Florida’s space industry push isn’t just at Cape Canaveral anymore.

As the sector grows, the promise of lucrative careers — the median aerospace engineer in Florida earns $134,830 a year — is driving a new push to get South Florida high schoolers into the industry before they even graduate.

More space and aerospace companies are setting up shop in South Florida, and the state’s aerospace agency, along with local school districts, is trying to make sure the workforce is ready to meet the demand.

In the upcoming school year, 951 students across nine Broward County high schools will be the first in the new Space Florida Academy, a partnership between Space Florida — the state agency tasked with growing Florida’s aerospace and space industry — and Broward County Public Schools.

“It’s creating a direct pathway from our classrooms to the space industry,” said Loli Formoso, director of career, technical, adult, and community education for the district.

The nine participating high schools already have aerospace and engineering programs in place. What the academy adds is more industry experience, the chance for students to test for an industry certificate, and access to a job portal called Orbit, which companies in these fields use to hire graduates.

“Those programs are offering everything that they need to offer for the jobs that are available in those sectors,” Formoso said. “So even though we had those programs, it’s making sure everything we’re doing matches what the industry needs.”

Formoso pointed to the number of aviation companies already based in Broward County, which puts the region in a strong position to build that workforce and gives students places that could hire them in the future.

The growth of these companies has mainly been in maintenance and repair work for aircraft, according to David Coddington, senior vice president of business development at the Greater Fort Lauderdale Alliance, Broward County’s main business development group.

“We don’t build the planes here, but we maintain, repair and overhaul a bunch of parts that make up the plane,” said Coddington.

He cited the Airbus A380, the largest passenger jet, as an example of the scale of this work.

“There are only two places on the planet those engines get serviced: Dubai and Coral Springs, Florida,” he said. “We’re trying to grow the pie of workforce here because the aviation industry is expanding so rapidly that it’s outpaced the pipeline of students coming out of the technical colleges.”

Broward County housed 626 aviation and aerospace companies in 2025, up from 588 in 2020, according to data from the Greater Fort Lauderdale Alliance.

Space Florida President and CEO Robert Long said workforce is often the first question companies ask when considering a move to Florida.

“One of the things we hear most from companies that are looking to grow, expand, move into the state, is ‘Where’s the workforce going to come from?’” Long said. “And we know generally that highly skilled technical labor is always in high demand … It’s a focus of ours to try to make sure that we’re closing any talent gaps that are out there.”

The agency was created under the Space Florida Act of 2006, which merged three older state space organizations into one to grow Florida’s space sector. Since then, Long said, the agency’s work has contributed to about $6 billion in gross economic impact across the state.

Part of the appeal, he noted, is the pay, considering the median annual wage for aerospace engineers is nearly $135,000 — or $65 an hour.

“Communities are interested in those types of wages,” Long said. “And the aerospace industry provides a lot of opportunities to do that.”

Broward isn’t the only South Florida county investing in this pipeline. Palm Beach County has its own version of a school-based aerospace program, called the