By Robert Hoskins

Feb 6,2007_Stratum Global along with Intermec (NYSE: IN) and other industry leaders

have helped create an RFID (radio frequency identification) program at Oakton

Community College. Based in Des Plaines, Ill., Oakton's RFID program provides hands

-on experience in a simulated industrial warehouse environment to prepare students

for opportunities in the workplace.

Intermec provided its IF5 RFID readers with 700 series mobile computers and portal

antennas. Stratum Global, an RFID software provider and Intermec Honours Partner,

was lead on the project and provided its TagNet RFID software solution suite.

The Oakton RFID lab is designed to emulate a factory portal where workers move

tagged boxes or pallets through the passageway allowing inventory processing to

occur automatically. The curricula will prepare students for managerial and

technical positions within the transportation, warehousing and logistics industries.

In addition to gaining RFID technical expertise, the program will teach students how

to measure and communicate the business value of RFID implementations to non-

technical managers.

"As RFID adoption grows, businesses will need employees skilled in its design and

operation," said Robert Sompolski, dean of mathematics and technologies at Oakton

Community College. "Our objective was to partner closely with RFID industry leaders,

like Intermec and Stratum Global, to create a lab that will give our students

experience working directly with RFID software, hardware and infrastructure so they

will gain the knowledge that will enable them to implement real-world RFID systems.

Without the donations of time and equipment from the industry, this could not have

happened so quickly."

The program was partially funded by a U.S. Department of Labor Workforce Investment

Act Initiative grant provided through the Illinois Community College Board.

"When industries have access to a workforce that is already educated about RFID, it

makes advancing the technology that much easier," said Stratum Global Chief

Operating Officer Bill Hood. "The Oakton Community College RFID Center creates a

bridge between the education and the industrial community to accelerate the adoption

of RFID technology."

source:  www.bbwexchange.com