Leah Palmer is Executive Director of the Arizona Advanced Manufacturing Institute, an advanced manufacturing workforce initiative serving Mesa Community College, the Maricopa County Community College District, employers, and communities across Arizona.
Named a 2024 Manufacturing Champion of the Year by the Arizona Manufacturers Council and Arizona Chamber of Commerce & Industry, Leah is known across Arizona and the nation for her global vision regarding program impact to support industry and communities.
She has hosted international manufacturing partners from Japan, Denmark, and the Netherlands. She is also an Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program Fellow, reflecting her national-level engagement in workforce and economic-mobility strategies.
Serving as an MCC adjunct faculty member in communication for more than 20 years, Leah considers her experience at the college an especially meaningful one in her career journey in manufacturing. MCC was where the Institute took root and where she and others began building a collaborative model that brought faculty, industry, workforce organizations, and community partners together to respond to Arizona’s changing economy.
For Leah, the most meaningful measure of her work is not the number of programs or partnerships created but the student who discovers a career they never thought was possible, the career changer who finds a new beginning, or the individual facing barriers who receives an opportunity to move forward.
Leah has developed industry-responsive workforce programs with Boeing, Intel, TSMC and other advanced manufacturing employers. She has also worked with nonprofit organizations–Fresh Start, United Way, A New Leaf, and Arizona@Work–to promote career-readiness, second chance employment and re-entry initiatives, employment connections, and technology career pathways for non-traditional and underserved populations.
Leah has also strengthened MCC's role as a community workforce partner by linking college programs with nonprofit, civic, workforce, and economic-development organizations. By building collaborative solutions that serve both individual learners and Arizona employers, she has helped reinforce the college's mission through measurable community and economic impact.