I’ve served as a reviewer for a couple of NSF panels, and one of the things I really liked about the program I reviewed for is that a lot of the proposals included collaborations with local trade and vocational schools to involve and train future technicians and operators in addition to researchers and scientists. I think that’s really important for actually succeeding at the technology transfer goals of NSF, and if I’m reading your comment it does at least partly address delivering direct value for a broader chunk of the population