SMS, Arkansas Northeastern College to open center for steel technology training in 2019

Left to right: Dr. James Shemwell, president of Arkansas Northeastern College; Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson; and Doug Dunworth, president/CEO of SMS group North America.

Steel producer SMS group North America and Arkansas Northeastern College (ANC) have signed an agreement creating the Arkansas Steelmaking Academy (ASA), which will begin offering training in 2019.

With the opening of Big River Steel, northeastern Arkansas has one of the highest regional concentrations of steelmaking in the U.S. In addition, SMS group opened a workshop in Osceola, Ark., in 2017 to serve clients such as Nucor Steel, Big River Steel, Tenaris, and TMK-IPSCO locally. Until now, SMS has offered steel technology training only in Germany, but the partnership will make ASA a training hub for North America, the company states.

The ASA will be housed in ANC’s 92,500-sq.-ft. Center for Allied Technology, currently under construction and scheduled to open in August 2018.