The 2026 Catapult Award: What USIC Shows Us About Changing the System
Some of the most important innovation in education does not begin with a grand strategic plan. It begins with someone becoming unwilling to accept the problem as permanent. A teacher sees students disengaging and changes the experience. A college notices employers asking for skills its programs do not yet provide. An employer realizes that waiting for qualified people to appear is no longer a workforce strategy. A leader discovers that a regulation designed years ago is preventing a good idea from reaching more students.
Then someone decides to do something about it.
That spirit is at the heart of the Catapult Award.
The award recognizes people and organizations doing more than operating successful Career and Technical Education programs. We look for innovation, measurable impact, meaningful alignment between education and workforce needs and, especially, ideas capable of creating systems-level change.
This year’s recipient embodies all of those qualities.
Catapult is proud to name United States Infrastructure Corporation (USIC) the recipient of the 2026 Catapult Award for its Career and Technical Education initiative.
But the real reason to tell this story is bigger than the award itself.
Because inside USIC’s work are lessons for anyone trying to make education more relevant.
It started with a problem employers everywhere recognize
USIC operates in the underground utility locating and damage-prevention industry.
Like many employers, the company faced a familiar challenge: it could not find enough qualified people to fill critical positions.
There are several ways an employer can respond to a skills shortage.
USIC chose to become part of the education solution.
The company created its own CTE department and began partnering directly with educational institutions.
USIC contributes curriculum.
It provides equipment and technology.
Students use virtual reality simulation.
And USIC industry professionals participate directly in teaching the programs.
Students are therefore gaining more than exposure to an occupation.
They are learning alongside people who understand what the work actually requires.
The numbers tell one part of the story
Since the initiative launched in 2021:
227 students have enrolled
209 have completed the program
The completion rate is above 92%
Approximately 83% of graduates have entered the utility locating and damage-prevention industry
Those outcomes demonstrate that the model can move students successfully from learning into real workforce opportunity.
But impressive numbers alone were not what elevated USIC for the Catapult Award committee.
The more interesting part came when the organization tried to grow.
Scaling revealed a different kind of problem
As USIC expanded the initiative, its team encountered a barrier.
The industry professionals with the knowledge and experience to teach students could face difficulty becoming CTE faculty because of existing teacher licensure requirements.
This is the point where many good ideas stop.
The pilot works.
People see the value.
Demand exists.
Then a process, policy or legacy rule makes expansion difficult.
USIC chose to engage with the barrier itself.
Its CTE leadership worked with policymakers in Indiana and Oklahoma to help develop legislation modernizing teacher licensure requirements and creating pathways for experienced industry professionals to enter CTE classrooms.
That distinction matters.
USIC was no longer simply building a program within the existing system.
It was contributing to the evolution of the system around the program.
That is what systems-level change looks like
Innovation is sometimes described as inventing something entirely new.
In practice, some of the most powerful innovation happens when people connect things that have remained unnecessarily separate.
Education.
Employers.
Technology.
Policy.
Industry expertise.
Student opportunity.
USIC's model brings those pieces closer together.
Today, the organization operates CTE programs in Indiana, Oklahoma, New York, Colorado and Texas, creating a model that can continue expanding into communities where workforce demand exists. It offers a useful picture of employer engagement that goes much deeper than occasional participation.
Industry becomes a co-creator of the learning experience.
What can the rest of us learn from it?
You do not need to work in utility locating to borrow from the thinking behind this model.
USIC's story raises questions worth asking inside almost any institution, organization or community.
Where are we discussing a workforce or education problem that we could participate in solving?
Whose expertise exists outside our institution that students need inside it?
What are we currently doing successfully that could become a replicable model?
What prevents that idea from scaling?
And if the barrier is structural, procedural or legislative, are we willing to engage with the system itself?
Those questions may lead to curriculum changes.
New partnerships.
Different credentials.
New uses of technology.
Policy conversations.
Or ideas we have not considered yet.
That is exactly why examples like USIC matter.
They expand our sense of what is possible.
An award can recognize one organization. Progress takes thousands.
There is another group we want to recognize as we announce this year's recipient.
The people doing this work every day.
The teachers trying to prepare students for occupations that are changing faster than curriculum cycles.
The administrators fighting for programs they know their communities need.
The counselors helping young people see more than one definition of success.
The employers willing to move from giving advice to becoming genuine partners in education.
The workforce leaders building bridges between institutions that have traditionally operated separately.
The policymakers willing to revisit rules when those rules no longer serve the people they were designed to support.
And the countless teams experimenting with better ways to prepare students for a world-ready life.
Much of that work happens quietly.
Progress often does.
The Catapult Award gives us one opportunity each year to shine a light on an example of what that work can become.
For 2026, that example is USIC. We congratulate the United States Infrastructure Corporation and everyone involved in its CTE initiative.
And we hope their story does something more than earn applause.
We hope it gives someone else permission to build the idea they have been thinking about.
To make the call.
Invite the partner.
Test the program.
Question the old requirement.
Collect the evidence.
And see whether something that begins in one classroom, one institution, one company or one community could eventually change the system around it.
If you are already building that kind of work, keep going.
And when the next Catapult Award cycle opens, consider putting it forward.
We would like to see what becomes possible because you did.
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