Meet the Speakers for T3: Targeted Titles and Topics at APPAU St. Louis
The speaker lineup is set for T3: Targeted Titles and Topics at APPAU St. Louis, and it is one worth clearing your calendar for.
Taking place September 15–16, this year's T3 curriculum is built around a single pressing theme: "Investing in the Future Facilities Workforce." The sessions cover recruitment, retention, apprenticeship, and upskilling strategies, led by practitioners and researchers who are doing this work at their own institutions right now.
Here are this year's speakers and their presentation topics.
Recruitment and Retention Trends and Impact
Kenna Boyd, Opus Partners and Katherine Simpson, American University
The facilities workforce serving colleges and universities faces a mounting crisis. An aging skilled trades population, intensifying competition from the private sector, and persistent budget constraints have made recruiting and retaining qualified facilities professionals one of the most pressing challenges in higher education today.
This session examines the current landscape of recruitment and retention in educational facilities management, exploring the structural forces driving workforce shortages and the innovative strategies institutions are deploying in response. From apprenticeship pipelines and grow-your-own programs to competitive compensation modeling and purposeful onboarding, attendees will gain practical insight into what is and is not working on campuses across the country.
Beyond tactics, this session explores how organizational culture, employee development, and a clear sense of mission contribute to long-term workforce stability. Institutions that invest in their people, not just their buildings, are discovering that retention is less about perks and more about belonging.
Your Campus as a Living Laboratory: Building the Next Generation Facilities Workforce Through University–Industry Partnerships
Bahar Armaghani, University of Florida and Steve Hoiberg, Siemens
Colleges and universities nationwide face critical workforce pressures: shrinking skilled-trades pipelines, accelerating retirements, and rising demand for expertise in smart building technologies, energy systems, and decarbonization. To meet these challenges, the University of Florida and Siemens have developed a scalable, industry-integrated workforce development model that aligns academic preparation with the operational needs of modern campuses. Within UF's College of Design, Construction and Planning, the new Ramos Collaboratory gives students, early-career professionals, and facilities teams a shared space to explore emerging technologies using real-time data.
At its core, the Siemens Technology and Innovation Lab features AI-enabled building systems and supports a hands-on "learn while doing" approach reinforced by internships, applied projects, and direct interaction with industry professionals. Early results show measurable gains in student engagement, stronger alignment between academics and facility operations, and clearer pathways into facilities careers.
Curriculum also addresses energy efficiency, sustainability, WELL, and LEED standards, with HBCU-focused content available virtually. Presenters will share challenges, best practices, and practical strategies attendees can adapt to use their own campuses as living laboratories for workforce development and recruitment.
Cross-Generational Innovation in Education Facilities Management: Building and Retaining a Workforce from Within
Marcie Glenn, Another Source and Dr. Winnie Kwofie, Texas Tech University
Facilities departments are on the front lines of higher education's workforce challenges, juggling retirements, recruitment gaps, and shifting employee expectations across five generations working side by side. This moment of disruption also presents a powerful opportunity: rebuild teams from within while future-proofing institutional knowledge and service delivery.
In this session, leaders from Texas Tech University and Another Source share real-world case studies showing how embracing generational diversity is not just a cultural initiative but a strategic advantage. Participants will learn how facilities teams have embedded cross-generational hiring practices, mentorship programs, and engagement tactics that boost retention and morale without requiring large budgets or complex systems.
Attendees will also discover how to start small with scalable pilot programs, use generational representation to reduce hiring bias, and design communication practices that meet employees where they are, whether they prefer text, email, in-person check-ins, or structured one-on-ones. These ideas are grounded in data, shaped by documented success, and built for sustainability.
Creating Career Ladders for Skilled Trades: A Practical Workforce Development Model
Morgan Winfrey-Hansen, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
This session shares how University Operations at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln developed and implemented a career ladder program to address recruitment, retention, skill development, and advancement challenges in skilled trades. Launched first within Building Systems Maintenance, the program is now serving as a model for additional operational departments across the university.
Attendees will hear the full origin story: the workforce problems the program was designed to solve, the assumptions that had to be tested, and the early design decisions that shaped its long-term success. The session details the structure of the career ladder model itself, including how levels were defined, what skills and competencies anchor each tier, and the practical steps used to build a repeatable framework for job progression that other job families can adopt.
Presenters will also explore how the program supports both new hires and current employees by creating clearer expectations, defined advancement criteria, transparent pay progression, and structured development conversations between employees and supervisors. Participants will leave with practical insights, lessons learned, and a workable blueprint for designing or refining a career ladder program tailored to their own institution's workforce needs.
Building the Next Generation of Facilities Leaders: A Case Study from PSFEI
Beth Clark, Pennsylvania State University
Developing and retaining the next generation of facilities leaders requires intentional investment and strategies rooted in real-world experience. This session presents a case study from PSFEI, a unique organization whose staff both practice and teach facilities management.
That dual perspective allows them to design, implement, and assess leadership initiatives for their own team while advising facilities professionals across PASSHE schools, correctional institutions, state hospitals, military and veterans facilities, and the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission. The challenges are universal: recruiting, developing, and retaining critical operations talent. At PSFEI, every staff member completes The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, aligned with APPA Leadership Academy Level 1, with many continuing to advanced levels. Their Effective Facility Management Year 2 leadership curriculum has been redesigned around situational leadership, delivered through interactive group activities and gamification.
Additional initiatives include the "Booked Solid" leadership book club, formal and informal mentoring, cross-functional assignments, and an annual Instructors' Summit. Participants will gain insight into what PSFEI implemented, what worked, what challenges arose, and how outcomes are measured.
Hidden Capacity: How Operational Restructuring Became Our Most Effective Workforce Strategy
Terry Maynard, University of Virginia
At UVA Facilities Management, the challenge was not a staffing shortage but a deployment problem. And the solution was already on the payroll. This session shares a real-world case study from UVA's Housing Facilities Zone, where a condition-based cleaning model created reclaimed capacity.
That capacity became the foundation for an earn-while-you-learn workforce development approach with no new budget, no new hires, and no external funding. The result was an internal pipeline moving custodial staff into trade roles. Controllable turnover dropped to 2–8 percent versus a national average of 25–40 percent, generating $366K in annual savings and cost avoidance and producing 15 verified advancements across three career tracks in three years.
The session will also cover what did not work, including supervisor resistance, leading with process instead of purpose, and rolling out without a pilot. Presenters will address the union question directly, as UVA operates in a non-union, right-to-work environment, and discuss what parts of this model can realistically translate elsewhere. Attendees leave with a starting framework, practical first steps, and a model that challenges the idea that workforce development requires new funding or new people.
Why Do Employees Not Participate in Offered Training Opportunities?
Dr. Alan Pogue, Emory University
Despite a persistent skills gap in the trades and growing employer willingness to fund development, many workers still choose not to participate in available training. Why?
This presentation, drawn from current doctoral dissertation research in workforce education, examines the human side of reskilling and upskilling: what motivates employees to engage in learning, and what holds them back. Attendees will explore the defining differences between reskilling and upskilling, the measurable benefits each delivers to individuals and organizations, and the personal, structural, and cultural barriers that quietly suppress participation rates even when programs are well-funded and well-intentioned.
The session will also unpack research-based strategies employers can use to optimize the conditions surrounding the training decision, from communication and scheduling to incentives, supervisor support, and psychological safety. Facilities leaders, HR partners, and workforce development professionals will leave with a clearer understanding of why training investments sometimes underperform and what practical levers they can pull to shift participation.
Filling the Pipeline: University of Arizona UFS Apprenticeship Program
Chris Kopach, University of Arizona
When a 2012 workforce survey revealed that 80% of University Facility Services tradespeople at the University of Arizona would be eligible for retirement within a decade, leadership faced a critical question: how do you sustain an organizational culture when your most experienced people walk out the door? Their answer was to grow their own.
Launched in 2013 and registered with the U.S. Department of Labor, the UFS Apprenticeship Program recruits candidates from within the university community and places them in a four-year, mentor-guided experience that combines full-time, benefits-eligible employment with college-level coursework through Pima Community College. Graduates earn a nationally recognized Journey Worker's credential and step directly into open trade positions. More than a workforce solution, the program has transformed organizational culture, strengthening institutional knowledge, deepening mentors' professional identity, and reinforcing UFS's commitment to the University's educational mission.
This session explores the program's structure, recruitment and selection process, mentorship model, lessons learned across more than a decade of operation, and the compounding returns of investing in your own people as both a workforce and culture strategy.
T3: Targeted Titles and Topics takes place September 15–16 at APPAU St. Louis, September 14–17 at the Hilton St. Louis at the Ballpark.