The Industrial Distribution Program at Texas A&M University celebrated its 50th anniversary Sept. 27-29 with a weekend-long series of events in College Station, Texas.

More than 1,000 people—students, former students, distributors, manufacturers and trade association representatives—attended. Highlights included a dinner, golf tournament and ribbon-cutting ceremony on the program's new Bosch Rexroth-R.C. Womack Fluid Power Laboratory.

ID program director Dr. Barry Lawrence said he was pleased but not surprised by the large turnout.

“The program has a very loyal student base as well as a loyal sponsor base,” Lawrence says.

Texas A&M's industrial distribution program focuses on sales, engineering technology and supply chain management. And its Thomas and Joan Read Center for Distribution Research and Education is the only distribution research center at any university in the country, Lawrence adds.

“The program is famous for its undergraduate program and we're very proud of that,” Lawrence explains. “It's also famous for its continuing education and now famous for the research center. We've been able to leverage those together.”

The program has about 500 students, a level school officials say meets the recruiting needs of its corporate partners. Those companies, which were listed as “Gold Sponsors” for the 50th anniversary celebration, include Crawford Electric, Rockwell Automation, Hydraquip and Wilson Supply.

“There is a correlation between the most successful recruiters and the companies that support the program,” Lawrence says. “Our partners work very hard with us in making this program a success.”

The industry's need for well-trained young talent is boosting the importance of Texas A&M's program and administrators say they are thinking about expanding it, but will do so cautiously.

“As it is, we're now almost twice the size of the next largest [industrial distribution] program,” Lawrence says. “I understand how the industry needs more people but, at the same time, we're trying to balance [things].”

These days, the program is getting more second-generation applicants, Lawrence explains. Many are freshmen whose parents attended the school or whose parents work in industrial distribution and have hired program graduates.

“So we get someone entering the program who did not get here by accident,” he says. “They knew they wanted to come here and they knew why.”

The ID program is part of Texas A&M's college of engineering, an important advantage, Lawrence says.

“We've always paid close attention to our engineering core,” he explains. “You have to understand the product in order to understand the supply chain.”