Corning’s roots in Hickory grow the community
As Corning expands its North Carolina footprint to support next generation AI infrastructure, employees are already strengthening the community that will grow alongside it.
On any given day in Hickory, North Carolina, you’ll find Corning employees in the community. Chris is standing in front of a classroom, shining a flashlight through a strand of fiber to show second graders how sound can travel on light. Liz is teaching adult learners how to splice optical fiber at the local community college. Jennifer is helping align education, workforce training, and economic development across the county. Tammy is organizing donations for a local soup kitchen.
Together, these moments form a portrait of Corning not just as a major employer, but as a deeply embedded member of the Hickory community. Corning – the inventor of low-loss optical fiber which drove a telecommunications revolution and is now powering artificial intelligence (AI) – has been operating in Hickory for nearly 50 years.
Corning and Meta executives and Hickory and Catawba County leadership break ground at the site of Corning’s expansion in North Carolina.
That presence is only growing. Earlier this year, Corning announced it is expanding one of its Hickory facilities following a multiyear, up to $6 billion agreement with Meta to produce optical fiber, cable, and connectivity solutions for AI-enabled data centers. The expansion reinforces Hickory’s role as a hub for advanced manufacturing. The resulting facility will be the largest cable manufacturing operation in the world. Corning’s workforce in North Carolina will increase by at least 15%.
But for the people who work here, growth has never been just about headcount. It’s about showing up.
“It’s fundamentally built into our core,” says Christopher McGuire, Supply Chain Systems Analyst, and co-chair of the site’s Diversity Council. “It’s just who we are as a company.”
Left: C-VETS, Corning’s employee resource group for veterans, organizes a coat drive. Right: Sisters Tammy Perry and Stacy Self, both Corning employees, work together to restock Little Free Libraries with their colleagues.
Neighbors helping neighbors
That philosophy is visible year-round, but especially during Corning Optical Communications’ Month of Service, when employees volunteer with organizations ranging from Habitat for Humanity to local soup kitchens, shelters, and food pantries. McGuire first volunteered at a soup kitchen shortly after joining Corning nearly a decade ago.
“I realized how much need was out there,” he says. “And Corning wasn’t invested in just one cause. They reach out to all and any.”
For many employees, giving back is personal. Tammy Perry, Manufacturing Associate, regularly rallies her coworkers around backpack programs that send food home with students, book drives that restock Little Free Libraries, holiday gift drives for nursing homes, and school supply collections each August.
Employees volunteer at the Hickory Soup Kitchen (left) and The Corner Table (right).
“It’s the need to want to give back,” Tammy says. “I’ve seen the benefits firsthand.”
Much of this work is organized by employee-led committees, often happening on days off or between shifts. Collection boxes appear in lobbies and break rooms. Groups sign up together.
“It’s good bonding,” Tammy says. “It’s a strengthening experience.”
The Fiber IQ program offers hands-on training for technicians.
Focusing on workforce development
At Catawba Valley Community College (CVCC), Corning partners closely to support workforce development. Through programs like Fiber IQ, Corning employees help train the very technicians who will build and maintain the networks powering modern life.
“Hickory is home for us,” says Elizabeth Lentz, who leads Corning’s Fiber IQ program. “Our goal is to build here, train and upskill our workforce here, and create good paying, sustainable job opportunities for people in Hickory.”
Jennifer Jones, Chief Development Officer at CVCC, sees the impact daily. “One of the things community colleges do best is give hope,” she says. “We open doors for students who didn’t always see themselves going to college and show them there’s opportunity right here in Catawba County.”
Left: Students receive snack donations to a local school. Right: Christopher McGuire teaches students about what Corning does.
STEM education right in Hickory
Corning’s involvement starts early. Employees regularly visit elementary schools for career days, bringing hands-on demonstrations that make abstract technology tangible. McGuire recently led six sessions at his son’s school.
“The kids’ faces just lit up,” he says. “They were asking questions like, ‘How does the light bend without breaking?’ They wanted to see it again and again.”
At area schools and colleges, students of all ages get to see engineering happening right in their hometown.
“You don’t have to move far away to work in technology,” Jennifer says about CVCC’s workforce development programs. “That’s a powerful message for kids to hear.”
Hickory itself plays a role in why this engagement feels so natural. Nestled between Charlotte and the Blue Ridge Mountains, the city blends small-town familiarity with growing opportunity.
“I feel like I can make an impact here,” says Jennifer Whipple, a Corning employee who helps connect coworkers with nonprofits. “What I do directly affects the town I live in.”
CORE employees engage in volunteer activities in Wilmington (left) and Science Olympiad (right).
Giving engineers options
That sense of connection is also shaping the next generation of Corning leaders through the Corning Optical Rotational Engineers (CORE), a one-year rotational program that brings early-career engineers from across the country to North Carolina, including Hickory. CORE engineers rotate through multiple Corning facilities, gaining technical experience while also putting down roots in the communities where they work.
“We’re building a community within these cohorts,” Whipple says. “They’re not just learning different parts of the business, they’re building friendships, volunteering together, hiking on the weekends, and getting involved locally.”
Many of the engineers arrive from out of state and ultimately choose to stay in Hickory, drawn by both professional opportunity and quality of life.
The program has already hired 91 engineers in the three years since the program started, with remarkably high retention, a testament to how intentionally Corning invests in people, Whipple says.
Corning and Hickory: to be continued…
As Corning expands its footprint to support the future of AI infrastructure, its employees continue to invest in something just as essential: people. From classrooms and college labs to food pantries and community festivals, Corning’s presence in Hickory is measured not only in fiber miles and facility expansions, but in relationships built—one volunteer shift, one lesson, one conversation at a time.