Workforce sector partners

Grow K-12 Outreach Programs

This project expands youth outreach and mentorship programs (serving 100+ students per year) that support middle school learners, particularly in underserved schools, while diversifying the STEM pipeline tied to shipbuilding. Specifically, the expanded Girls with Engineering Minds in Shipbuilding and Young Men Engineers Program opened in Hampton Roads, VA.

Manufacturing and Engineering Education Reimagined for All (MEERA)

MEERA expands and modernizes the DIB workforce by attracting and diversifying the next generation of skilled technicians through early exposure and competency-based education. It brings foundational manufacturing competencies from community college and high school education CTE pathways into K–12 programs, allowing students to reach proficiency earlier. MEERA also increases awareness of career and education pathways by creating a nationally scalable manufacturing and engineering education program for K–12 students and educators.

GSM/UMASS Industrial Engineering Scholarship

This project reduces tuition burden and pairs scholarships with co-ops and industry-driven senior design projects to broaden the industrial engineering pipeline by ~20 graduates per year into the MIB workforce.

STEM+M

This is a semester-long, hands-on middle school manufacturing course designed to build foundational skills, introduce manufacturing technologies, and improve perceptions by elevating the attractiveness and prestige of manufacturing careers through early exposure.

Social Media/Targeted Marketing Campaign

The MIB faces an awareness and understanding gap around maritime career pathways and training opportunities. In an effort to address this gap, this project delivers coordinated public relations, outreach, and digital marketing to spread awareness of maritime industrial skills training opportunities and associated career pathways in the Hampton Roads regional economy. By packaging and amplifying clear pathway information, the effort supports a more robust, sustainable recruitment funnel for the DIB workforce.

X-STEM

This project inspires K–12 students to pursue DIB career opportunities by educating teachers, students, and parents on workforce needs and career pathways that are often missing from conventional career services. It delivers X-STEM All Access, a free online program with national reach and reusable content beyond the period of Government investment, and Science Spark (in-person and online), targeting students with hands-on science experiences connected directly to real-world careers and community/national impact. The effort focuses on targeted regions (Gulf Coast, Great Lakes, California, and Indo-Pacific) while building broader nationwide awareness for future expansion.

Bird Inc.

According to Auburn University research, by 2033 our economy will need 3.8 million manufacturing jobs, and 1.9 million of those will be unfilled unless more people are inspired to pursue modern manufacturing careers. Without a future workforce, Government organizations will not be able to support projects of national importance. Bird Inc. is a middle school and manufacturing career promotion program designed to increase students’ awareness of and interest in STEM learning and manufacturing vocations. The project introduces students to manufacturing concepts, real-world applications, and career options, helping them see manufacturing as a viable, high-impact vocation.

DOW, Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) & Discovery Education Partnership

This collaboration aims to destigmatize industrial careers, engage communities early, and expand recruitment in non-traditional communities. It will amplify the complementary relationship between the DoW and the DEA to scale existing Operation Prevention resources and professional development, spotlight modern manufacturing and the value of skilled trades, and showcase the range of industrial production and applied STEM careers that support DoW capabilities.

Rural Indiana Workforce Development For Microelectronics (WDM-IN)

WDM-IN Uplands establishes clear workforce pipeline connections, meaningful experiences, and seamless transitions from education into the DIB. It uses vertically integrated, comprehensive K–12 through post-secondary components to increase U.S. capacity to produce microelectronics-skilled workers to meet DoW needs, while promoting ME-skilled manufacturing careers as prestigious and attainable.

JA K-12 Submarine Skills Pathways Program

A critical shortage of skilled industrial workers is constraining the DIB. This program addresses the gap through a comprehensive K–12 career pathways approach that introduces students to MIB trades and STEM skills connected to submarine manufacturing and shipbuilding. It engages schools and key influencers, students, teachers, and parents, to increase exposure to vocational and technical career options and clarify the education-to-career pathway. The effort is focused on Connecticut and Rhode Island, where it will build sustained awareness and interest to support long-term workforce readiness.

Workshop For Warriors (WFW)

The DIB lacks sufficient training pipelines to bring workers into defense-critical manufacturing jobs at speed and scale. Founded in 2008 and headquartered in San Diego, WFW is the nation’s largest advanced manufacturing training pipeline for veterans and is approved under DoW SkillBridge. WFW provides compressed training in welding and computer numerical control (CNC) machining, paired with nationally recognized third-party credentials and certifications. Through its IBAS partnership, WFW will expand welding training capacity and develop additional programs tailored to U.S. Navy workforce requirements.

Project MFG – National Workforce Program

The DoW faces a skilled industrial labor shortfall that threatens the ability to produce and sustain systems needed for modern military forces. Project MFG has emerged as a collaborative effort with communities, educators, and industry leaders to elevate the next generation of highly skilled trade professionals. The project is promoting the prestige of manufacturing, accelerating workforce training and the education pipeline, and collectively strengthening the broader manufacturing industrial base. It addresses these constraints by hosting a series of competitions that expand awareness and recruitment while aligning education and training to the day-one skill gaps that matter most.

Expand GOTEC

This effort expands the GOTEC Career Connections program into schools through coordination with the Institute for Advanced Learning and Research. The project establishes school activity schedules to launch the program, finalizes program design, identifies and procures necessary equipment, and markets the effort to prospective students, in alignment with the broader social media campaign.

New England Submarine Shipbuilding Partnership

The New England MIB faces significant trade and industrial skill gaps and lacks sufficiently coordinated regional training capacity. SENEDIA supports trades and industrial skilled workforce development for the New England submarine industrial base as a DoW SKILLBRIDGE program1. It executes this mission by facilitating partnerships and organizing the regional training network to efficiently address trades and industrial skills gaps. By aligning educators, training providers, and industry stakeholders around priority trades, the project reduces the risk of the Navy meeting production objectives by building a steady pipeline of qualified, employable talent.

Incentives for Transitioning Military and Spouses

Military families often make sacrifices as part of their service, and for many spouses, that includes their own career advancement. The Incentives for Transitioning Military and Spouses project creates and expands outreach and incentive programs that connect transitioning members and spouses to civilian employers and career opportunities. Leveraging a DoW SkillBridge program1, it supports structured transitions from military service into civilian roles through targeted engagement and employer-facing incentives that reduce hiring friction.

New England Defense Supply Chain Enhancement

Most educators lack access to costly industrial-grade equipment, experienced operators, and challenging DoW parts that are often proprietary, limiting their ability to build directly applicable, high-quality manufacturing curricula. This project addresses that gap by leveraging the new Advanced Manufacturing Center at Vermont Technical College (VTC) in Randolph, Vermont, using its equipment and operators to develop training and technical content on real DoW use cases in collaboration with regional stakeholders across the Northeast manufacturing supply chain. It engages regional DoW commands and suppliers to prioritize existing Army use cases, identify additional DoW-relevant component opportunities, and co-develop technical data packages. These packages meet use-case requirements, strengthening regional capacity, accelerating technology transition, and improving readiness to support defense supply-chain needs.

Interdisciplinary Center for Systems (ICAMS)

ICAMS at Auburn University is a hands-on hub that provides equipment, space, and expert support to train students and incumbent workers in advanced technology. Established in 2018, ICAMS’ efforts focus on helping small and medium manufacturers adopt systems, such as Industry 4.0 technologies, by reducing the barriers to learning and implementation, and collaborating with industrial partners, government, and others to expand technology awareness and training across the industrial base.

Accelerated Training in Defense Manufacturing (ATDM)

ATDM is a DoW SKILLBRIDGE program1 that develops and tests a prototype training platform to rapidly produce job-ready technicians for critical DIB manufacturing and sustainment positions. By modernizing and scaling training pathways and accelerating time-to-proficiency, the project expands the pool of qualified, skilled technicians entering the DIB. This helps stabilize production and sustainment capacity, strengthening readiness to meet Navy strategic requirements and reducing risk to delivery and maintenance schedules.

High Velocity Talent Continuum (HVTC) Regional Training

HVTC Solutions addresses systemic OIB workforce challenges affecting U.S. Army Materiel Command (AMC) / AMCOM by strengthening the end-to-end talent pipeline, from recruiting through training and qualification. The program focuses on expanding and diversifying recruitment channels, aligning training to depot requirements, and accelerating worker progression from hire to job-ready competency in critical depot roles.

The Technologist Advanced Manufacturing Program (TechAMP)

TechAMP is a workforce development program designed to close the technician-to-engineer gap in advanced manufacturing by creating industry-aligned pathways for incumbent workers to progress into intermediate technical roles and technical leadership. It addresses a persistent deficiency in the DIB talent market: too few workers combine technician-level practical expertise with engineer-level system understanding, while employers increasingly need technicians with stronger analytical skills and engineers with stronger shop-floor fluency. By delivering core competency curricula plus role-relevant specializations, TechAMP improves readiness for critical manufacturing roles and expands the regional pipeline supporting maritime and defense production.

Systems Engineering Technology (SET) Program

Universities are not adapting modern systems engineering training quickly enough to meet growing demand. As the U.S. Government implements MM-BSE to accelerate design, development, and test and evaluation, the demand for MM-BSE-proficient engineers is outpacing the available supply, creating a workforce gap that slows adoption and execution. SET promotes, teaches, and advances model-based engineering concepts and enabling technologies, including Industry 4.0, additive manufacturing, computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) automation, computer numerical control machining, and product lifecycle management systems. SET aims to close the talent gap by developing a new “systems engineering technician” skillset to be offered by community colleges nationwide.

Resilient Manufacturing Ecosystem

This program expands the existing Neighborhood 91 effort into a replicable RME model, integrating technology, processes, and “tech-know” into a connected regional production network focused on critical part needs. It targets gaps where advanced manufacturing knowledge and capabilities are dispersed and disconnected across organizations and regions, currently slowing additive manufacturing adoption and limiting scale due to skills/knowledge shortfalls and a distributed manufacturing value chain. The project codifies the ecosystem approach to enable duplication across CONUS and OCONUS, improving speed, reliability, and surge capacity to produce critical parts.

Defense Precision Optics Consortium (DPOC)

AmeriCOM enhances domestic capabilities in high-energy laser optics testing, deterministic polishing of optical components, and optical materials processing and metrology. The project advances manufacturing research and develops workforce training programs to build the specialized skills needed to produce, qualify, and scale precision optical components.

America’s Cutting Edge Network (ACENet)

ACENet is a growing national workforce network focused on strengthening U.S. machine tool technology and innovation. ACENet strengthens the manufacturing workforce pipeline by scaling hands-on training and applied research through a national hub network. ACENet conducts research to improve machine tool efficiency, build trainings for machine tool designers and operators, and develop next-generation machine tool CAM skills. ACENet hubs are active at educational institutions throughout the US2.

Manufacturing Model-Based Systems Engineering (MM-BSE)

MM-BSE will support the convergence of IT and OT systems and develop materials and initiatives that accelerate technology adoption for small and medium manufacturers. This program develops strategies and prototypes to implement Digital Engineering capabilities and delivers training for the DIB, the DoW, and educational partners.

INDOPACOM K-12 Regional Training Talent Pipeline

Systemic and institutional deficiencies are constraining the recruiting and training of the next generation of American workers needed to build, repair, and sustain defense-critical systems and parts in the Indo-Pacific region. This project develops a regionalized approach to build and sustain the future advanced manufacturing pipeline that supports the DIB. It implements K–12 education and training programs that develop foundational skills and create clearer on-ramps into downstream pathways. The effort aligns education experiences to the practical needs of defense manufacturing and sustainment, so students can see tangible career options earlier and prepare intentionally.

The following programs fall under this portfolio of investments: Science Spark, X-STEM, IACMI InnoCrate, TECHnista MEERA, IACMI ACENet, DES stem+M, SME PRIME and Skills Development System, and Project Manufacturing.

Critical Skills Loss Model

This project develops a forecasting model that projects the workforce from today’s state to a future state. Comparing projections against expected programmatic needs. It produces quantitative estimates of workforce program value to support investment decisions and tradeoffs across the NIIS portfolio.

Advancement in Manufacturing Upskilling Program

Aim UP modernizes and enhances Mississippi-focused training and workforce development to bolster national security. It develops educational tools, upskills faculty, and improves curriculum processes aligned to three goals: (1) engineering talent growth, (2) skilled trades training, and (3) workforce pipeline development. The project will establish a lab, enhance the engineering curriculum, and deploy targeted training programs to close MS DIB skills gaps.

Partnerships for Manufacturing Training Innovation – Advanced Manufacturing Center (AMC)

AMC establishes accessible, tailorable workforce development training pathways for the incumbent (currently employed) manufacturing workforce in Maine and the broader New England region, with a specific emphasis on upskilling Maine’s DIB workforce.

Professional Development For Hypersonic Materials

This initiative establishes a sustainable, targeted professional development program focused on the materials science and engineering fundamentals that underpin hypersonic performance, specifically ultra-high-temperature ceramics, ceramic matrix composites, carbon/carbon composites (when paired with advanced ceramics), and refractory metals and cements. Subject matter experts develop two delivery formats: full-day tutorials in ITAR-compliant environments and half-day tutorials via an online distance-learning platform, enabling both controlled delivery and broader reach.

Electronics Manufacturing and Assembly Collaborative (EMAC)

EMAC establishes a collaborative resource that connects manufacturers, workers, and job seekers to education and training programs for electronics manufacturing careers. It creates lower-cost, shorter-term training with immediate, sustained relevance to produce qualified candidates and upskill incumbent workers. It also develops, hosts, and promotes a centralized online resource directory that consolidates national workforce development tools, resources, and connections to help fill skills gaps.

New Horizons Increased Welding Capacity

Constrained welding booth capacity is limiting training quality and throughput at a time when the Navy needs more qualified welders to meet submarine build and maintenance demand. New Horizons Increased Welding Capacity addresses this challenge by expanding and modernizing the Hampton Roads welding training program to safely train more students in line with current technology standards. The project retrofits existing booths, adds additional booths and large-fabrication capability, and expands hands-on learning projects. It also redesigns the space to incorporate newer, advanced manufacturing techniques into the welding curriculum, directly supporting the workforce pipeline required to execute submarine schedules at scale.

Advanced Manufacturing Training Suite (AMTS)

A shortage of skilled manufacturing labor, especially in remote locations like Pearl Harbor, threatens the DIB’s ability to meet maintenance demands. AMTS addresses this challenge by implementing the full array of High Velocity Training Program solutions to produce more qualified workers faster and more consistently than the current local training ecosystem. The project builds and delivers role-aligned training across priority skill areas (e.g., ISM, OSM, welding, etc.) to close readiness-critical gaps. By linking training outputs directly to Navy workforce needs at Fleet Readiness Base Pearl Harbor, AMTS helps stabilize the talent pipeline and improve operational readiness.

Gulf Coast Skills Development (GCSD)

This project focuses on a localized training pathway pilot serving the broader MIB in the Gulf Coast, connecting proven programs at both the high school (PRIME) and community college (MI-WPC).

The Forge Facility

Overreliance on CONUS depots, with historically long lead times, creates significant readiness and supply-chain risk for operations in the Indo-Pacific. The Forge Facility project addresses this challenge by conducting technical assessments and developing requirements for a forward-based pilot plant at Schofield Barracks, HI. The facility is intended to rapidly test, validate, and scale promising technologies to accelerate the MIB’s adoption of innovations that improve productivity, readiness, and resilience.

TEQ Connect Workforce Analytics

This project enhances hiring for MIB trade roles by using employer network assessments to identify best-fit candidates and improve hiring outcomes across the network.

Shipbuilding Regional Industrialization Pilot (SHIP)

SHIP delivers data-driven, relationship-based roadmaps to scale regional workforce solutions and speed technology adoption across three regions (Connecticut, Michigan, Southern California). Topics span training, supplier growth, capability discovery, and productivity technology demonstrations. SHIP uses data analytics to address: (1) workforce growth, education, and training programs for current and future workforce; (2) supplier growth by identifying companies with critical capabilities that are not currently in the DIB/SIB; and (3) productivity improvement technology demonstration programs to enable MIB to evaluate and adopt new technologies for enhanced productivity. SHIP also informs stakeholder decisions to manage workforce risks and problems.

Submarine Workforce and Industrial Base Enterprise Integration Partner (SWIB-EIP)

SWIB-EIP is aDepartmentpriority sponsored and contracted through IBAS via General Services Administration (GSA) Assisted Acquisition Services to advance warfighter readiness by revitalizing the DIB through measurable efforts spanning workforce and supplier development, shipyard infrastructure, strategic outsourcing, and advanced technologies.

National Workforce (LOE 1)

This effort integrates and coordinates SWIB workforce development through the Talent Pipeline Management Tool and national deliverables, including a Training Gap Analysis, national and regional recruitment/training strategies, a standard job architecture framework, and a quality training framework, anchored by a national workforce hub to align regional efforts collectively.

SIB Workforce Enterprise Integration Sub-Projects

A shrinking U.S. manufacturing workforce and an accelerating Navy shipbuilding plan are creating a widening labor gap. This portfolio addresses the challenge through a set of sub-projects that apply innovative technology, workforce outreach, and analytics to increase recruitment and retention across the SIB. Each sub-project is designed to directly support the strategic submarine mission of 1+2+sustainment and align with the four IBAS statutory objectives outlined in 10 U.S.C. § 4817. Together, the portfolio improves how the SIB attracts, onboards, and keeps critical talent to meet near-term production demand and long-term sustainment needs.

SWIB Regionalization Assessments

This project conducts regional assessments to identify metro- and region-specific opportunities to rebuild the MIB. Deloitte engages local, state, and national stakeholders, suppliers, shipbuilders, workforce agencies, associations, small businesses, and nonprofits to identify gaps in workforce and supplier development, translate findings into scalable project designs, and strengthen maritime workforce and supplier pipelines across regions.