For government

Upskilling that adds up.

Free workshops and team projects where people learn by working on your region's real problems. Everything they make is open source, free for residents, communities, businesses, institutions and the city itself to use.

Start a conversationHow it works

What it adds up to

Work, wages, wealth.

Work
Making something that lasts and that others can use: a tool, a playbook, a better way to run a service. It outlives the hours that went into it.
Wages
What makes work a job.
Wealth
What makes the labor of a job mean something. It keeps working for households and communities on its own.

Where it happens

In your communities, run by your residents.

State programs and funds set the direction. The Labs is where people show up: free workshops and team projects close to home, run by volunteers who live there. It's the part of a workforce strategy residents can walk into this week.

How it works

From a first workshop to a sector cohort.

  1. 01

    Workshops

    Free, and open to anyone

    We're working out, in the open, which competencies people need to stay productive as work and the economy change. Each workshop builds one: framing a problem, telling a story, working in a team, using digital and AI tools well.

    That makes them a natural next step for digital opportunity programs: once someone's connected, a navigator can send them to us.

  2. 02

    The open cycle

    Every twelve weeks, join any time

    A Build Cycle runs in the open, and anyone can join as a contributor at any time. In set windows, the community proposes problem situations and ways to tackle them. Teams of three to five form around the ones people want to build, and every cycle ends at a public Showcase.

  3. 03

    Inside the open cycle

    Sector cohorts

    Twelve weeks, by application

    Inside the open cycle, a cohort of people who applied takes on one sector's problem situations, with Mentors from that sector: health care, cybersecurity, public service, manufacturing, or whichever a sponsor chooses. What they make goes back into the open cycle, and on to every Lab.

How it gets better

Open to every contribution. Kept by what works.

Anyone can add a workshop, a playbook, a tool or a proposal. There are no formal requirements. What we keep, share and build on is decided by how it performs: what people make with it, and what happens for them next. The best of every Lab rises and spreads to the others. What doesn't work stays where it is.

Delivery is earned.

We're introducing a common standard for the people who run our workshops and Pods: they train for the role, then earn it by doing it well, signed off by people who already have. So every Lab delivers the same method, whoever's in the room.

Ways to work with us

Five ways to work with us.

  1. 01

    Sponsor a sector cohort

    Bring the sector, its problem situations, and two or three employers or agency teams who own them. We recruit and run the cohort inside the next cycle, through to the Showcase. You keep the solutions and the playbooks, and you meet the people who made them.

  2. 02

    Host a Lab

    Your public libraries and community spaces provide the rooms, a staff liaison, and a line to your navigators and job centres. We bring the workshops, the open cycle, and the volunteers who run them.

  3. 03

    Adopt the playbooks

    Run our workshops and the Build Cycle in your own programs, free. We can train your staff to run them.

  4. 04

    Refer people

    Workforce boards, job centres, navigators and agencies can send people to workshops and cohorts, including workers whose jobs are changing or have ended.

  5. 05

    Fund Mentors

    Mentors turn every obstacle a team hits into a workshop for the next team. Stipends, service-year positions or loaned staff time keep them in the room.

Where it started

Built by the people it was for.

In fall 2025, fifty former federal workers met at DC Public Library to work out their next move together. From that group came The Labs, so anyone could do the same.

Our results are public, like our code.

The numbers that decide what we keep are published every cycle: who took part, what they made, and where they went next.

The first published numbers come with the fall cycle.

In the press: Technical.ly, February 2026. →

How to start

Three steps to the next cycle.

It takes about an hour a week from one person on your side.

For procurement and grants

The details.

  • The Upskilling Labs is a fiscally sponsored project of Superbloom Design, a 501(c)(3).
  • A common standard for the people who deliver our programs is being introduced this year.
  • Taking part is free for residents. Using the playbooks is free, and needs no contract.
  • Code is MIT-licensed, and everything else is CC BY 4.0.
  • We partner on library, workforce and digital opportunity grants.
  • On request: a capability statement, a sample agreement, and our data and Mentor policies.

Bring us your region's problems.

Tell us your sector, your problem and who you serve. We'll shape the rest with you.

Start a conversationHere for yourself? Join The Labs: it's free. →