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Community colleges expand chip training as U.S. fabs face worker shortfall
The Associated Press reports community colleges are shortening semiconductor courses as SEMI warns of a possible 157,000-worker U.S. shortfall by 2030.
- New headline Was: “Community colleges rush to expand semiconductor training as labor shortage looms US chip industry”
- Our desk filed its story
Based on reporting by AP
Community colleges in Arizona and other chip-plant states are shortening semiconductor training into weeks-long courses meant to fill technician jobs at new U.S. factories, the Associated Press reported on Nov. 51.
The AP said the 2022 CHIPS Act has drawn more than $800 billion in announced U.S. fabrication investment, while SEMI talent lead Shari Liss put a possible shortfall at as many as 157,000 full-time semiconductor workers by 2030, with Texas, Ohio, California, New York and Arizona facing the sharpest gaps1.
Rio Salado College in Tempe opened a tuition-free 12-week manufacturing program this fall after talks with companies including TSMC and Intel, the AP said, with about a dozen students this term using virtual-reality drills and roughly 20 hours in Arizona State University clean rooms1.
The AP said the National Science Foundation, TSMC, Samsung and SK Hynix are funding school partnerships; SEMI counted more than 200 colleges and universities in similar coordination; similar short programs exist at Austin Community College and West Valley College in Saratoga, California1.
TSMC Arizona education consultant Pearl Chang Esau told the AP that experienced engineers from Taiwan and South Korea are training U.S. staff, and she estimated TSMC's northern Phoenix project could create about 25,000 jobs over the next decade, half of them locally hired technicians1.
Whether the shorter courses will match hiring needs at TSMC, Samsung and SK Hynix remained unresolved in the AP account1.
