Minding the gap: Laurentian University to meet mining industry's needs.

• Author: Kelly, Lindsay
• Position: SUDBURY

Discovering a business's competitive advantage, global marketing, export education, expanding market access: they're the goals of the Sudbury Area Mining Supply and Services Association (SAMSSA), but they could easily be the founding principles of the Goodman School of Mines at Laurentian University, according to its president.

Dominic Giroux was the guest speaker at SAMSSA's annual general meeting Dec. 4, and he outlined the scope and aims of the new mining school, which was announced last year and is expected to get underway in 2013.

According to industry statistics, 40 per cent of mining-industry workers are expected to retire over the next few years, leaving a deficit of 60,000 to 100,000 workers across the country Laurentian aims to close that gap by offering education in mining-related programs that will bolster Northern Ontario's existing mining cluster and boost the number of skilled workers in Canada.

Canvassing SAMSSA members, Laurentian found business owners appreciated the technical skills of engineering and earth sciences grads, of which there is a current demand, but they also voiced a need for executive programs in the areas of project management, business acumen, and international business.

The mining school will address this need by creating new programs that cut across traditional disciplines, Giroux said.

"Essentially, what the Goodman School of Mines will do is not only look at the needs of our undergraduate students that are here for three, four or five years, it's really looking at the needs of those employees for the next 40 years," Giroux said.

What the school won't do is delve into research, since there are already several facilities in the city that excel at that, Giroux said. The Goodman School of Mines' sole focus will be education.

"The distinctive feature of our students is that many of them come from mining families--their father, uncle or brother has worked in the mines," Giroux said. "And when we talk to industry, nationally and internationally, we say we're not training mining grads to go work on Bay Street--some of them do and are very successful--but really our focus is to meet the needs of industry."

Giroux credits Dick DeStefano, SAMSSA's executive director, with planting the idea for the school of mines four years ago. As the pair sat down for a drink, DeStefano challenged Giroux, who was only six months into his role as president...