Center for Transportation Workforce Development (CTWD)

Highway Construction Workforce Partnership: Collaborating to Identify, Train, and Place a Skilled Workforce

Federal Highway Administration (FHWA)’s Center for Transportation Workforce Development has formed some important partnerships to tackle the worker shortage in highway construction. The Highway Construction Workforce Partnership (HCWP) brings together FHWA, the U.S. Department of Labor Employment and Training Administration (ETA), the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO), the Associated General Contractors of America (AGC), and American Road & Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA) to identify, train, and place workers into highway construction jobs.

FHWA hosted four webinars in FY20 to share best practices and success stories related to the 12 pilot HCWP locations. The first webinar provided an overview of the HCWP and the second discussed the Los Angeles and Arizona pilot programs. The third webinar was about the Public Workforce System, and the last webinar detailed workforce development in the asphalt industry. The webinars are located on the HCWP website: #RoadsToYourFuture. A new webinar series is scheduled for FY21.

Further, FHWA interviewed HCWP partners and produced a 14-part video series that included hiring insights from the partner organizations, FHWA, and Department of Labor perspectives. Nicholas Lalpuis, Regional Administrator for the ETA, shared, “Where there’s job growth and where we see projections of jobs and careers that are going to grow over the next 10 to 15 years, let’s get these individuals trained and skilled to meet that demand.” Others from partner organizations, higher education, workforce boards, and departments of transportation spoke about the benefits of the HCWP. The videos are located on YouTube and on the HCWP website, and have received over 850 views. FHWA also shared clips of the videos via social media channels like Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

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Another Successful Year for Eisenhower Program

The Dwight David Eisenhower Transportation Fellowship Program (DDETFP) provides funding for students to pursue advanced degrees in transportation-related disciplines. Since 1983, the DDETFP has awarded more than $53 million to the brightest minds in the transportation industry. From this investment, whether supported through USDOT grants or through the FHWA partnership with the TRB Minority Student Fellows Program, fellows have pushed for innovative change in multimodal areas from highway infrastructure to aviation to maritime, making the industry more effective and efficient. Fellows pursue careers in academia, private industry, and public service, becoming leaders across the nation.

Fellows, faculty advisors, and staff gathered for a group photo during the DDETFP Research Showcase
held during the 2020 TRB Annual Meeting in Washington, DC. Photo source: FHWA.

For the 2019 academic year, FHWA awarded over more than $1.7 million in grants to 216 students attending institutions of higher education across the country. During the January 2020 TRB Annual Meeting, FHWA hosted the 27th Annual DDETFP Research Showcase, with more than 200 students, along with many faculty, participating in the events. The DDETFP Research Showcase provided an opportunity for 17 graduate student lectern presentations and 60 poster presentations on transportation-related research. We appreciated the time devoted by the TRB Executive Director Neil Pedersen and FHWA Executive Director Tom Everett, along with several other FHWA Leaders, to share their perspectives and support the program events. In late 2020, the DDETFP program transitioned to the Office of Administration in order to align with FHWA’s recruiting efforts. The goal is to introduce FHWA as an employer of choice to all DDETFP fellows.

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Reintroducing… The Center for Transportation Workforce Development

There have been many changes in the three years since the Center for Transportation Workforce Development (CTWD) was formed, including new programs, updates to existing programs, and staff changes. To rebuild awareness, CTWD created and hosted a two-part webinar entitled “A Reintroduction to the Center for Transportation Workforce Development” for FHWA civil rights specialists in June 2020.

The two one-hour sessions provided an overview of CTWD’s programs, introduced the center’s staff, and focused on how CTWD can help division civil rights specialists better administer workforce development programs and improve outreach in their respective States. The webinar was attended by representatives from all FHWA division offices and the Resource Center.

The work of the center spans the continuum from K-12 to professional/practitioner. CTWD programs include:

• K-12
  • National Summer Transportation Institute (NSTI)
  • Garrett A. Morgan Transportation Technology Education Program
• Professional / Practitioner
  • Highway Construction Workforce Partner (HCWP)
  • OJT/SS
  • Training Education Deployment Program

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