Students join first ever PMMI ‘Summer Tour’

PMMI: The Association for Packaging and Processing Technologies will take a select group of packaging students and professors on a 6-day tour of packaging industry end users and manufacturers in the Chicago and Milwaukee areas in the “How It’s Packaged Summer Tour,” June 23-28, 2013.

“The summer tour was developed to give a select group of students greater access to the workplace and innovative designs they’ll see when they enter the workforce,” said Maria Ferrante, vice president of education and workforce development, PMMI. “These students are really going to get some great insight into what their future holds.”

The tour will take six college juniors and two professors from select PMMI partner schools through several PMMI member and end user plants.

The students and professors have also been selected to receive PMMI’s Future Leader and Outstanding Educator awards, respectively. PMMI’s Future Leaders Award seeks to recognize an outstanding pre-professional undergraduate student attending one of PMMI’s partner schools who has excelled academically and exhibits interest in advancing the packaging and processing industries.

PMMI’s Outstanding Educator Award honors those professors who demonstrate a dedication to the spirit of learning and teaching in the field of packaging and processing, and whose efforts continue to advance the packaging and processing industries as well as serve as an inspiration to others.

“These kids really are the next generation of leaders in our industry and this is a great example of the things that PMMI does to get the them excited about what packaging and processing have to offer,” said Timm Johnson, vice president of sales and marketing at Spee-Dee Packaging Machinery, Inc., and chairman of PMMI’s education and workforce development committee. “These kids are getting a first-hand look at the wonderful opportunities they’ll have with their education, and building bonds with the industry as well.”

Participation in the 2014 Summer Tour will be open to students at all 4-year PMMI Partner Schools. Students will be selected in a contest that will kick off at PACK EXPO Las Vegas 2013 (Sept. 23-25, 2013; Las Vegas Convention Center).

Future Leaders Award Winners:

• Derek Pincus, CalPoly
• Michael Grandinetti, University of Florida
• Alan Belcher, Clemson University
• Timothy Dehm, Rochester Institute of Technology
• Anthony Disanto, University of Wisconsin – STOUT

Outstanding Educator Award Winners:

• Felix Barron, Clemson University
• Robert Meisner, University of Wisconsin – STOUT

Participating Companies:

• ARPAC
• Nation Pizza and Foods
• Z Automation
• Power Packaging
• General Mills
• Herrmann Ultrasonics
• Triangle Package Machinery
• Cooper’s Hawk Winery and Restaurants
• Morrison Container Handling Solutions
• Spee-Dee Packaging
• Lake Front Brewery
• KHS USA
• Dorner
• Palermos Pizza
• MillerCoors
• PMI Cartoning