Over the past two years, Miami has seen an influx of technology firms from all over the country establish new offices and headquarters in Miami. At the state level, Florida had the largest year-over-year increase of net-new tech business establishments (+2,715) in the country. Companies are now facing a mismatch between the growing number of tech jobs and the skilled talent available to fill them. The lack of trained tech talent stands as an obstacle for continued tech job growth in Miami.

Miami-Dade County welcomes more immigrants each year than almost any other metropolitan area in the country. While immigrants represent a disproportionate share of the working age population, they lack access to educational opportunities, and ultimately have lower levels of education achievement than the general population. As a result, they are not well-positioned to take advantage of the recent influx of technology jobs.

Through an Immigrant Technology Training Program, Miami-Dade County can address the need to provide immigrants with opportunities that will help them build a new life while addressing two major challenges in the tech ecosystem: (1) a shortage of trained tech talent seeking employment and (2) a lack of representation of the larger community. The Ironhack Immigrant Technology Training Program aims to provide immigrants in Miami-Dade County with the opportunity to gain technical web development skills and certification, in addition to English language proficiency that is required to build a technology career in Miami-Dade County. Through the program, Ironhack seeks to support the training and development of at least 500 Miami-Dade County Spanish-speaking immigrants per year. The program will consist of: (a) technology training in Web Development through either a 9 week full-time course or 24 week part-time course, (b) tech enabled English language proficiency training through one of our corporate partners, EducUp, and (c) career services and job placement support to each student during and for a minimum of six months after the training program.

We are looking for partners that can help us bring this program to life through financial support and community partnerships that will ensure job placement at the end of the program.