About
On this page you will learn more about the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy's (EERE) workforce and education activities.
Overview
Designed to help create highly-skilled professionals to support energy efficiency and renewable energy sectors, EERE's workforce and education (W&ED) effort focuses on targeted activities along the education-to-employment pathway.
DOE/EERE's workforce and education objectives:
- Engage students to pursue clean energy and Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) careers
- Inspire all Americans to understand energy's place in their lives and the world
- Facilitate training to support a skilled clean energy workforce
What We Do
EERE workforce and education activities range from supporting the rapid scale-up of deployed energy efficiency and renewable energy technologies through technology-specific workforce training programs, creating job task analyses for selected sectors, developing career visualization tools (ex.: Solar Career Map); creating a systems-based approach to teaching energy (ex.: Energy Literacy); updating existing K-12 curriculum; organizing school competitions; and funding experiential learning opportunities from K-12 through post-doctoral levels. These initiatives are supported by a robust use of advanced learning technology tools, including interactive simulations and game-based learning.
The deployment of EERE technologies is dependent on the U.S.'s ability to innovate, produce, install, maintain, and service advanced energy technologies; these critical workforce skills are supported by the W&ED area's activities. In addition to easing the transition to a clean energy economy by preparing a skilled workforce, EERE efforts are focused on broadening participation to close the achievement gap in STEM fields. Multiple approaches to STEM jobs are provided to address the needs of the workforce, ranging from entry-level to the highly skilled.
Many workforce and education activities are administered by individual program offices (see EERE Program Activities on left navigation on this page). Cross-cutting activities are coordinated through a central office that creates resources that fill a gap in the energy-related workforce pathway (ex.: NTER training platform; Energy Literacy Guidelines), promotes the sharing of best practices, reduces duplication of efforts, and is establishing evaluation criteria across these activities. Please visit the left navigation to explore the different workforce and education activities of DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.