Today, to launch the third Investing in America tour, the Biden-Harris Administration is hosting a White House convening to officially kick off its Advanced Manufacturing Workforce Sprint—an intensive drive to build a diverse, skilled pipeline of workers for good jobs, including union jobs, in advanced manufacturing. The President’s historic Investing in America agenda—including the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, CHIPS and Science Act, Inflation Reduction Act, and American Rescue Plan—is creating strong demand for the skilled advanced manufacturing workers in clean energy, biotechnology, semiconductors, and more.

The nationwide sprint is bringing together employers, unions, education and training providers, community-based groups, philanthropic organizations, and state and local governments to take concrete steps to help more Americans train for and succeed in this growing field. Over the next two weeks, as part of the third installment of the Investing in America tour, President Biden and senior Administration officials will travel to communities across the country to highlight the impact of the President’s Bidenomics agenda—including how his Administration is creating manufacturing jobs in industries of the future. To celebrate the official kickoff of the Investing in America tour and the Sprint, President Biden will deliver remarks marking Jobs Day and National Manufacturing Day, citing the 800,000 manufacturing jobs created under his Administration. First Lady Jill Biden is also visiting Dutchess Community College in Fishkill, New York today to attend the launch of a new mechatronics training lab funded in part by the President’s American Rescue Plan.

The Advanced Manufacturing Sprint will continue beyond the Investing in America tour and through the end of 2023. The White House invites all interested organizations to join the Sprint by submitting a commitment at this link.

The Sprint builds on significant actions and investments that the Administration has already made to train students and workers for advanced manufacturing jobs and careers—many of which do not require a four-year college degree. In September alone, federal agencies awarded more than $200 million in projects that support the goals of the Sprint—including training the next generation of talent in the semiconductor industry, expanding high-quality workforce pathways into clean energy, and supporting experiential learning in biomanufacturing and other emerging occupations.

The convening coincides with the following new actions to expand high-quality pathways into good advanced manufacturing jobs and careers, including:

• The Department of Labor (DOL) is announcing an Advanced Manufacturing Registered Apprenticeship Accelerator Series that will support hundreds of employers to speed the development and launch of Registered Apprenticeship programs in high-demand occupations, such as industrial manufacturing technicians, robotics technicians, and industrial maintenance mechanics. Since the beginning of this Administration, the number of apprentices in advanced manufacturing Registered Apprenticeship programs has increased by 10 percent—and this effort will build on that growth.
   
• BioFabUSA is launching a new Registered Apprenticeship program for biofabrication technicians. This program will provide apprentices, including veterans, with the skills and knowledge essential to earn industry-recognized credentials and advance in a career in healthcare innovation.
   
• DOL will convene a national table of leading labor, industry and workforce organizations in the manufacturing sector and support them to develop and lift up workforce solutions that equitably build and grow the next generation of a manufacturing workforce. To support this cross-sector effort, the AFL-CIO Working for America Institute will work with other organizations to develop, scale, and adopt a first-of-its-kind pre-apprenticeship curriculum and standards to provide a pathway for workers and students to a variety of good manufacturing jobs and careers.
   
• The AFL-CIO Working for America Institute has created a new brief to offer best practices and real-world examples of workforce development—including union-community college collaborations—within the building trades and manufacturing industries.
   
• The American Federation of Teachers (AFT)—with its affiliates the New York State United Teachers and the United Federation of Teachers—is working with Micron to help students get ready for the thousands of new technical careers in the semiconductor industry. Through the cooperation, AFT and its affiliates are piloting a new framework, teacher training, and work-based learning opportunities. After piloting the framework, it will be made widely accessible—enabling other communities to scale this program that supports the alignment of education and workforce development programs, including for K-12 students and underrepresented students.
   
• The National Science Foundation (NSF) and DOL will work together to ensure the incorporation of equity, job quality, and worker empowerment in advanced manufacturing research and workforce development programs across the federal government, including by providing technical assistance to awardees as appropriate.
   
• The Cybersecurity Manufacturing Innovation Institute (CyManII) has committed to developing and launching a new education and training program for advanced manufacturing professions that will reskill up to 10,000 students through an Introduction to ICS Cybersecurity training for the manufacturing sector. This commitment supports the National Cyber Workforce and Education Strategy, in addition to the Sprint.

The convening will also highlight existing efforts to ensure workforce development programs effectively meet the needs of workers and employers, such as:

• The Investing in America Workforce Hubs—announced in five cities across the country in May that are seeing significant public and private sector investment and job creation in key industries—continue to make progress expanding pathways in advanced manufacturing jobs and careers in those regions. For example:
  
  • In the Pittsburgh Workforce Hub, the Advanced Robotics for Manufacturing (ARM) Institute and New Century Careers will launch a new rapid short-term, employer-driven training program to help dislocated workers re-enter the workforce in good quality, high-demand manufacturing jobs.
     
  • In July, in the Columbus Workforce Hub, Columbus State Community College announced that it will work with allies across the state to quadruple the number of students trained for engineering technology jobs over the next five years.
     
• In August, Siemens’ non-profit arm, the Siemens Foundation, committed $30 million to fund EVeryone Charging Forward, an initiative to advance inclusive workforce development in the EV charging sector with a focus on accessible training opportunities in underserved and underrepresented communities.

Recent federal investments to support advanced manufacturing workforce development include:

• In September, NSF announced nearly $100 million in funding including with support from the CHIPS and Science Act and across programs that push the frontiers of research, expand workforce development and experiential learning, and support industry collaboration to ensure that the future manufacturing workforce is developing skills needed for today and tomorrow.
  
  • The NSF Future of Semiconductor (FuSe) program, a public-private partnership with Intel, IBM, Ericsson and Samsung to train the next generation of talent in the semiconductor industry, announced $45.6 million in awards for 24 research and workforce development projects across 47 institutions.
     
  • The NSF Future Manufacturing program, which makes targeted investments in advanced manufacturing research and workforce development, awarded $35 million to 21 projects across 40 institutions in 25 states for a variety of research and workforce development programs, including manufacturing in space and underwater, AI-based manufacturing, and biological therapeutics. Over the past four years, this program has supported an estimated $137 million in awards.
     
  • The NSF ExLENT program, a first-of-a-kind training initiative to provide current professionals in any field an experiential learning opportunity that builds the skills and competencies they need to pivot into careers in technologies critical to the nation’s long-term competitiveness, announced the inaugural project cohort of $18.8 million to 27 teams working to build cooperation between research and workforce development in microelectronics, biomanufacturing, energy, and other emerging occupations. 
     
• Last week, DOL awarded $94 million in Building Pathways to Infrastructure Jobs funding to 34 grantees, 30 of which will target renewable energy and transportation sectors that can include advanced manufacturing occupations.
   
• This summer, DOL awarded 19 states more than $35 million through the State Apprenticeship Expansion Grants that will focus on advanced manufacturing as a target sector for expanding Registered Apprenticeship programs.
   
• In September, the Department of Defense awarded six Defense Manufacturing Community Support Program (DMCSP) grants totaling approximately $30 million from the Office of Local Defense Community Cooperation. The DMCSP makes long-term investments in critical skills, facilities, workforce development, research and development, and small business support to strengthen the national security innovation base.

During the convening, Lael Brainard, Director of the National Economic Council, Neera Tanden, Director of the Domestic Policy Council, and Dr. Arati Prabhakar, Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy will join senior leaders from companies, unions, community colleges, Manufacturing USA institutes, and other organizations to discuss how to leverage the Sprint to continue to build collaborations to enhance the quality of advanced manufacturing jobs and ensure workforce development programs effectively meet the needs of workers and employers.

The Biden-Harris Advanced Manufacturing Sprint builds on the Administration’s prior workforce sprints, which have driven commitments to equitable workforce development and job quality improvement to address critical needs. These include efforts to expand Registered Apprenticeships in trucking and cybersecurity, and to build pathways into good jobs and careers in broadband, electrification, and construction through the Talent Pipeline Challenge. It also supports the goals of the plan to expand education and training opportunities to biotechnology and biomanufacturing released in July.