The workforce isn't
missing. It's mislabeled.
A U.S. national analysis reveals a surprising truth about the future of STEM talent: the skills the economy urgently needs are already here. Young people are coding, analyzing data, and building — they just don't call it what industry calls it.
demonstrate coding
data analysis
territories represented
analyzed, 2024–2026
The skills are already here
Read the projects for what they actually do — not the topic on the label — and the picture is striking. Roughly two-thirds of students code, seven in ten work with data, and most apply real research methods and hands-on building. This isn't a generation that lacks technical ability. It's a generation applying that ability to the problems it cares about — health, climate, community — and rarely identifying with the industries that need exactly those skills.
Already doing manufacturing
Nearly half of projects involve designing, prototyping, and building physical systems — modern manufacturing. Yet in 700+ applications reviewed, not one used the word.
Cybersecurity, unnamed
Information security is a top-5 fastest-growing U.S. occupation. Students are doing the work — encryption, secure systems — but it shows up in under 4% of projects, and never by name.
The skills are here. The names aren't.
Read the same 700+ applications for what students build, and the technical work is everywhere. Read them for the industries that need that work, and the words are missing.
Share of 700+ student projects (2024–2026) that demonstrate the skill. “Manufacturing” and “cybersecurity” appeared zero times in the applications reviewed.
A translation guide
Every project below came from a National STEM Champion. Students describe what they made — industry has its own words for it, and its own hiring need.
| Students call it | Industry calls it | Demand |
|---|---|---|
| A water-powered sensor for clean water | Environmental & IoT engineering | High growth |
| A snake robot for disaster zones | Robotics & advanced manufacturing | Critical shortage |
| An AI tool to improve gene editing | Computational biology | Fast growing |
| A machine that recycles plastic | Materials & advanced manufacturing | National priority |
| An app that screens for pneumonia | Health tech & software | High growth |
| Encryption & secure systems | Cybersecurity | Top-5 fastest growing |
The interest exists. The aptitude exists. What's missing is the connection between what students are already doing and the industries that desperately need them.— Jenny Buccos, FRSA, Hon. DLitt.
Driven by impact
Across every year, students concentrate in a handful of mission-driven challenges. They're motivated by consequence — which is a strength. The opportunity is to help them see that the technical fields powering the economy's future are the same tools they're already using.
A gap the country can close
The fields this generation under-identifies with — software, data, cybersecurity, advanced manufacturing — are national priorities in both U.S. and global demand data. The World Economic Forum's survey of 1,000+ employers across 55 economies points to the very same skills. Because the signal appears years before students enter the workforce, naming and channeling it is among the lowest-cost, highest-leverage moves available to educators, employers, and policymakers.
Sources: BLS Employment Projections 2024–34; WEF Future of Jobs Report 2025.
About
The National STEM Festival is EXPLR's flagship program and the source of this analysis. Program cycles 2026–2028 are supported by a funded U.S. Department of Defense prototype; the inaugural year (2024) was delivered with the U.S. Department of Education. This early-signal evidence is proprietary — and it's how EXPLR helps partners and policymakers see emerging talent years before the workforce does.