Here’s the challenge Virginia Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam heard from constituents during a recent roundtable with local business owners: Employers are ready and willing to hire more workers into middle- and high-skill technical jobs, but there aren’t enough workers who have the right amount of post-high-school training to even begin the job-specific training. “We have
Layne Beatty had a Class B commercial driver’s license and no technical experience. Robison Oil needed a service technician. It was a match made in America. First, Robison hired Beatty as a warehouse worker. Then it put him through technical training and summer classes with Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act support. And now Beatty’s got
Millions of working adults, including many who have earned a high school diploma, have low literacy, numeracy and digital problem-solving skills — and this problem won’t just “age away.” According to the Center for Postsecondary and Economic Success, half of workers with limited skills are under the age of 45. And while many of these
With funding made possible by the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act, Vermont will be among the first states to launch a program specifically targeted at raising graduation rates and career readiness for students with disabilities. The three-year pilot, called the Linking Learning to Careers program, will provide 400 high school students with access to community