With just three weeks to go before the UK’s premier manufacturing technologies showcase kicks off, the MACH 2018 team have announced their full plans for Education and Development Zone.

The Education and Development Zone will serve as a base for student visitors, as well as housing some exciting cutting edge educational projects. Over 3500 students attended MACH 2016 and the organisers are hoping for an equally as successful show this year.

Students and their teachers can register to receive free guided tours of the MACH 2018 site, which will be led by apprentices from MTA member companies, enabling students to gain an in-depth insight into the industry. In a change to previous years, parents and guardians are also welcome to register their children (over the age of 11) as visitors and come along to see for themselves the future of manufacturing.

In the Education and Development Zone there will be an opportunity for young people to take part in exciting hands-on activities: Build your own drone; coding a robot to navigate a driverless car; designing and programming robots; immersive virtual reality environments and the chance to programme and use some of the latest machine tools.

There’s a special focus on encouraging girls into engineering at this year’s MACH including Siemen’s inspirational See Women show (13 April) and a People like Me sessions run by national charity Women in Science and Engineering.

James Selka CEO of Manufacturing Technologies Association (MTA) said “Education and Development is a massive part of what MACH 2018 is about. We know that Engineering faces a huge skills gap and in order to bridge that we need to attract new talent into the industry. We also know that manufacturing suffers from an image problem. The state of the art technology on display at MACH provides an opportunity to excite and enthuse young people and the E&D Zone can help educate them about the reality of modern manufacturing and the careers that are available for them within it.”

To register, and join the thousands of people attending the UK’s premier manufacturing technologies event this April, just follow this link.