Practical AI Training

Miami Dade and other two-year colleges try to be nimble by offering training for AI-related jobs while focusing on local employers. Also, Intel’s business struggles while the two-year sector wonders if Republicans will cut funds for semiconductor production.

Making Sure AI Training Pays Off

Few community college graduates are likely to land AI-related jobs with top tech companies. Yet a growing number of two-year colleges are partnering with Big Tech to help students earn AI skills and credentials so they can work elsewhere in the rapidly growing field.

“We want to ensure that students are understanding this technology and have the opportunity to become credentialed and certified,” says Don Daves-Rougeaux, a senior advisor on workforce and economic development in the Office of the Chancellor for the California Community Colleges. “We don’t just want them to be impacted by the technology.”

Daves-Rougeaux spoke with reporter Lilah Burke about California’s deal with Nvidia, which aims to bring the chipmaker’s AI curriculum to students across the huge two-year college system. While many details about the partnership remain unclear, it’s likely to include a significant focus on Nvidia’s training of faculty members, Burke reports for Work Shift.

Miami Dade College is a pioneer with its certificates and degrees in AI and machine learning. MDC also is helping to lead the new National Applied AI Consortium, which is backed by the National Science Foundation. The community college enrolls roughly 1K students in AI courses.

Larger companies have greater capacity to employ engineers with four-year and advanced degrees in those fields, says Antonio Delgado Fornaguera, MDC’s vice president of innovation and tech partnerships. But he says community colleges are well positioned to prepare students for AI-practitioner roles in the workforce.

“Particularly with small companies, we have observed a substantial demand from business owners eager to integrate AI into their operations and engage with our students to develop AI solutions,” Delgado Fornaguera says.

MDC collaborates with companies to offer real-world, project-based learning to AI students. The college also incorporates projects from these employers into its AI applications course.

The Miami-based eMed is one of the college’s partners. With 1K employees, the digital healthcare company has seen 35% productivity gains from applying AI across functions like marketing, finance, and HR, Ken Finneran, eMed’s vice president of human resources, said during a recent webcast hosted by New America.

Finneran cited the affordability and convenience of community college programs, as well as the diversity of students. He also praised the stackability of MDC’s AI-related credentials and the practical, applied approach of those programs. 

“Community colleges are the most nimble,” said Finneran. “We are now training for jobs that don’t exist.”

While Big Tech may not hire community college grads, Delgado Fornaguera says partnerships with those companies are essential in building capacity for faculty to teach AI skills.

He points to cutting-edge, hard-to-duplicate resources from top companies, including coursework to help students prepare to earn industry-recognized certifications (Microsoft’s Azure AI Fundamentals and AWS Certified AI practitioner), discounts on certification exams or free access to certificates (Grow with Google’s AI content), and virtual labs with realistic environments for students to practice (AWS Academy).

In particular, Delgado Fornaguera says Intel’s AI for Workforce program has been essential in preparing MDC’s faculty to teach courses for associate and bachelor’s degrees in AI.

“The over 1K hours of content and prepacked courses with assignments, quizzes, and lab activities align perfectly with the courses developed in collaboration with the AI subject matter experts that are part of MDC’s AI Business Industry Leadership Team,” he says.

Intel helps community colleges ensure they have the right credentials and applied-AI pathways for students across industries, Anshul Sonak, who leads digital readiness program strategy for Intel’s global government affairs group, said during the New America event.

Just 2% of the U.S. workforce is concentrated in typical information and community technology roles, said Sonak. But he said AI increasingly is being used across many other job roles, including in HR, manufacturing, retail, and even running a flower shop. And the huge range of students community colleges serve is a major asset for the sector.

The Kicker: “Who’s best poised to really bring this to everyone?” Sonak said. “Community colleges can be the biggest agent of change.”

More From Work Shift

Worries About Intel and CHIPS Funding

As community colleges create applied-AI programs, many are wondering what will happen with $39B in federal subsidies and additional tax credits that are aimed at jump-starting the U.S. production of semiconductors, which power artificial intelligence.

Graduates of community colleges are expected to land thousands of the more than 125K projected new manufacturing and construction jobs under the CHIPS and Science Act. Intel, for example, has said that 70% of the workers who will staff its new fabrication plants will be technicians who don’t need four-year degrees. And the White House this week said that more than 80 community colleges have created or expanded programs to train students for semiconductor jobs spurred by CHIPS.

President-elect Trump has criticized the funding, however, calling it a bad deal: “We put up billions of dollars for rich companies.” He argued that the federal government could have imposed tariffs to make semiconductor companies spend more of their own money to build fabs in the U.S.

Congressional Republicans have given mixed messages about the law’s future, with some criticizing its childcare requirements or encouragements to use union labor. For example, House Speaker Mike Johnson said his party probably would try to repeal the legislation. But he quickly changed gears, saying he would instead like to “streamline” CHIPS.

Many observers think Republicans are unlikely to roll back the bill, given broad support for subsidizing advanced manufacturing. Even so, the Biden administration is rushing to complete agreements with semiconductor companies, reports Mackenzie Hawkins for Bloomberg. While 90% of the funding has been approved, the U.S. Department of Commerce has only announced one binding agreement so far.

Republicans and business groups have criticized the Biden administration for not releasing money for a law that was signed two years ago. Commerce officials counter that CHIPS was designed to withhold payments until companies hit milestones, including ones related to the development of facilities. That work has been slow, and several of the projects have faced delays.

Meanwhile, Intel is facing existential questions. With a pledged $20B in federal support, the company has committed to investing $100B to develop facilities across five states. But as The New York Times reported, Intel’s sagging business has raised worries about whether it can deliver on those promises. Meanwhile, the global semiconductor industry has hit recent speed bumps, with a major chip and GPU producer announcing layoffs this week.

“I’m sure all these companies would prefer that we just back up the Brinks truck of taxpayer money into their parking lot and deposit it into their treasury,” Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo told the newspaper. “But I can’t do that.”

Open Tabs

Short-Term Data
While states increasingly fund noncredit workforce programs, big gaps remain in even the most basic data on those programs at community colleges, according to a new report from the Rutgers University Education & Employment Research Center. The researchers analyzed five states—Maryland, New Jersey, Oregon, South Carolina, and Tennessee—and found that only two captured completion data for noncredit programs. Only Maryland tracks post-program wages.

Grades and Jobs
Academic performance is a modest predictor of how college graduates perform on the job, due to grade inflation and increasing differences between academic and work contexts, found a recent study from researchers at the University of Iowa. The meta-analysis had similar findings about high school grades for workers who did not attend college. Educators should consider how their curricula incorporate hands-on courses that help students practice occupation-relevant behaviors, the study concluded.

AI and Freelancing
After the introduction of ChatGPT, job postings for online freelancers in automation-prone roles related to writing and coding declined by 21% compared to manual-intensive jobs, according to a new academic study. Demand for graphic design and 3-D modeling roles saw a similar decline after the release of image-generating AI tools. The researchers also found no signs of demand rebounding, revealing a growing trend of job replacement.

AI and Desk Jobs
While executives are all in on AI, with 99% saying they will invest in the technology this year, uptake among desk workers is starting to cool, according to a new survey from Slack. Over the last three months, AI adoption rates stalled in France and the U.S. while excitement about AI dropped globally. The survey also found a persistent lack of training among employees, as well as suspicion that AI could lead to more busywork and an increased workload.

Recession Wage Loss
Graduates of relatively high-quality colleges had bigger earnings losses when they graduated into the Great Recession, according to a new research paper. The study also found that students from high-quality colleges are more likely to major in fields that are more adversely affected by a recession (STEM and social science) while students from lower-quality colleges are more likely to major in fields that are resilient over a business cycle, such as education.

Job Moves
Van Davis has been named executive director of the WICHE Cooperative for Educational Technologies. Davis is WCET’s chief strategy officer. He will replace Russ Poulin, the nonprofit’s longtime executive director.

Frank Dooley will step down at the end of the year as chancellor of Purdue University Global, a role he has held since 2020. Dooley was previously senior vice president for teaching and learning at Purdue University.

I’ve been on the road and unable to do much reporting. But thanks to Work Shift’s supporters, reporters like Colleen Connolly and Lilah Burke have carried the load. Thanks also to Ben Wildavsky, Michelle Van Noy, and Thomas Hilliard for their excellent contributions this week. —PF