Meet Mike!

The clean energy transition is creating new technologies, new industries, and new jobs across our region. The question is: who gets connected to those opportunities?

That’s the challenge Mike Marvin has been working on through NextCorps and the Clean Jobs Collaborative—helping grow the clean energy workforce while making sure people who have historically been left out of these opportunities have a pathway in.

“We need to save the planet,” Mike said. “But the people who can come in and help us save the planet are people who have been left out of these discussions to a large degree.”

The work starts long before someone submits a job application. People need to know these careers exist. They need access to training, support, employers, and clear pathways into the workforce.

And increasingly, Mike has found that no single organization can build those pathways alone.

The Clean Jobs Collaborative was created to bring different parts of the workforce system together around that challenge. The work has included helping people better understand clean energy careers, connecting them to training and support services, identifying employer needs, and looking at how companies can better welcome people from different backgrounds into the workforce.

It was through that work that Mike became more connected to the Climate Solutions Accelerator.

Accelerator staff were already working on many of the same questions around clean energy, education, workforce development, and access. Instead of creating parallel efforts, the groups began finding ways to collaborate and share information, relationships, and resources.

“That’s one of the things that I really appreciate about the organization,” Mike said. “Just the willingness to collaborate and share resources.”

That collaboration has taken different forms.

Sometimes it has meant combining information and employer contacts to better understand where clean energy jobs are growing. Other times it has meant going into schools and talking directly with students about what clean energy is and what kinds of careers exist within it.

One recent project showed what can happen when those connections keep expanding:

The idea started with creating more opportunities for young people to learn about clean energy.

Through relationships with RIT, Mike and his partners helped connect students to an Energy of the Future summer program. The Clean Jobs Collaborative committed funding to help students who otherwise may not have been able to participate attend the camp.

Then another organization stepped in.

The Workforce Development Institute helped support scholarships as well.

Then another connection opened another opportunity.

Through the Accelerator’s renewable energy network, Haylee Farrington, who was connected to the development of a solar farm in Mount Morris, helped arrange a tour for students.

There, students were not only able to see how solar energy works, they also learned about the workers who build that infrastructure, including electricians, laborers, sheet metal workers, and other skilled trades.

That connection led to another experience: a visit to the Sheet Metal Workers training center in Rochester.

What began as a summer camp became a much wider look at what a clean energy future could actually mean for a young person. Students were exposed to renewable energy, skilled trades, union careers, workforce training, and people doing this work across the region.

For Mike, that is the power of community.

“We have this community of people who are very open to working together,” he said.

That openness matters because many of the barriers between education, workforce development, climate organizations, employers, and community groups are not as fixed as they can sometimes seem.

Mike describes the work as “erasing” those lines. “That’s the power of community,” he said. “Erasing a lot of the lines that are really not there.” And when those lines begin to disappear, opportunities can grow. An education program can connect students to a union training center, a climate organization can connect workforce partners to renewable energy companies, and one funding source can help a student enter a program they might not otherwise have had access to. One relationship can lead to another and in this case, everyone involved gained something: organizations strengthened their own work, new partnerships formed, and more resources were shared. Most importantly, young people were introduced to possibilities they may not have seen otherwise.

“The bottom line was we’ve got a bunch of young people exposed to things that they wouldn’t have been otherwise,” Mike said. That kind of access is central to how Mike thinks about the clean energy transition.

His own interest in climate began long before his workforce development work:

He grew up near a river and remembers it as a place of refuge and connection to the natural world. “As a kid, that was my sanctuary,” he said. That connection gave him a lasting desire to protect natural spaces and preserve the environment. At the same time, he became increasingly aware of the economic, racial, and social barriers that can determine who has access to opportunity. Clean energy workforce development brought those two concerns together.

“It’s always been a focus to kind of take those lines down—to erase those lines.”

That means making sure the people helping shape the clean energy future reflect more of the communities that future is supposed to serve. It also means recognizing that climate action can look like many different things: developing new technology, installing solar panels, learning a skilled trade, training workers, supporting employers, educating students, or helping someone understand that a career they had never considered is actually within reach.

It can look like bringing the right people together.

That is part of what gives Mike hope about where the Genesee-Finger Lakes region is headed.

“Climate Solutions Accelerator is one of my big hopes,” he said, pointing to the work already underway to engage people who care about climate and connect them to opportunities to participate. He is also encouraged by the growing alignment between workforce development, economic development, education, and climate work across the region. But he is quick to point out that creating an opportunity is only the beginning.

After watching students participate in the Energy of the Future program, the next questions became obvious:

Now what? How do those students stay connected? How do they keep learning and how do they get more opportunities to speak, explore careers, meet employers, or see themselves as part of this work?

Those are not just questions for one summer program, but for the entire region, because introducing someone to an opportunity matters. Helping them take the next step matters even more. That’s where community becomes powerful. A connected community can help build pathways to a healthier, more equitable, and regenerative future.