Trib Live reports last month that 24 fourth graders at Sloan Elementary School in Murrysville, Pennsylvania, used Hummingbird robotics kits to create automated dioramas. As part of a Carnegie Mellon University project combining STEM education with art, the students used materials to build a range of robots ranging from Iron Man to the Stay Puft Marshmallow. Today robotics kits like this can be found in thousands of classrooms around the world illustrating how robots are becoming a part of everyday life. Many people worry that robots will steal their jobs, but some of these children will grow up working alongside robots, or even working on them in some of the new career options that the robot revolution is creating. Here are some fields where robots are transforming the workplace in potentially positive ways.

Here are some fields where robots are transforming the workplace in positive ways.

Manufacturing Robotics

According to PricewaterhouseCoopers, manufacturing is at the forefront of the robot revolution with 59% of companies in this industry segment already using some type of robot. While some are taking the place of humans, others called “collaborative robots” are safely working alongside humans, increasing productivity and making jobs easier.

Baxter, one of the first collaborative robots, features arms with seven degrees of freedom and an ability to sense force giving it a range of motion and dexterity comparable to those of humans. This makes Baxter flexible enough to use in a wide range of applications. Baxter learns by mimicking human trainers on the job. The robot’s programming adjusts to the workplace. This versatility enables Baxter to be integrated with other automated machinery in the workflow. These qualities make Baxter suitable for repetitive tasks, including loading and unloading, material handling, machine tending, and packaging. Robots like Baxter make workers’ jobs easier and safer, handling monotonous and high-risk tasks while working seamlessly side-by-side with humans. , which will improve workers†jobs rather than replacing them, OTTO Motors argues. Manufacturing jobs will require humans who know how to work alongside robots, leading to a better-educated and higher-paid workforce. In addition to doing components of tasks that robots canâ€t do, manufacturing workers will get paid to supervise and maintain robots, performing tasks such as lubricating them, replacing

New manufacturing jobs will require humans to work alongside robots. That should lead to a better-educated and higher-paid workforce. In addition to participating with robots in completing tasks, manufacturing workers will also supervise and maintain them performing routine maintenance such as lubrication, replacing of O-rings, and electrical repairs. Educational programs, such as RAMTEC, are training the workers of the present and future to be prepared for these new types of manufacturing jobs.

Healthcare Robotics

Another field where robots are making jobs easier is healthcare. One of the most dramatic applications is robotic surgery. Robots such as Intuitive Systems, da Vinci surgical system received approval from the FDA in 2000. Today daVinci is used by surgeons to perform thousands of procedures. It is helping specialists to operate with clearer vision and greater precision than previously possible while making it surgery minimally invasive and safer for patients. Surgeons can use da Vinci to perform procedures remotely guiding the robot over a telecom link.

But robots are also helping healthcare professionals in other ways. For example, Robo Global reports hospital helper robots that deliver messages and samples within medical facilities, freeing up nurses and doctors to spend more time with patients. Other robots assist with elderly, autistic and paraplegic patients. At Georgia Tech specialized programs are being used to train healthcare professionals to work with robots. (See Robots to the Rescue for other biomedical robot systems and applications.)

Robot Operators and Robotics Technicians

Regardless of the job or industry, robots will require human supervision and maintenance creating new career opportunities for operators and technicians. Many robots will require supervision around the clock. If anything needs attention, a robot operator will step in. If a robot needs repair, a technician will have to be knowledgable about the intricacies of both the hardware and software.

Robot operators will require training in related areas of manufacturing, such as welding. According to PayScale, current hourly rates for this line of work average $13.79 U.S. Annual salaries top $47,000. Robot technicians average $18.55 per hour, with annual salaries of 67,000. Organizations such as Yushin University in Rhode Island, and George Brown College in Toronto, Ontario, are helping train robot operators and technicians for emerging career opportunities.

• jobs requiring repetitive acts such as those on assembly lines
• jobs in warehousing and logistical operations
• jobs requiring producing repetitive reports from massive amounts of data
• hazardous environment jobs
• transportation jobs

In all of these robots will outperform humans. That’s because the jobs involved require the operator to follow repetitive and specific rules, or a narrow range of processes. In the past week I have written a three-part series on education and the 4th Industrial Revolution. In these postings I have talked about the potential massive disruption we may encounter if we do not engage youth by teaching for the 21st century. That means robot proofing youth’s future.

A large number of studies indicate that up to one half of current jobs within advanced economies will be automated within two decades.

Marjory Blumenthal, a science and technology analyst, in a 2014 Pew Report on robots and the future of work writes, “In a given context, automated devices like robots may displace more than they create. But they also generate new categories of work, giving rise to second and third-order effects. Also, there is likely to be more human-robot collaboration — a change in the kind of work opportunities available.”

It is teaching to these new categories arising from an increasingly automated world that will be the key to robot proofing the current generation entering the world of elementary, high school and post-secondary education. That’s why robot proofing strategies are critical. Here are a few:

• Teach youth to excel in unstructured work. This is work where objects or subject matter are non-predictive. Robots are good at predictable tasks only.
• Encourage creative pursuits with cultural value. Robots can execute tasks but until now have no sense on how to appreciate the artistic or cultural significance of output.
• Develop skills around interpersonal intelligence including communication, negotiation, persuasion and social interaction. Robotic intelligence is based on switches that are “off” or “on,” or “if” and “then.”
• Robert Kennedy once said “Some men see things as they are and ask why.  Others dream things that never were and ask why not.” For the first sentence substitute the word “robot” for “men.” Dreaming is not something robots do.
• Teach not only cognitive skills but also adaptation skills. Robots can emulate routine cognition. Robots can do the task they have been built for. Robots cannot adapt.
• Encourage “outside-the-box” thinking. Sometimes humans can make quantum leaps in serendipitous situations producing breakthrough results. Robots don’t do serendipity.
• Teach youth to accrue baseline knowledge in a number of fields, but teach them also how to find and assess knowledge sources. Computers as resources of information make knowledgeable people that much more effective.
• And finally teach about the building and servicing of advanced robotic and computing devices. For sure youth with these skills will always have a job.

Related articles across the web

• Watch This Industrial Robot Teach Itself
• Educationist advocates use of robotics in schools