By Hannah DiPalomares and Em Jankauski
LEMONT, Ill. – The Battery Workforce Challenge collegiate competition is officially entering its sophomore season. BattChallengers will head to the Detroit metro area this month for the Fall Workshop, held Oct. 29-Nov. 2.
Here students will present their strategies for building partnerships with vocational colleges, enhancing their chances for success in the ongoing competition.
“We can hardly wait to have our students back in action again,” said Ajay Gnanasekaran, director of the BattChallenge. “This year’s fall workshop provides our university and vocational students a real opportunity to gain real-world competencies and skills from the industry’s subject-matter experts. It also marks a huge milestone in the competition with teams receiving key fobs for their Ram ProMaster EVs.”
A plenary session will kick things off featuring Michael Laughlin, co-headline sponsor U.S. Department of Energy’s technology manager for the Vehicle Technologies Office’s Technology Integration Program; Tim Grewe, Stellantis’ propulsion system vice president of battery cells, modules and packs; Les Alexander, Battery Innovation Center’s CEO; Gnanasekaran; Scott Sullivan, Eaton’s technical strategy lead; and Dana Bubonovich, Volta Foundation’s director of marketing and communications.
The true highlight of this year’s fall workshop will be a visit to co-headline sponsor Stellantis’ Chrysler Technical Center, where students will participate in a ride-and-drive event experiencing several of the automaker’s EVs. They’ll also get to go on a dome tour exploring several of the automaker’s well-known vehicles and a benchmarking tour where they’ll get to explore the EV battery packs broken down from other automakers.
Additionally, teams will receive their key fobs for their 2024 Ram ProMaster EVs during the Nov. 1 Key Ceremony, where Ram brand CEO Chris Feuell plans to motivate the teams before they get to explore their teams’ vans for the very first time.
Later that evening, teams will get unwind with a team appreciation night where they’ll bowl for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Southeast Michigan. Competition organizers donated $3,500 to BBBS on behalf of its students and faculty. Altogether, organizers hope to raise more than $5,000 for BBBS and have invited sponsors to contribute to bowl alongside them.
That’s exactly what Ryan Sewell, a University of Nevada, Las Vegas undergraduate engineering student, is looking forward to.
“I’ve built quite a relationship with many of the members of other teams, and I look forward to seeing them again as well as build further relationships with other teams,” Sewell said. “I really enjoy speaking to people I’ve met both with matters pertaining to (the) competition, but more so in a personal matter and becoming more acquainted (with them) on a personal level.”
The workshop will conclude with subject-matter expert training sessions covering various topics, such as automotive diagnostics, software simulations, battery recycling, the fundamental principles of LEAN, agile methodologies and a social media power up to promote each team’s efforts.
But for students like Sewell, the workshop is so much more than an excellent learning opportunity; it’s a formative time to build life-long connections.
“I look forward to gaining and building my relationships with students I’ve bet from other schools, but also with the sponsors, organizers and other Stellantis personnel to grow my professional network and personal relationships,” Sewell said.
