A Bright New Normal in Illinois

What does it look like when industry, academia and government come together to foster a workforce development pipeline within a community? The story of Rivian Automotive Inc., Heartland Community College (HCC) and the city of Normal, Illinois, paints a picture of just such a partnership.

Rivian, the electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer founded in 2009, with headquarters in Irvine, Calif., acquired the former Mitsubishi Motors Corp. plant in Normal in 2017. It launched production on its R1T truck and R1S SUV there four years later.

The arrival of the company in Normal, located about 130 miles (209 km) south of Chicago, was a major boon for the area that brought both challenges and opportunities. Rivian faced a workforce gap in both foundational and specialized skills, while HCC, established in Normal in 1990, was looking to expand its career and technical education (CTE) offerings. At the same time, state leaders saw a chance for robust job growth in the sector.

“This was really unique because we had the newest community college in Illinois working with a very young company that also happens to be the largest manufacturer in the state,” says Adam Campbell, dean of CTE at HCC.

With Rivian poised to open the facility in 2021, the goal was to collaborate with HCC and other stakeholders to create a talent pathway as efficiently and effectively as possible, using the company’s “lean” core competency as a guiding principle. The question, says Rivian Director of Learning and Development Hugh Shadeed, was, “How do we do this from a lean standpoint and maximize our time and resources to get the thing done?”

Building a Pipeline

Rivian’s partnership with HCC began in earnest that same year, 2021, with the launch of the college’s Electric Vehicle Energy Storage certificate program. HCC crafted the content and curriculum in tandem with the company and supplemented its own training equipment with preproduction pieces provided by Rivian. The first group to enroll were students from the college’s automotive technician apprenticeship program.

Since then, HCC and Rivian have built out three-year tool-and-die and industrial maintenance apprenticeship programs, with 43 total completions so far. The latter program has grown rapidly in the past few years, Campbell says. As of spring 2025, there were more than 30 apprentices enrolled in industrial maintenance, with an additional 24 set to join in the summer and fall.

Courses are taught at HCC’s recently opened 48,000-sq-ft (4,459-sq-m) Advanced Manufacturing Center and 7,800-sq-ft (725-sq-m) State Farm Electric Vehicle Lab, as well as at the Rivian Training Center, a 60,000-sq-ft (5,574-sq-m) facility that supports Rivian-specific training. The faculty is comprised of industry professionals who combine technical instruction with critical workplace-success skills, like emotional intelligence, responsibility and personal accountability.

When it comes to the curricula, “everything that we do on the academic side is informed by industry” and the needs of area employers, Campbell explains, noting that such needs include so-called softer skills. “It’s really more about mindset than skillset coming in the door,” Shadeed agrees.

With increasing demand for these programs, HCC is turning to Rivian and other local manufacturers to recruit new adjunct instructors. And Rivian aims to open additional apprenticeship tracks in the future, in fields including mechatronics and paintless dent repair.

Meanwhile, the company is also focused on upskilling its existing workforce through platforms such as Tooling U-SME, which provides online manufacturing training tools. Rivian employees have completed a total of 27,250 Tooling U-SME courses, Shadeed says. “It’s really cool when we get feedback from team members like, ‘I can’t believe that Rivian’s given us access to this.’”

A Regional Approach

Rivian’s workforce development efforts in Illinois aren’t limited to the Bloomington-Normal metropolitan area. “We’re really taking a regional approach with them,” says Lisa Clemmons Stott, electric mobility and innovation director at the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO).

As the state’s largest EV automotive company, Rivian has worked closely with DCEO to develop a range of programs, Stott explains. In 2021, Illinois invested $7.5 million each to fund two manufacturing training academies: the Advanced Manufacturing Center at HCC, built in partnership with Rivian, and a comparable 31,000-sq-ft (2,880-sq-m) facility at Southwestern Illinois College in Belleville.

In addition, the company is currently helping Illinois pilot an EV career and technical education program in Normal to create a deeper pathway down through high schools and lower grades. This could then be replicated in other cities.

Rivian has also begun working with local Climate and Equitable Jobs Act (CEJA) Workforce Hubs in Decatur, Champaign and Peoria to create an entry-level “manufacturing pathway” and support hiring for the company’s R2 launch. Illinois spends $180 million per year on curriculum development and training at 14 such hubs throughout the state.

DCEO has launched a marketing campaign to spread the word to Illinois workers, families and young people about all the “good-paying lifetime jobs” now available in EV and other advanced manufacturing sectors, Stott notes. Such opportunities are expected to increase as Rivian constructs a recently announced $120 million, 1.2-million-sq-ft (111,484-sq-m) supplier park near its plant in Normal.

“Thanks to the partnership with Rivian and community colleges like Heartland, we’re tackling workforce development from a micro scale all the way to the macro level,” Stott says. “The work that we’re doing here with this group is really helping the industry statewide.”

Overcoming Obstacles

Amid this forward momentum, obstacles still remain. Chief among them is the persistent stereotype held by some potential students and their families that manufacturing is a “dark, dirty, dangerous, low-skill, low-wage” industry, Campbell says.

“Anybody who comes to our facilities is going to see very technologically advanced equipment,” Campbell adds, also noting HCC’s modern, glassy structures and open-concept floor plan. “They’re going to see highly skilled instructors. They’re going to see things they never would have thought they’d see at a community college in the middle of Illinois.”

Similarly, Shadeed describes the Rivian team bringing an R1 truck to a local elementary school, giving students a chance to explore the vehicle up close. “You’re setting the stage for the future,” he says. “Like, ‘Hey, I want to go to work for you. That’s exciting.’”

Another issue is that the traditional academic model of rigidly scheduled lectures and lab sessions may not work for students who are older, have families or are looking to change careers. To address this, HCC has set up the Flexible Learning in Technical Education (FLITE) Lab, which allows students to take online courses asynchronously and then come into the physical lab at their convenience. The FLITE Lab is open 40 hours per week and staffed by full-time faculty.

Finally, there’s an ongoing need to “get out of silos and continue these cross-collaboration efforts,” Shadeed says. For Rivian, that means not only leveraging the resources of partners such as HCC and DCEO, but also expanding its network to include other large manufacturers in the area, like Bridgestone, which produces off-the-road tires, and the Ferrero chocolate factory.

In March 2025, Shadeed and Campbell joined the McLean County Chamber of Commerce’s manufacturers’ roundtable and found fellow leaders all focused on the same objective: in Shadeed’s words, “How do we close the gap on this manufacturing pipeline?”

While acknowledging the hurdles ahead, Rivian, HCC and their government partners are optimistic about the future of their workforce initiatives in Illinois. “We have some unique challenges,” Campbell says. “But I think we’ve got the right people in place.”