Seeding the Future: How NSF Funding Fuels Workforce Innovation at Community Colleges

Whether it is smart tractors in Virginia or virtual diesel labs in Alabama, today’s technical workforce requires a new kind of education. Employer needs—and the jobs they are hiring for— are changing fast. And at the forefront of this change are America’s community colleges, training the next generation of technicians for fields that didn’t exist a decade ago. But they can not innovate without capacity-building investments.

In 1992, Congress passed the Scientific and Advanced Technology Act and, as a result, the National Science Foundation (NSF) established the Advanced Technological Education (ATE) program. A game-changer for workforce readiness, ATE has granted over 500 community colleges a combined $1.5 billion since 1994. ATE emphasizes collaboration, bringing together two-year institutions and K-12 systems, industry partners, and economic development agencies. Community colleges are on the frontlines of workforce development, and federal support, especially through ATE program, is not just helpful. It is essential.

Take Virginia Western Community College (VWCC) in Roanoke, Virginia and Wallace State Community College (WSCC) in Hanceville, Alabama, as two powerful case studies. In Roanoke, students are infusing mechatronics into greenhouse functions and growing food without soil. In Hanceville, they’re using virtual reality to train for careers in diesel technology. Both programs are breaking new ground—and both are powered by NSF funding.

Building Ag-Tech Training from the Ground Up: Virginia Western Community College (VWCC) in Roanoke, Virginia

Agriculture is rapidly evolving, especially in states like Virginia, where it remains a top economic driver. Tractors are “smart,” equipped with advanced technology, sensors, and connectivity to enhance efficiency, precision, and productivity. And yet: no agriculture technology training pathway existed in Virginia’s community college system until Virginia Western took the lead after receiving an NSF ATE grant last year.

With support from the NSF ATE program and its Mentor-Connect initiative, Virginia Western built a new pathway—literally from the ground up. The funding allowed them to hire an outreach coordinator to build relationships with high schools and industry, design and build hydroponic teaching systems that integrate mechatronics, and develop a curriculum that prepares students for the realities of modern agriculture.

The college even updatedits own outdated greenhouse into a learning lab, where mechatronics students designed control systems to monitor temperature, light, and acidity levels—mirroring automation practices used in agricultural manufacturing.

“We’re teaching students to see agriculture through a tech lens—and teaching tech students how they can have a real impact in ag,” says David Berry, a faculty lead. “None of this would’ve happened without NSF funding.”

“We’re teaching students to see agriculture through a tech lens—and teaching tech students how they can have a real impact in ag,” says David Berry, a faculty lead at Virginia Western Community College. “None of this would’ve happened without NSF funding.”

Expanding Access to Diesel Tech Through Flexibility and Innovation: Wallace State Community College in Hanceville, Alabama

The diesel engine is more powerful, efficient, and durable than its gasoline-burning counterpart. Because of this, diesel engines power the nation’s heavy transportation and work vehicles. Diesel service technicians and mechanics repair and maintain the engines in equipment from trucks, buses, and locomotives to bulldozers, cranes, and combines. The demands of this job are increasingly technical: modern diesel service technicians use computers to diagnose and solve problems. Technicians must regularly learn new techniques to repair vehicles as automotive technology continues to advance.

Staff at Wallace State designed Diesel by Distance—now a national model for hybrid, flexible workforce training—during the pandemic with NSF ATE support. Diesel by Distance was designed to help women, adult learners, and working students who couldn’t attend traditional on-campus programs gain access the training they needed to get a good-paying diesel technician job. Diesel by Distance leverages hybrid instruction, virtual reality labs, weekend and evening competency demonstrations, and stackable certificates in everything from diesel engines to electric vehicle systems up to an Associate of Applied Science degree.

Wallace State is not just training diesel techs, but opening doors for people who were never part of the workforce before. That includes the program’s first enrollee: a single mother from South Alabama, sponsored by her employer, Altec. She attended tuition-free and now earns more than she did before the program. Her story is one of many—proof that smart, targeted federal funding can lift individuals and strengthen the workforce at the same time.

Why Federal Funding of NSF Matters

Community colleges operate on tight margins—this kind of innovation would be impossible without catalytic federal investment from the National Science Foundation. Virginia Western couldn’t have launched an Ag-Tech pathway without labor support and early investment. Wallace State couldn’t have built and scaled Diesel by Distance without federal funding for technology and outreach. There are hundreds of other colleges with programs like these that have benefited exponentially more students, local businesses, and community members.

If we want a future where American agriculture thrives and diesel fleets run clean, it won’t be built in corporate boardrooms or university research labs alone. Community college classrooms, greenhouses, and virtual reality labs are a critical component, where students are learning the tools of tomorrow today. Places made possible by smart, strategic federal investment bolster future-forward economic growth, mobility, and opportunity.

The NSF’s ATE program is not the only program supporting such initiatives. It’s fueling the engine of workforce innovation and the American innovation economy—one community, one campus, and one student at a time.