Three Kettering students were named winners of the 2011 Italian Machine Tool Technology Award. They were among just eight college students nationally to receive the award. Mitchell Krogman (Industrial Engineering), William Seldon (Mechanical Engineering) and Cory Hayes (Mechanical Engineering) will travel to Milan, Italy, as guests of the Italian Machine Tool Manufacturers Association. They will visit several Italian machine tool companies and take part in an advanced international engineering program at the Polytechnic of Milan between July 2 -16. The students entered papers on machining and machine tool topics in a contest as part of Dr. W.L. Scheller's IME 403 CNC Machining course during the winter 2011 term.

"It is really a joy to mentor Kettering students competing against students from other universities," Scheller said. "Of the eight awards in this technical paper competition, three went to our students. I think this really shows the caliber of the students here at Kettering University, as well as the maturity and knowledge they develop from applying what they learn on campus to practical problems for their co-op employers. Mitch, Cory, and Will are the best of the best!"

The three students were recently featured in a story by the Flint Journal.

Seldon said that he’s looking forward to comparing assembly lines in Italy to the ones he’s seen in the United States.

“It will be interesting to compare and contrast,” he told the Flint Journal. “One thing might work for one company and not for everybody, but it’s good to see how other people do things and how they approach the same problems differently.”

Scheller told the newspaper that he believes Kettering’s classroom, lab and co-op opportunities helped the students do so well in the competition.

“I believe that one of the reasons their papers were so high quality was that they have experience both in industrial settings, as well as the classroom.”