'Natural transitions'

“The problem we were called to solve hasn’t gone away,” Task Force Movement (TFM) Co-Chairman Dan Kunze stated early in the TFM Summit at the New Orleans Ernest N. Morial Convention Center Aug. 21; “it’s actually bigger.” He was speaking about the need for employees in critical U.S. industries, including those touching on national security – delays in delivering Navy ships can be put down to a lack of workers. TFM, a White House initiative, launched in April 2022 with the goal of using public-private partnerships to get the military-connected community trained, credentialed and into those industries as quickly and painlessly as possible.

This year’s summit, which has been held at Legion national conventions for several years – the organization has a seat on the TFM Steering Committee – found the initiative at a crossroads. Although it is apolitical, 2024 is an election year, and the outcome has the potential to significantly alter the landscape TFM is working in; Kunze referred to them as “natural transitions.” During the breakout sessions on Aug. 22, Chairman Patrick Murphy said a roadmap will be worked on this fall, but touted their standing relationship with the bipartisan National Governors Association. This will be even more important as TFM expands its work with state models like Illinois’ for credentials and careers. Another future focus will be the defense industrial base, sinking into which Kunze added is “what we really need to do,” and getting the right leaders and stakeholders in place.

Patrick Nemons is the director of safety administration for the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, and the Department of Transportation’s (DoT) appointee to TFM. He said that in 2021, 72% of goods in the United States were delivered by truck – sometimes it’s the only way to move them. “Time is money,” he said, “and for these truckers that’s reality.” DoT gives grants for innovation in the field, and has stood up task forces for different trucking populations and concerns: “not just talking at people, but listening to them.” The latest number on the industry’s labor shortage: 80,000.

Part of the defense industrial base is the maritime industry. TFM’s new maritime chairman is Ed Lewis, vice president of business development at the Maritime Institute, which has campuses in Virginia, Washington state and California. The institute offers 145 different courses, reflecting the breadth of the industry. Its Maritime Boot Camp offers 28 days of mentoring, soft skills and preparing students for interviewing as well as hands-on learning. The last 30 years have seen a sizable reduction in the national fleet, which leads to a reduction in shipyard capabilities; as Lewis, who served 32 years in the Coast Guard, put it, “we could not do the Gulf wars again with our lift capabilities.” 

The institute is in a “sea of other schools,” but Lewis is pursuing a TFM-branded recruitment event in Virginia that will reach the large military-connected community there. The industry is in need of everyone from trade school instructors to tower workers for wind farms, but needs everywhere are acute; it is a full cycle behind on submarines. TFM Executive Chairman Elizabeth Belcaster concluded, “look at what happened in Baltimore (the Dali wreck) – this is a national security issue.” A TFM maritime report is scheduled for release in January.

Another new TFM focus is aviation. Its chairman is Chris Moore, an airline representative for the Teamsters, which has 1.3 million members in the industry. Jeremy Cooper, senior manager of United Airlines’ Calibrate in-house apprenticeship program, said United doubled down on growth during the pandemic, the only airline to do so, and is anticipating the arrival of 200 new Boeing aircraft. He believes about 10% of their workforce are veterans, and touted the Technician Pathway Program as an opportunity for transitioning servicemembers to get their foot in the door.

Calibrate solves several problems aspiring workers have with aviation training; apprentices are issued Snap-on tools, which can be expensive, free of charge, and in two or three years they can graduate with a “significant bump” in pay. Even before this, the Aviation Basics program offers six weeks of hands-on training to see if students want to pursue the other programs. To sum up the industry’s needs, he offered that Boeing estimates it will need 716,000 new Airframe & Powerplant (A&P) technician positions filled by 2043; more than 40% of its workforce is currently eligible for retirement.

Speakers also touched on the cyber industry, especially how artificial intelligence (AI) is impacting it and how that is affecting training and credentialing efforts. Chris Etesse, CEO of Future Cyber and TFM’s cybersecurity senior adviser, stated that there are currently 450,000 open cyber jobs in the United States, 200,000 of which require clearance; in fact, the security behemoth Halliburton suffered a breach Aug. 21. He described Security Operation Centers (SOCs) across the country as “like giant call centers right now.” And transcriptions of help calls taken are going into AI bases to build its knowledge base. The company Beacon AI is using the technology to develop educational e-books that can be updated in real time. But programs still have human tutors and instructors; Etesse offered the story of Nike, which pulled its advertising from retail stores because an AI-generated report announced that all such efforts were going to be online in the future. That report cost Nike $25 billion. Belcaster reminded the attendees that cyber is a facet of all industries, not just an industry of its own.

The attendees, representing a range of companies, institutions and TFM partners, listened intently as Dr. Taheesha Quarells of the Department of Defense Military-Civilian Transition Office described the changes coming to the longstanding SkillBridge training/credentialing program. It started with the goal of skill acquisition, education and training, but has moved toward transition efforts like TAP and Yellow Ribbon – “but taking that through channels already developed.” SkillBridge 2.0, launching in 2026, will feature changes like:

- No more rolling enrollment

- Military department/servicemember changes coming in 2025

- A company/program cannot accept more students than it has jobs to offer; “servicemembers are not free labor”

- No 100% online/self-directed program

- Single point of authorization/information

“We know there are gaps,” Quarells continued, stressing that SkillBridge 2.0 is still a work in progress. Its goals are a high (at least) likelihood of employment, at no cost to the student. But it has been working – the current veteran unemployment rate is 2.6%.

One attendee, unconnected to TFM, was Todd Chamberlain – Navy veteran, vice commander of Stanley Cochrane Post 16 in Crisfield, Md., and department delegate to the national convention. He flew in early for the summit to learn more about credentialing issues, for a very personal reason: for the last six years, he has been helping a friend and fellow Legionnaire draw attention to substandard CDL training programs. The friend hurt his shoulder and lost the use of his right arm for a year after attending a program with an expired safety certificate and using modified, out-of-date equipment; he was injured trying to lower landing gear that on modern trucks is much easier to use. 

The two have been as far as Washington, D.C., to talk to congressional representatives, aides, etc., and “fix a broken system.” The experience has made Chamberlain eager to get more involved with American Legion legislative efforts, and he is pursuing Legion College for 2025. He is “100% glad” he attended the summit; it provided “good stuff I can go back with.”

Belcaster offered a number of other fields and projects Task Force Movement has on its mind: an updated study of truckers’ health, expanding STEM programs like cyber to JROTC units and more. And based on the last 2.5 years, the initiative is confident it can succeed in them too; as Kunze put it, “The things we’ve done allow us to do more.”