MFGS, Inc. Joins Micro Focus in Support of Grace Hopper Code for Us Act Legislation, Sustaining Critical IT Infrastructure and Workforce

News | Press Release

McLean, Va., Aug. 3, 2021 – MFGS, Inc. today announced that the company is joining Micro Focus in full support for U.S. Representative Matt Cartwright’s Grace Hopper Code For Us Act to provide universities and colleges with funding for “the development and implementation of courses of instruction regarding maintaining, developing, and modernizing information systems utilizing critical legacy computer languages.”

“As the master government solutions supplier for Micro Focus, we’re incredibly proud of the company’s support of this bill to help strengthen the important infrastructure skills this act will create and maintain,” said Robert J. Makheja, President of MFGS, Inc. “This measure will help to ensure the next generation of programmers are well trained and prepared to respond in times of crisis when programming languages like COBOL are most essential.”

According to the Society for Human Resource Management, the COVID-19 pandemic amplified the need for COBOL programmers and the importance of workforce planning.

In an announcement from the office of Rep. Matt Cartwright, D-Pa., the bill’s sponsors said the nation needs workers who can update federal government’s legacy systems, especially in light of the increased demand on digital services during the coronavirus pandemic.

“A lot of sectors are seeing a mismatch between the skills workers have and what employers need. Training workers for jobs that are in demand now is key to getting more people back to work and continuing our economic recovery,” said Rep. Cartwright. “When it comes to IT, that mismatch was painfully clear as government agencies struggled to keep their computer systems using older coding languages running during the pandemic. The Grace Hopper Code for Us Act will help prepare workers for good-paying jobs available now in maintaining and modernizing our critical government and private sector information systems.”

Named after late Navy rear admiral Grace Hopper, who is credited with developing the first machine-agnostic programming languages, including COBOL, the act would create the designation of “critical legacy computer languages,” which are used to update federal systems but not commonly taught in higher education.

The proposed bill seeks to give three-year grants of no more than $5,000,000 to five U.S. institutions of higher education. The grants will support courses, scholarships and internships for students choosing to learn about maintaining, developing and modernizing core computer languages like COBOL, Assembly, PL/I and others.

The bill would also prioritize recipients who plan to conduct outreach to grades 6 through 12, give scholarships to students who are learning legacy programming languages and connect participants with internships and job placements, as well as grant applicants that recruit women and other underrepresented groups.

With thousands of successful modernization projects completed for customers around the world, the expertise of Micro Focus was requested in the bill’s development due to the company’s rich history of leadership in application, process and infrastructure modernization activities.

“With our company’s work in modernizing business programming languages and investing in future talent with our Micro Focus COBOL Academic Program, we are honored to support this U.S. House of Representatives’ bill,” Micro Focus General Manager of Application Modernization and Connectivity Neil Fowler said in a statement.

Recent Micro Focus research shows that modernization projects using an incremental and continuous improvement model achieve superior results when compared to other project-based approaches, including the ripping and replacing of core business applications like those written in COBOL.

With 92% of IT leaders regarding their COBOL applications as strategic to their business, this legislation has the potential to support the training of the next generation of programmers for not only proper application maintenance, but for the modernization of these core applications that continue to underpin some of the nation’s most critical IT processes.

 

About MFGS, Inc.
MFGS, Inc. is a Master Supplier of Micro Focus’ best-in-class portfolio of enterprise-grade scalable software solutions to the U.S. Government, its partners, and system integrators. We are an independent, 100% U.S.-based, employed, and owned company. MFGS, Inc. is customer-centric, government compliant, and purpose built to fulfill, support and deliver Micro Focus government solutions to the U.S. Federal Government.

 

About Micro Focus
Micro Focus delivers enterprise software to empower 40,000 customers worldwide to run, transform, and adapt. With a comprehensive portfolio, underpinned by a robust analytics ecosystem, Micro Focus delivers pragmatic, customer-centric solutions to bridge the gap between existing and emerging technologies and enable organizations to achieve Smart Digital Transformation. That’s High Tech, Low Drama. 

MFGS, Inc. Contact:
Assistant Director, Marketing & Digital Media
Andrew M. Scott
(571) 781-8325
Andrew.Scott@mfgsinc.com