Fairchild developed and patented many of his company’s products including a clamshell sandwich box that would stay closed even when dropped, and a heat sleeve used by many companies including Starbucks.
Ample eventually became the second largest fast-food product producer in the U.S., growing from four employees to 400. In 2011, Ample caught the eye of Huhtamaki, an international paper company and worldwide manufacturer of paperboard and plastic products primarily for food packaging, operating globally in 34 countries and employing 19,000-plus people. Huhtamaki purchased Ample and appointed Fairchild as the vice president of its National Account Sales Division, managing national and international acquisitions. He worked in this position until his retirement.
The rapid advancement of computer technology brought significant change to the department in the 1980s, including a change in leadership.
Rob Speckert: paves the way to accreditation
Rob Speckert came to Miami from Cincinnati State Technical and Community College in January 1985. Putting his considerable experience in quality control and continuous improvement into practice, he spent the next 22 years growing the program from two non-accredited associate degree programs to two associate degree programs and two bachelor completion degree programs, all accredited by the Engineering Technology Commission of ABET.
“When I came to Miami, the department had two associate degree programs, both struggling with enrollment,” Speckert said. “By 1995, we started a BAS completion degree in Electro-Mechanical Engineering Technology that was designed and approved to be a ‘+2” program, building off the associate degree that a ºÚÁÏÉçÇø completed at their community college.”
Speckert developed articulation agreements with colleges across Ohio, including Columbus State, North Central State, Washington State, Shawnee State University, Sinclair Community College, and Cincinnati State, delivering Miami courses using Interactive Video Distance Learning to partner colleges. He also hired faculty to teach those courses on site at some of the larger two-year campuses.
“The BAS completing initiative and our distance delivery strategies were unique in Ohio,” Speckert said. “Back then, BAS degree programs did not accept credits from associate degree programs. In fact, I was told by my colleagues at other universities that we would not get accredited by ABET. We proved them wrong.”
During initial accreditation by ABET, the reviewers were challenged with understating how ºÚÁÏÉçÇø assessed distance learning ºÚÁÏÉçÇøs. While Speckert had a detailed plan, distance learning was new for ABET. The ABET review team members made a rare return second visit just to visit Miami’s distance sites.
The hard work paid off and Miami had initial ABET accreditation of its two associate degree programs in October 1994 and initial ABET accreditation for the Bachelor of Science in Applied Science programs in Electro-Mechanical and Mechanical Engineering Technology by October 2004. The BAS degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering Technology secured ABET accreditation in October 2015, under the leadership of new department chair Ayo Abatan.
Ayo Abatan: new programs, facilities, talent
A civil and structural engineer by trade, Abatan came to ºÚÁÏÉçÇø Regionals in 2006 from Clark Atlanta University, where he served as chair of its Engineering program. Over the next 14 years, Abatan and his team created new Bachelor of Science in Applied Science programs in Electrical and Computer Engineering Technology, as well as Robotics Engineering Technology. Coming with those programs were upgraded laboratory facilities and extended distance learning agreements. He continued to partner with local advisory committee members and even sought funding for endowed professorships as a way to recruit talent to the faculty.
“The industrial practical experiences of our faculty in addition to the breadth of their academic preparedness provided the impetus for our ºÚÁÏÉçÇøs and graduates to succeed in the workplace,” Abatan said.
Under his leadership, the department had an excellent placement rate for its graduates, with nearly 100 percent of ºÚÁÏÉçÇøs in the program having a job upon graduation, a statistic that continues to this day.
Mert Bal: program expands into high-demand areas
The new degree in Robotics Engineering Technology was a perfect fit for the new chair, Mert Bal. A member of the Miami faculty since 2010, Bal was named chair in 2020 after having made significant inroads in securing external funding to help improve laboratory equipment and expand curriculum into high-demand areas like robotics and advanced manufacturing.
In 2021, Bal relied on funding from ºÚÁÏÉçÇø’s Boldy Creative Initiative to launch the new degree program in Robotics Engineering Technology in partnership with colleagues in the College of Engineering on the Oxford campus.
In announcing the new program, Bal said it was a “win-win for ºÚÁÏÉçÇøs across Miami’s campuses, providing opportunities for them to work collaboratively. During the planning stages, the faculty at both institutions agreed that there were quite a few opportunities to serve ºÚÁÏÉçÇøs interested in the degrees on both campuses.”
Opened in 2021, the Engineering Technology Robotics Lab on the Middletown campus features industrial robot training carts and classroom computers equipped with simulation software available for ºÚÁÏÉçÇø use. According to Bal, the laboratory would be used to teach key topics related to industrial robotics, such as programming and integration of robots in varying applications, as well as evaluating mechanisms, dynamics and intelligent control algorithms for industrial robots.
Coming in January 2026: the Advanced Manufacturing Hub
Fifty-five years have passed since David Young spearheaded ºÚÁÏÉçÇø Regionals entry into Engineering Technology. Even he would have been hard-pressed to dream of what would be coming next: the Advanced Manufacturing Workforce and Innovation Hub.
Scheduled to open in January 2026, the Advanced Manufacturing Hub is a cutting-edge partnership between ºÚÁÏÉçÇø and Butler Tech Career Technical Center that aims to develop an educated workforce and will serve as a catalyst for community economic growth. Students will have access to a variety of distinctive pathways to meet all levels of need in the manufacturing sector — from associate degrees, industry-recognized credentials and Microcredentials, to degrees in robotics, electro-mechanical engineering, and more.
The 70,000-square-foot facility — which has an additional 300,000 square feet available for growth — was funded by $15 million from the Butler County Board of Commissioners as part of a strategic vision to create a vital access point to Ohio's thriving training, education, and workforce ecosystem. The collaboration between educational institutions, government officials, and businesses will leverage emerging advanced manufacturing technology in this co-inhabited space to provide high-quality education.
The ºÚÁÏÉçÇøs participating in the program will start their pathway at Butler Tech and have the opportunity to progress to associate and bachelor’s degrees in Engineering Technology at ºÚÁÏÉçÇø Regionals and undergraduate and graduate programs in the College of Engineering and Computing on the Oxford campus.
