Improve The Skills of The American Workforce Through Reauthorization of The Workforce Investment Act

As Congress reauthorizes the Workforce Investment Act (WIA), improving the strength of the American workforce should be a continued priority. Employment and training services play a vital role in preparing the American workforce to meet community and industry needs. WIA supports quality training in postsecondary settings, including community colleges through partner programs such as the Carl D. Perkins Vocational and Technical Education Act. Additionally, youth programs supported by WIA provide crucial development and employment services for at-risk youth. At a time of economic uncertainty, improving the skills of the American workforce to meet these needs is crucial to our nation's ability to successfully compete in the 21 st century economy. Some facts:

Skills training and continuing education provide crucial links to good jobs

Census data consistently show that people with higher educational attainment have higher median earnings, and several studies show that those with higher skills earn more and work more over time.

Youth unemployment is at historically high levels

The number of jobless and out-of-school youth has increased by 12 percent and approximately 600,000 youth have lost their jobs since 2000; and in 2002, 5.5 million youth (ages 16-24) were both out of work and out of school, according to a recent study conducted by the Northeastern University 's Center for Labor Market Studies.

Employers across the nation continue to need well-trained workers with good skills

Nearly 75 percent of employers report severe conditions when trying to hire qualified workers, 40 percent say that applicants are poorly skilled, and 30 percent say that applicants have the wrong skills for available jobs, according to a 2002 survey by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Center for Workforce Preparation.

What should be done to improve WIA and meet the needs of youth, job seekers and employers?

One-Stop Infrastructure Funding

The Association for Career and Technical Education (ACTE) and the National Association of State Directors of Career Technical Education Consortium (NASDCTEc) support overall increases in WIA funding to meet the skills development needs of employers and the workforce. Reauthorization efforts should include a separate line to fund WIA's One-Stop system's infrastructure needs. If a reauthorized WIA is unable to provide a separate line item for infrastructure, ACTE and NASDCTEc support the continued negotiations of these cost sharing agreements at the local level, where local agencies can best make such decisions. Infrastructure funding proposals in the House and Senate that seek to take funds from WIA partner programs (including the Perkins program, which provides post secondary education and training services) will hinder these already under funded programs' ability to meet education and training needs both inside and outside the WIA system. Should such proposals move forward, any funds taken from Perkins should come from only the postsecondary portion of a state's Perkins' allotment. Only the postsecondary aspect of Perkins is a mandatory partner in the WIA system. A greater proportion of overall Perkins funding serves secondary programs. Taking a percentage from a state's overall Perkins funds would unnecessarily harm career and technical education programs in America 's high schools.

Youth

ACTE supports conserving WIA's current focus on serving both in-school and out-of-school youth, maintaining funding for youth programs, and maintaining WIA's Youth Councils to ensure that local communities continue to focus on the employment concerns of young people.

Training

ACTE and NASDCTEc support increasing overall opportunities for training in the WIA system, including the elimination of WIA's “sequence of services” provision which forces participants to go through a prescribed sequence of core and intensive services before gaining access to training. Participants instead should be able to access immediately the services most suitable for their needs.

For more information, contact: Christin M. Driscoll, ACTE at cdriscoll@acteonline.org or (703) 683-3111, and Nichole Jackson, NASDCTEc at NJackson@careertech.org or (202) 737-0303.