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At Ferris’ National Elastomer Center for Plastics and Rubber Technology, Kathleen Frank displays rubber products and materials of the trade, from raw natural rubber that costs about $1 a pound, to raw Fluroelastomer used in spacecraft parts, which can cost in excess of $3,000 a pound.
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    At the ADAC plastics factory in Muskegon, Mich., a door handle is being made for a Ford Taurus. A worker at the plant expertly controls the machine as molten plastic is forced under enormous pressure into the intricate mold. The person responsible for this process isn’t what most people would expect. It’s 21-year-old Margi Pawlowski, a dual Rubber and Plastics Engineering Technology major in Ferris’ College of Technology.
    “I picked the Rubber and Plastics programs because I wanted to go into something that was a challenge, especially for females,” says Pawlowski, who started as an intern at ADAC before being hired full-time.
    The Plastics program at Ferris is well supported by the industry and widely recognized as one of the best in the country. It is so highly regarded that industry leaders came to Ferris asking the COT to develop a similar program for rubber, resulting in the only four-year Rubber Engineering Technology program in the country.
    “I think I’ll be the fourth or fifth female to graduate with a bachelor’s in Rubber in the entire country,” notes Pawlowski.
    Students in the Rubber and Plastics programs are faced with unique opportunities. Plastics students learn the latest in processing, computer design for product and tooling development, material performance testing, product development, hydraulics, chemistry electronics, CAD and much more. Rubber majors learn product design, manufacturing processes, mold construction and management skills. Students in both programs get to work on machines actually used in the industry in classes that are hands-on and lab intensive.

A Special Kind of Woman
    While the rubber and plastics industries are still male dominated, women are quickly realizing there are many opportunities for them in these fields. And the industries are scrambling to hire women. The starting salary for a Ferris rubber graduate with a bachelor’s degree is typically about $45,000. Salaries in excess of $100,000 per year are not unusual for those with a few years of experience in the field.
    However, it takes a special kind of woman to succeed in this type of labor-intensive field. Women must be strong both mentally and physically.
    “Women have to prove that they can do the work,” says Pawlowski. “Men sometimes think that women aren’t physically capable. They don’t expect that I want to get dirty or put on jeans and a t-shirt and climb underneath a press with a wrench.”
    Kathleen Frank, an RET major, agrees, “For a while there was some teasing, but I can hold my own. I didn’t feel like I was being harassed or anything, but some of the girls can’t take it. This field takes a different breed.”
    And these women are making a difference. Frank recently planned the first-ever Rubber and Plastics career fair that brought in 240 high school students to tour the National Elastomer Center for Plastics and Rubber Technology, experience laboratory demonstrations, question an alumni panel and see industry exhibits. Frank, with assistance from the Rubber Manufacturers Association, received a grant from the National Association of Manufacturer’s Center for Workforce Success for the program.
    Frank also was asked to give a presentation about the career fair in Las Vegas at the RMA’s annual meeting. Her presentation will be distributed to other colleges and universities to help them duplicate the fair’s success and draw students to the industry. Additionally, while at the RMA annual meeting, she was interviewed by the History Channel for a documentary on the history of rubber.
    Frank graduated from the Ferris RET program in May and already had a position lined up at Avon Automotive, which makes radiation hoses, fuel filter hoses and more. At Avon, Frank will be in a two-year training program where she’ll cycle through different disciplines, starting with materials development, readying herself for a position in management.

The World of Rubber and Plastic
    Because of the programs’ beginnings, Rubber and Plastics majors receive a great deal of industry support, both in the form of donated supplies as well as scholarships and other help.
    “I received a scholarship from Avon Automotive,” says Frank. “They awarded me $5,000 a year for four years and in exchange I worked for them in the summers, so I did my required internships with them.”
    The world of the rubber and plastics industries is a different place, and these women have some advice to share with future females who might be interested.
    “The rubber industry is very open to women, and currently there are not that many women in management positions,” says Frank. “I’ve been told by several top executives, ‘You’ve got it made, being in this program and being a woman.’”
    “You really have to stand your ground, show the guys that you can do the work, and you’re willing to get dirty,” says Pawlowki. “Sometimes you have to mentally push yourself to do something, but you’ll earn respect.”
    Frank certainly has been willing to push herself.
    Looking at one of the Elastomer Center’s showcases displaying different kinds of rubber and plastic (as well as photos of some pretty funky clothing made from recycled rubber), Frank points out a long blue tube being used as an example of a product made from methyl silicone rubber.
    “That’s a Bougie Dilator. I used to use those all the time in surgery,” she says.
    That’s because for 10 years, Frank was a certified surgeon’s assistant in the Army and used Bougies in cases of constriction of the esophagus.
    Now she has the knowledge and skills to make them as well as use them. Given the training required, that makes her perhaps the only person—and almost certainly the only woman—in the country with that particular skill set.
    In the history of rubber, that would seem to make her worthy of at least a footnote all to herself.