CDC OneLab Grant Fuels ASCP's Expansion of Laboratory Workforce Support and Engagement

CDC OneLab^TM is the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) initiative to unify medical and public health laboratory professionals and testers into a community of practice. The initiative was driven by the need for stronger shared dialogue, best practices, and a centralized education hub for free high-quality training resources designed for the testing community. This initiative further sought to dismantle operational silos and subject matter gaps observed during the COVID-19 pandemic to better prepare for and coordinate laboratory testing services in the event of a future public health emergency.

In April 2022, the CDC issued a funding opportunity to laboratory partners interested in bridging these gaps through the CDC OneLab initiative, supported through a three-year federal cooperative agreement grant. ASCP was uniquely positioned to respond to this funding opportunity due to the breadth and depth of its member base of medical laboratory professionals, as well as its member-driven pulse on laboratory training and workforce development gaps, which could serve as critical drivers of laboratory education and resource development. As such, the CDC awarded the ASCP with one of the four federal grants issued in service of CDC OneLab^TM in September 2022. The other three recipients of the three-year award were: the American Society for Clinical Laboratory Sciences (ASCLS), the University of Maryland, and the New York City Department of Public Health.

Over the three-year CDC OneLab^TM grant period and with more than $1M in federal awards, ASCP was able to advance key laboratory workforce projects, guided by five member committees, including the Workforce Steering Committee, the Council of Laboratory Professionals, the Council on Laboratory Management and Administration, the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Steering Committee, and the Curriculum and Educational Resource- Scientific Advisory Council. More than 100 ASCP members served as distinguished subject matter experts (SMEs) in the efforts to develop key resources and activities in service of the CDC OneLab Initiative.   

Since their launch, the 10 eLearning activities developed by ASCP have collectively engaged more than 50,000 learners. All resources developed through this grant are freely available on ASCP’s grant resource website here.

Scholarships

ASCP launched the Dr. Alvin Ring Empowerment Scholarship for Laboratory Professionals in 2024 to provide financial support to students from rural communities pursuing medical laboratory education in NAACLS-accredited laboratory science programs. ASCP leveraged $106,000 in CDC OneLab^TM grant funds, in addition to a combinatorial strategy for outreach, to directly support tuition and needs-based expenses for 26 scholars (9 MLT, 17 MLS). The distribution of scholars spanned a wide range of candidates including: 3 high school students (interested in starting their lab science education), 14 current laboratory science students (not yet in the lab workforce), 3 non-laboratory science students starting laboratory science programs, 6 laboratory science students (who are working laboratory professionals).

eLearning courses

Through this federal grant, ASCP developed ten free eLearning courses, for which CME and/or CMLE credit was available. Eight of these courses will remain freely available on ASCP’s LMS for three years, and two have since retired.  Two of these enduring courses were designed as case-based eLearning courses for the specific training needs of in-service lab team members, while six free eLearning courses were developed as a part of the ASCP Basic Medical Laboratory Skills training series (each course structured independently and offering 1.0 CMLE credits).

Case-Based eLearning Courses for Laboratory Professionals

Engagement Impact: At grant closeout, over 26,000 learners have engaged with these two eLearning courses.

The purpose of the ASCP Basic Medical Laboratory Skills eLearning series, designed by a team of ASCP member volunteers, is to empower new laboratory hires (with minimal existing medical laboratory training) with the foundational skills and knowledge needed to work in a medical laboratory practice setting. The training intends to simultaneously reduce laboratory leadership’s burden for directing on-the-job training through didactic level-setting of applied medical laboratory concepts, including Laboratory Safety, Laboratory Terminology, Laboratory Math, Basic Operations of Laboratory Equipment, Routine Procedures, and Quality Control.
“One of our staff members did an educational activity through the ASCP website and was very impressed with the content of it,” says Jeriel Hess, a member of the CCL/CSL Education Specialist Team at Mayo Clinic – Rochester.

“Recently, due to the shortage of MLS graduates, our lab has turned to hiring non-MLS science related degrees. Many have little to no lab experience, and so we conduct a ‘Lab Basics’ course with them during their New Employee Orientation week. It's not a perfect course by any means, but it does a decent job of filling a need. However, the [ASCP Basic Medical Lab Skills: Lab Terminology course] my colleague discovered on your website does a more comprehensive job of covering the laboratory/hospital basics our new staff desperately need.” 

While the primary intended target audience of the ASCP Basic Medical Laboratory Skills training series is new hires to the medical laboratory, this series would also be an excellent resource to supplement existing medical laboratory training programs, refresh former lab scientists considering re-entering the workforce after a gap period, build language confidence in basic laboratory concepts for non-native English speakers, orient other members of the patient care team about the laboratory, as well as other applications. At the time of grant closeout, after only three months online, these six eLearning courses engaged nearly 17,000 learners combined.

Practical job aids

ASCP designed, developed, and leveraged existing concise, practical job aids and tools for specific member-derived needs. Over the course of this three-year period, 160+ resources have been made freely available on the ASCP’s Support for CDC OneLab Initiative website or through one of its key deliverables, the ASCP Negotiation & Advocacy Toolbox.

The Negotiation & Advocacy Toolbox was pioneered by ASCP member volunteers, Ihab Abumuhor, MSHCA, MSCS, MLS(ASCP)SBB^CM​, Christy Nickel, MHA, MLS(ASCP)^CM, CPHQ​, and Aaron Odegard, MS, MLS(ASCP)^CMSM^CMQLS. This digital toolbox features 140+ adaptable tools, templates, presentations, and strategies to help laboratory leaders advocate effectively to decision-makers such as hospital administrators and C-suite executives. Interactive events like the ASCP Amazing Lab Race have supported awareness and implementation of these resources. ASCP invites members to contribute by: 1) sharing new resources for inclusion in the Toolbox, or 2) highlighting successful implementations to amplify lab success stories

As job aids are a fast, portable means for educational upskilling, ASCP has also generated job aids on a number of topics based on medical laboratory professional interests, including (but not limited to) the following.

Laboratory Resources Overview 

Laboratory community building

The CDC OneLab Initiative was born out of the need for stronger unity and collaboration within the medical and public health laboratory communities. ASCP set out to develop the Building Bridges Across the Laboratory Community (colloquially called: Building Bridges) webinar series designed to be wholly inclusive to the greater laboratory community – across a range of laboratory positions and practice settings.

Launched in February of 2023, over the three-year grant period Building Bridges tackled three key topic areas: 1) the power of partnership to solve big laboratory workforce challenges, 2) highlighting the diverse array of laboratory professions, and 3) professional development opportunities for laboratory scientists. The webinars employed case studies, panel-based discussions, and an interactive question and answer session to tackle wide-ranging topics including: Using Wastewater Surveillance to Understand Infectious Disease Trends, Twinning & Sharing Best Practices: Regional Partnerships, International Lab Scientists Practicing in the US., among many others. Each session was recorded with the recorded video, slide deck, and summary report publicly available after each session. All webinars remain freely available on our grant website (2025 series, 2024 series, 2023 series).

Building Bridges engaged strong partners in the CDC and the Association for Public Health Laboratories (APHL) to help design a robust curriculum and a diverse target audience across scientific disciplines and sectors, including academic medical centers or hospital laboratories, private clinic or hospital laboratories, academic institutions or research laboratories, state or federal public health laboratories, industry, commercial reference laboratories, and more. While the majority of attendees identified as medical laboratory scientists (42 percent, 2025 series), laboratory managers, supervisors, directors, and undergraduate-level laboratory science program educators also well-represented in the 2025 webinar series.

Unique attendees (excluding ASCP and CDC staffers) totaled over 1,390 across 49 countries, with 54 percent of attendees (participating in evaluations) having participated in more than one webinar in the six-part 2025 series. Nearly two-thirds (63 percent) of attendees were in the U.S., followed by the Philippines (11 percent), and Kenya (4 percent). While the majority of evaluation respondents were already members of the current laboratory workforce, 85 percent reported that the series introduced them to new career opportunities, and 59 percent indicated that they became interested in a new career path through the webinar series. Only 46 total evaluation respondents reported that they were neither currently nor previously in the laboratory workforce, but 72 percent of these individuals (33) indicated that the webinars interested them in pursuing a laboratory career.

The Building Bridges series has been lauded as a model of interactive and inclusive laboratory community building, achieving its goal of centering shared dialogue on collaboration, elevating the visibility of the laboratory profession, and what we love about being laboratory scientists – discovery in service of patients. ASCP will continue to design and host the series in 2026, where the central theme will focus on communicating about our profession. More information will be shared on ASCP’s Workforce Initiatives website as registration opens for the series.

Maintaining momentum

The ASCP Laboratory Workforce Steering Committee, an essential guide in shaping these activities, will continue to advance many projects made possible through this grant. ASCP intends to continue to bring awareness of these materials to its members to expand the reach of these resources to the widest scope. The CDC will also directly cross-promote a number of ASCP’s grant-funded products through their communication channels and partners. ASCP has also shared these key resources widely with the Medical and Public Health Laboratory Coalition, as well as other laboratory stakeholders including laboratory science training program directors, students, educators, laboratory directors and administrators, and more.

If you haven’t done so already, it’s not too late to join the OneLab Network today to engage with your peers and access resources on topics like safety, quality, preparedness, diagnostic testing, core science, and informatics that your laboratory can use today. ASCP members have embraced the CDC OneLab VR^TM portfolio of virtual reality (VR) laboratory training scenarios. These short, interactive VR scenarios are perfect for those exploring laboratory career paths, refreshing skills, and gaining new skills in a safe and controlled environment.

This high-visibility grant offered ASCP an opportunity to show the laboratory community what we can do, working together, with just over $1M in federal funds. It provided a funded channel for ASCP members, committees, and staff to work in tandem, identifying and reporting on critical laboratory workforce and training needs, designing and developing educational resources across a variety of interactive modalities, and engaging partners and colleagues to reinforce networks of collaboration across laboratory sectors and communities. The strength of this collective effort will continue to be demonstrated in the reach of its materials and leveraged as a model for future partnership efforts in service of elevating the laboratory profession.

This project was supported by Cooperative Agreement number CDC-RFA-OE22-2202 (CFDA No. 93.322), funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the American Society for Clinical Pathology and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention or the Department of Health and Human Services. This project was 100% funded with federal funds to the American Society for Clinical Pathology (NU47OE000107).