When Joanne Ivory first arrived at the Quantum Education & Policy Summit last week, she was only beginning to learn about quantum information science and technology. Harper College, the Chicago-area community college where she serves as dean of career and technical programs, had joined the US Economic Development Administration–designated Bloch Quantum Tech Hub, and she wanted to boost her knowledge and connect with other educators to better support her institution’s efforts.
By the end of the event, she said she felt more informed and better equipped to support her college and her students.
“I feel like my brain is absolutely full,” she said. “I've learned so much from everyone in the last two days.”
The event, held October 22 through 24 at the University of Maryland, was hosted by Quantum Systems through Entangled Science and Engineering (Q-SEnSE) and the Institute for Robust Quantum Simulation (RQS)—both National Science Foundation (NSF) Quantum Leap Challenge Institutes—in partnership with the Chicago Quantum Exchange (CQE) and the Quantum Economic Development Consortium (QED-C) with funding from the NSF.
The Quantum Education & Policy Summit drew participants from 27 states across the country. Some traveled from community colleges, both rural and urban, others from large research universities. All shared the same mission: to build a more connected and inclusive ecosystem for quantum education in the United States.
“There’s incredible momentum in regional quantum ecosystems across the country,” said Emily Easton, the CQE’s director of education and workforce development and a key organizer of the event. “But if we want to build a truly national quantum workforce, those regional strengths have to connect. Meetings like this are where that alignment starts to happen.”
The importance of working collaboratively to build a robust quantum workforce will also be a topic at next week’s Chicago Quantum Summit, which is one of the world’s key forums for exploring the full spectrum of quantum economy needs. Easton will be part of a panel discussion, “Global Talent for the Quantum Future.”
Different regions of the US have different resources when it comes to developing quantum workforce programs. Prominent US quantum ecosystems include the Midwest, which is home to the CQE, The Bloch Quantum, and Quantum Connected, a coalition of academic, industry, nonprofit, and government partners that has advanced to the final stage of the National Science Foundation Regional Innovation Engines (NSF Engines) program. They also include the DC-Maryland-Virginia area, which this year launched the $1 billion “Capital of Quantum” initiative with IonQ, and the Mountain West, which hosts EDA-designated Elevate Quantum Tech Hub as well as notable universities, companies, and national labs working on quantum information science.
The education and policy event featured six geographic breakouts for stakeholders to discuss issues specific to their region.
“We’re trying to platform as many voices as possible, so that we can meet the needs of as many people as possible,” said organizer Michael Bennett, director for education and workforce development at Q-SEnSE. “Intentionality is crucial in fostering collaboration between people at different kinds of institutions and with different regional priorities and resources, and we designed the event with that in mind.”
Organizers plan to release a report that will provide a snapshot of current efforts, challenges, and needs and will inform how the field of quantum education moves forward.
Building partnerships with industry
Quantum science and technology is moving swiftly from research labs into commercial and societal impact. As quantum computers, sensors, and networks become more powerful and accessible, the need for a workforce fluent in quantum concepts becomes more crucial. But the pathways to that literacy are still taking shape, even as the US is prioritizing development in quantum.
“We don’t want to repeat the mistakes of the past, where we’re retrofitting the sort of wide access that we want after the field is no longer nascent,” Bennett said. “Coming together now will make quantum education more effective when we need it most.”
Q-SEnSE and RQS are two of 10 federal quantum research centers created by the National Quantum Initiative Act of 2018. Of the other eight centers, four are in the Illinois-Wisconsin-Indiana region.
Emerging technologies remain a key priority for the United States, with the Office of Management and Budget and the Office of Science and Technology Policy specifically citing quantum information science and technology as critical to American prosperity.
“These critical and emerging technologies promise to fuel American prosperity, improve quality of life and national security, and create high-paying jobs for American workers,” according to a memo that outlined research and development budgetary priorities for fiscal year 2027.
These jobs were a central topic at the education and policy summit: What do they look like? What skills does someone need to learn in order to be hired for them? How do we design curricula to most effectively prepare our students for jobs in this sector, now and in the future?
Many educators in attendance emphasized the need for deeper partnerships with industry—a goal made all the more attainable by the presence of representatives from NVIDIA, Lockheed Martin, and QuEra. Such partnerships could better inform quantum technology curricula at different levels of education and lead to internship and apprenticeship programs
Attendees strategized about how to utilize success stories from other technology sectors such as AI and green tech to drive the development of quantum talent. Public-private partnerships, work-based apprenticeships, integrated K-12 and post-secondary career pathways, and skills-based micro-credentials were all discussed as potential approaches and models to empower a quantum-ready workforce.
Industry representatives said they appreciated the opportunity to connect with educators.
“This has been such a wonderful opportunity to learn about what academia is looking for and what their struggles are in interacting with industry,” said Yelissa Lopez, government and industry advocate at QuEra, a quantum computing company and a CQE corporate partner. “We want to be more strategic about how we can better support these institutions in building the workforce that we need.”
The role of community colleges
Because of the complex needs of different students and teachers, the education and policy summit was structured to highlight a variety of stakeholders and educators. Breakout sessions were organized along multiple axes: one session divided into groups by the size and access level of their institution, while another divided into groups by geographical region.
A panel on community college programming, for instance, focused on strategies for developing programs to meet the emerging needs of the quantum sector, especially given the uncertainties around which specific needs will arise and when.
Stacia Edwards, the deputy provost of City Colleges of Chicago, said existing programs offer a strong foundation.
“As we’re thinking about technical education for quantum, we are going to use our engineering technology program as a base,” she said.
A CQE study showed that fewer than half of quantum jobs require PhDs, highlighting the role that undergraduate institutions will increasingly play in building the future quantum workforce. A large number of attendees were from undergraduate-focused institutions, and many said the experience of the workshop was an invaluable learning and networking experience.
“It has just been such an absolutely wonderful experience in every group that I've talked to,” said Ivory, the participant from Harper College. “I look forward to continuing to build these relationships.”