Austin Community College District (ACC) and the U.S. Army are expanding a nationally recognized partnership that\u2019s changing how technical training happens and what\u2019s possible for students interested in technology, innovation, and real-world learning. On Monday, January 12, the partners signed a 10-year Intergovernmental Support Agreement (IGSA).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The new $16 million agreement builds on the success of the Army Software Factory, doubling the original investment and scaling a model that pairs hands-on, mission-driven work with academic instruction. What began as a pilot has grown into a national proof of concept, showing how higher education and the military can work together to build advanced technical skills and accelerate innovation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At the Army Software Factory, soldiers work on live software missions while learning skills in software development, platform engineering, and product design. ACC supports this work through its Tech Accelerator and academic programming from the College\u2019s Computer Science and Visual Communications departments, providing an agile curriculum that adapts quickly to real operational needs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That flexibility is a key part of why the partnership works. When a new training need emerged that required soldering skills, ACC faculty quickly modified existing coursework, customized it for the mission, and launched training within weeks, allowing soldiers to certify and return to work without long delays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt has been critical to our success to have the pipeline and go from zero to hero. ACC has been very accommodating and very helpful in moving our work forward,\u201d said First Lieutenant Johnathan Riemerspeters, Software Factory Engineer. \u201cPreviously, when we looked at a problem in the hardware space, we looked at people who worked on it on the side. When it comes to operational needs, we can\u2019t do that. ACC\u2019s ability to build that pipeline in real time for us for this specific need helped us move forward in what would usually be a huge blocker.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Software Factory demonstrates how education can move at the speed of real life, evolving alongside workforce and mission demands. It also reflects ACC\u2019s broader commitment to applied learning and career-ready pathways that prepare learners for high-demand fields.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The model\u2019s success is already expanding beyond the Army. Inspired by the program, the U.S. Marine Corps partnered with ACC to launch a Marine Software Factory at the Rio Grande Campus, with plans to explore additional growth in Austin and beyond. Looking ahead, ACC and the Army are exploring how to develop a national learning network that could serve soldiers across the country.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Austin Community College District (ACC) and the U.S. Army are expanding a nationally recognized partnership that\u2019s changing how technical training happens and what\u2019s possible for students interested in technology, innovation, and real-world learning. On Monday, January 12, the partners signed a 10-year Intergovernmental Support Agreement (IGSA). The new $16 million agreement builds on the success […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":103,"featured_media":51944,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[1465,1466,380,1467,1468],"class_list":["post-51943","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-for-you","tag-intergovernmental-support-agreement","tag-military-technical-training","tag-rio-grande-campus","tag-software-factory","tag-us-army","et-has-post-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51943","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/103"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51943"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51943\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/51944"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51943"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51943"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/students.austincc.edu\/infohub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51943"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}