Workforce Developments

Some Shameless Promotion...That Might Benefit You Too! The Aspen Institute’s Workforce Strategies Initiative (WSI) (including yours truly and my absolutely fabulous colleagues) is currently seeking applicants for a new three-year demonstration project, Courses to Employment: Sectoral Approaches to Community College-Nonprofit Partnerships. The demonstration is designed to support partnerships between community colleges and community-based organizations that employ sectoral employment development principles in their work with low-income adults. The demonstration is funded by the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation. Up to six partnerships will receive up to $100,000 each year of the three-year demonstration. WSI will document promising collaborative approaches and challenges, as well as costs and outcomes for participating workers and the businesses that employ them. Currently, Aspen WSI is seeking Letters of Interest from partnerships, a completed application form and endorsement letters from each participating organization. All materials must be received, in one package via e-mail, by the Aspen Institute by close of business June 29, 2007. Based on a review of the submitted Letters of Interest, in September 2007 WSI will invite full proposals from a select group of applicants. Further details about the Letter of Interest process are available here. Posted by Allison Gerber on May 31, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

The Aspen Institute’s Workforce Strategies Initiative (WSI) (including yours truly and my absolutely fabulous colleagues) is currently seeking applicants for a new three-year demonstration project, Courses to Employment: Sectoral Approaches to Community College-Nonprofit Partnerships. The demonstration is designed to support partnerships between community colleges and community-based organizations that employ sectoral employment development principles in their work with low-income adults.

The demonstration is funded by the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation. Up to six partnerships will receive up to $100,000 each year of the three-year demonstration. WSI will document promising collaborative approaches and challenges, as well as costs and outcomes for participating workers and the businesses that employ them. 

Currently, Aspen WSI is seeking Letters of Interest from partnerships, a completed application form and endorsement letters from each participating organization. All materials must be received, in one package via e-mail, by the Aspen Institute by close of business June 29, 2007. Based on a review of the submitted Letters of Interest, in September 2007 WSI will invite full proposals from a select group of applicants.

Further details about the Letter of Interest process are available here.

New Article Looks at Effect of Gender in Workforce Development In an upcoming article in the New England Journal of Public Policy, "New Directions in Workforce Development: Do They Lead to Gains for Women," authors Susan Crandall with the Crittendon Women's Union and Surabhi Jain with the National Council of La Raza look at demand-driven workforce approaches from a gender perspective. Interestingly, their research found that demand-driven approaches often place women at a disadvantage, as they focus on industries and occupations that are traditionally male-dominated. Simply put, women are less likely to enter these industries and/or occupations and more likely to enter jobs that pay less. The author's proffer several recommendations for achieving parity of outcomes for women, including: a focus on preparing women solely for jobs that lead to family economic self-sufficiency, promoting systemic change that help women gain access to male-dominated industries or occupations, building career ladders that facilitate women's promotion within these same industries, and increasing investment in math and science. To read the full text of the article, click here. Posted by Allison Gerber on May 30, 2007 in Allison Gerber, Policy, Wages, Women | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)

In an upcoming article in the New England Journal of Public Policy, "New Directions in Workforce Development: Do They Lead to Gains for Women," authors Susan Crandall with the Crittendon Women's Union and Surabhi Jain with the National Council of La Raza look at demand-driven workforce approaches from a gender perspective. Interestingly, their research found that demand-driven approaches often place women at a disadvantage, as they focus on industries and occupations that are traditionally male-dominated. Simply put, women are less likely to enter these industries and/or occupations and more likely to enter jobs that pay less. The author's proffer several recommendations for achieving parity of outcomes for women, including: a focus on preparing women solely for jobs that lead to family economic self-sufficiency, promoting systemic change that help women gain access to male-dominated industries or occupations, building career ladders that facilitate women's promotion within these same industries, and increasing investment in math and science. To read the full text of the article, click here.

Immigration Debate Sheds Light on Workforce Development Issues

All this talk about immigration is closely related to a topic that those of us interested in workforce development grapple with every day - jobs. In fact, questions surrounding jobs seem to dominate the immigration debate. Questions include things like: Are immigrants “stealing” jobs from Americans, as some would claim? Or, are immigrants filling jobs that employers often can’t otherwise fill? Is an increasing supply of immigrant labor driving down wages in the United States? Or, given the nature of our global economy, is cheaper labor always available in the marketplace, whether it is within our borders or involves companies outsourcing to access it? And, despite any negative impacts immigration may have on the value afforded labor, is it true that it stimulates the economy in other ways, through real estate use and retail consumption? If so, what’s the net effect? These are difficult questions to answer. In some cases the answers proffered appear to be based mostly on opinion or perspective. In other cases, the economic data is so convoluted and difficult to understand that is seems as if economists could argue about it forever.

Despite the inherent difficulty in answering some of these larger questions, for those of us in workforce development, such questions might not be the most interesting ones the immigration debate is bringing to light. Some of the questions about the nature of work in the U.S. help shed light on issues we look at every day. Where are the jobs – in what industries or which locales? Who fills them? Why do some jobs appeal to some people and not others? What defines a good job – is it higher wages, increased benefits, location, etc? How does a particular business or industry source labor? What skills are needed to find good jobs? How does one acquire these skills – is education or on-the-job experience more important? These are weighty questions that most of us grapple with each day.

These are also very difficult questions, with sometimes equally convoluted answers. But, I, for one, am really excited to engage in a national debate that prompts people to ask some of them. Some of my reasons are purely selfish. When I was asked, “what do you do?” while attending a barbecue on Memorial Day, I was able to explain my job using some context from the immigration debate that people seemed to find interesting. Their eyes didn’t glaze like they usually do when I explain that I conduct research on issues related to jobs. People seemed genuinely interested in having a conversation around immigration and jobs. Some brought up several the questions I mentioned above. Aside from the fact that this seems to indicate my job remains relevant in today’s economy, I think a national conversation on some of these issues is long overdue.

The most interesting part of the conversations I’ve had around immigration and jobs was that, in many cases, people brought up a human interest story on immigration and jobs they had read in their local paper or heard on the radio, which help illustrate these issues. And, these individual’s stories were really fueling the discussions. In hopes that the circulation of a few of these stories will continue to spur discussion, a few stories on immigration and jobs I have read or heard recently are:

• "Hmong Fill Jobs Left Empty by Immigration Raid” by Jennifer Luden, NPR, May 29, 2007

• "High-Tech Industry Opposes Immigration Bill," NPR, May, 24, 2007

• "Dropping Out to Take Day Jobs: Many Immigrant Students Miss Out on Education to Maintain Standard of Living” By Ashley Lau, Washington Post, May 14, 2007

I hope others will share some of the stories on immigration and jobs that have sparked their interest.

Welcome guest blogger Allison Gerber

This week, Workforce Developments welcomes guest blogger Allison Gerber. Allison is Research Associate at the Workforce Strategies Initiative (WSI) at the Aspen Institute. WSI is part of Aspen's larger Economic Opportunities Program, and is particularly known for their in-depth research on sector-based workforce development initiatives. Click here to see the highlights of their findings.

Prior to joining Aspen, Allison was Staff Counsel and Director of Special Projects at American Community Partnerships, where she oversaw ACP's workforce and small business development programs in construction, healthcare and hospitality, in Camden, NJ, and Philadelphia, PA. Her areas of expertise include strategic planning, local coalition building, policy development and technical assistance delivery. And yes, you read it right - she's also an attorney.

For the rest of this week, Allison will be blogging about her work and experience, here on Workforce Developments.

Gulf Coast employment and economics after Katrina

What does the Gulf Coast labor market look like today, nearly two years after Hurricane Katrina? What kinds of businesses are leaving the area because they can't find workers? How do escalating land prices affect the local workforce?

On yesterday's All Things Considered, NPR reporter Debbie Elliott explored these questions. Spokesman Bill Glenn of Northrop Grumman, the largest employer in Mississippi, said told her, "Our biggest need ever since Katrina has been people. Right now, we need 400 craft jobs, 250 professionals." In addition,

The labor shortage, combined with rising insurance costs, forced another major employer, the Oreck Corporation, to leave the coast. The vacuum maker closed its Longbeach, Miss., plant and moved to Tennessee.

To read or listen to the whole story on Gulf Coast economics reshaped by Katrina, click here.

Looking for advice from readers

I've received an email with a questions from a reader, but I don't know the answers. I'm hoping other Workforce Developments readers might be able to provide some advice.

• After a conviction for simple assault and battery, can a person ever get a job teaching, in any state?
• Is it possible to get a government job with such a conviction on one's record?
• Is it necessary to wait for a specified period of time before applying for either type of job?
  

If you have an answer to any of these questions, or if you can offer any advice to this reader, please click on Comments below and let us know.

Minimum wage to rise!

It's been ten years since the last increase, and they had to tie it to the most recent emergency spending bill for the war in Iraq, but Congress has finally passed a minimum wage increase that the president has promised to sign. The federal minimum wage will increase in 70 cent increments until summer 2009, when it will top out at $7.25 per hour. This will bring the federal level in line with the level of many states. It's safe to assume that by 2009, many of those states will have already pushed their minimum wages up past the federal level.

I've put together some links on the minimum wage in this blog post. The Economic Policy Institute has loads of background info and analysis on the minimum wage. For mainstream media coverage of Thursday's minimum wage rise click here; to see what they're saying in the blogosphere, click here and here.

Coming next week on Workforce Developments

Next week I'll be handing the reins over to guest blogger Allison Gerber, Research Associate at the Aspen Institute's highly respected Workforce Strategies Initiative. They do terrific research there, with a special focus on sector initiatives. I'm looking forward to seeing what Allison has to say.

Improving the environment while creating good jobs

Clean energy can create jobs and provide a pathway out of poverty for low-income workers.

The House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming got that message loud and clear in a hearing this week, with testimony from Jerry Ringo of the Apollo Alliance, Van Jones of the Ella Baker Center,  Elsa Barboza of SCOPE and Bob Thelan of Capital Area Michigan Works!

The Apollo Alliance is one of several emerging blue-green alliances across the US, looking at ways to invest in businesses to build green infrastructure that will help clean up our environment while creating living wage jobs. Their ideas range from construction work retrofitting buildings to be energy efficient, to domestic manufacturing of components required to generate solar and wind energy. Apollo estimates an investment of $300 billion over ten years could create 3 million jobs.

Just last November I met a researcher who's measuring the positive employment impact of energy programs. With companies like Citibank describing global climate change as "an emerging investment opportunity," a critical mass may finally be emerging that can make Apollo's vision a reality. Just how green (both environmentally and in terms of worker pay) these opportunities turn out to be will be worth watching.

TANF work requirements are bad for kids

When single mothers work full time, their teen children have problems in school. That's the key finding of a new study from MDRC and Syracuse University. Using data on welfare-reliant mothers living in disadvantaged communities in four major US cities being followed in MDRC's Project on Devolution and Urban Change, the study found that when the mothers worked more than 31 hours per week, their adolescent children were more likely to skip school and have behavioral problems, and their school performance decreases.

In other words, tough new work requirements that were further tightened last year through TANF reauthorization are likely to have long-term negative impact on low-income children and the communities they live in. It means that as labor demand tightens while baby boomers retire, we may have have fewer well-educated and qualified American citizens prepared to take their jobs. When AFDC was replaced by TANF in 1996 in an effort to "end welfare as we know it," the primary focus of financial aid to poor families shifted to reducing caseloads and pushing recipients into the workforce. Reauthorization of TANF last year required more work and redefined what the feds consider work or training.

This new study provides statistical confirmation what many case managers have seen first-hand over the past ten years. It's not to say that work in and of itself is a bad thing. At least one study has found that most TANF-leavers like the jobs they found. It's that work needs to pay well and be combined with a wide range of financial and social supports to ensure that the family doesn't suffer when a parent is out of the home for 40 and more hours a week.

Maternal Work Hours and Adolescents' School Outcomes Among Low-Income Families in Four Urban Counties was conducted by Lisa A. Gennetian of MDRC, with Leonard M. Lopoo and Andrew L. London of Syracuse University. Click here to read or download the full report.

Food stamp challenge: surviving on $3 a day

Today is the final day of the Congressional Food Stamp Challenge. For one week, four members of Congress ate only what they could buy with food stamps, which worked out to about $3 a day. The participants are blogging about their experiences and what they learned here. They had to pass up fresh vegetables and leaner cuts of meat for fattier, unhealthier processed foods. The goal of the Challenge is to raise awareness that food stamp benefits are insufficient to meet the needs of Americans who are going hungry. The Food Stamp program, which is managed by the US Department of Agriculture, served some 26 million Americans in 2005 at a cost of $28.6 billion. Members of Congress who took the Food Stamp Challenge want to increase funding for Food Stamps by $4 million.

Why is Workforce Developments covering an anti-hunger program? Too many Americans work hard but still can't make ends meet. MDRC includes food stamps as one of several income supplements that workforce development programs should connect with more closely in order to strengthen and improve the workforce system. 

The Challenge is getting a fair amount of media coverage, including the Boston Globe, Washington Post, CNN and in the blogosphere. The Seattle Times, on the other hand, called it a publicity stunt that trivializes a serious issue. Sure it's a publicity stunt, but I wouldn't call it trivial. Programs like food stamps don't get budget increases without plenty of political pressure. Perhaps this event will raise awareness and get the public to light a fire under their members of Congress to increase funding for this important program.

I/O Psychology goes Web 2.0

Got an email the other day about a new social networking website for professionals in Industrial / Organizational Psychology, IOCareers.com. They're promoting it as a place where you can "build relationships and promote your expertise to your peers.... [T]hrough this online community we promote life long mentorship and discussions amongst our members." It's outside my area of expertise, so I can't vouch for the site, but if this is in your area, you may want to check it out.

Cartoon captioning contest #2 at CLASP

CLASP's cartoon captioning contest is off to a great start. They've picked three finalists for their first cartoon (click here to vote), and they've posted a new cartoon for their second contest. So get on over to the Opportunity at Work blog and check it out.

DOL still calls financial services a 'high growth industry'

Just in time for the implosion in the subprime mortgage industry, DOL is releasing new tools to train workers for careers in the financial services industry. Financial services is one of fourteen key industries of the High Growth Job Training Initiative, and they define it as comprising the banking, securities and commodities, insurance, and real estate sectors. DOL reports financial services accounted for more than 20% of GDP in 2004. More than 8 million Americans worked in the industry that year, and BLS projects growth in employment of 10.5% by 2014.

Wonder what those numbers will look like by the end of 2007. Bankruptcies and buyouts among subprime mortgage lenders have led to significant job losses already, and they're expected to have a ripple affect in other industries as well. How will other sectors within financial services will be affected? Mortgage lenders in good financial shape are tightening rules and lending less - can we expect job losses to follow? Will borrowers at risk of losing their homes crank up credit card borrowing and turn to payday lenders, spurring job growth in those sectors? Will we see new job openings at collection agencies?

I've read conflicting reports on the potential impact of the current housing slowdown on real estate markets and the larger economy, ranging from dire warnings of a complete economic meltdown, to predictions of nothing more than minor hiccups and mild general malaise. I don't suppose anyone has a clearer crystal ball than did BLS when they predicted healthy job growth in financial services, or DOL did when they selected it for special funding streams as a high growth industry.

NNSP sector conference set for November

This year's conference of the National Network of Sector Partners (NNSP) will be in Denver, November 13-15.  They promise workshops that will highlight "improving job quality for low-wage workers, state policy support, and growing community college involvement in sector initiatives, as well as many other exciting advances emerging in the field of sector-based workforce development."

NNSP is an exceptional resource center for more than 300 sector initiatives now underway in more than twenty industries, and is a project of the National Economic Development and Law Center (NEDLC).

Give Rockefeller your workforce ideas

Earlier this month the Rockefeller Foundation released results of a survey of American workers, reporting what a lot of us already know: We feel economically insecure, and expect things to get worse. And we have good reason to feel that way. (Click here for a one-page summary, and here for the full results.) They also found that workers would choose a job with health and pension benefits over a job with higher pay.

Rockefeller isn't known as a leader in funding workforce programs, but this may be changing. I did a quick search for "workforce" in their grants database, and found only $3.6 million in grants since 2004, with most of the money going to groups like MDRC, The Workforce Alliance, and CLASP. However, their site has an intriguing description of an American Workers Initiative, currently in development. Here's an excerpt:

Through its American Workers Initiative, The Rockefeller Foundation would support the development and promotion of new instruments and novel solutions that -- if implemented on a large scale -- would guarantee a basic level of economic security to all American workers.

Here's where you come in. Rockefeller has created a place on their website where you can submit your ideas directly to the foundation. You'll find the form right here. The Chronicle of Philanthropy reports the foundation has taken several of the ideas submitted so far under serious consideration.

I expect Workforce Developments readers and colleagues have plenty of great ideas for workforce development projects, grants and initiatives that can support basic economic security for American workers. So get over to the Rockefeller site and start sharing them.

If you can, teach

Ran into a colleague of mine the other day who recently made a career change, from teaching junior high school to program management at a small nonprofit. What's the difference between the two? She had this to say (I'm paraphrasing only slightly):

When I was teaching I had to create five plans every day. Then I had to implement them with 150 people who didn't want to do what I said. By comparison, this is like smoking dope on a beach in Jamaica. Why do they try to tell teachers we don't have any real skills?

IBM to lay off 150K?

The hottest workforce rumor burning up the blogosphere these days says IBM Global Services plans to lay off 150,000 of its estimated 350,000 employees worldwide by the end of the year, at which point they'll also freeze their American pension plan. The story was broken by PBS blogger I, Cringely, who cites sources inside Big Blue. Analysts call his story "hogwash."

IBM has engaged in recent layoffs on the scale of 1,000 at a time. Whether they grow as the year progresses - and whether Wall Street rewards them for it - is worth watching for.

Casey's new website

The Annie E. Casey Foundation has launched its brand-new-and-improved website, right at its same old address, aecf.org. Most of their workforce development resources and information are within their Economic Security initiative. You can also find the locations of Casey initiatives on this cool map.

Is the internet your friend?

What kind of info technology user are you? Do you see the internet solely as a source of information, or do you use Web 2.0 tools to create content that expresses who you are? Does the availability of all that info help you do your job and live better, or do you feel overloaded?

The Pew Internet and American Life Project has released the results of a study of how Americans use the internet and cell phones. They found that while most of us are connected via one or both, we use these technologies in very different ways. They've divided us into ten different categories of users, based on what gadgets we own, how we use them and our attitude toward them. A brief rundown of the ten categories is provided in this press release.

They even have an online quiz you can take to find out what kind of user you are, although I'm not entirely convinced by it. For example, the first question:

Some people feel overloaded with information these days, considering all the TV news shows, magazines, newspapers, and computer information services. Others say they like having so much information to choose from. Do you feel overloaded, or do you like having so much information available?

My answer depends on what kind of day I'm having.

The quiz put me in their lackluster veteran category, a person who's been online for quite a while and has lots of gadgets, but doesn't always love the way they impact our lives. "But I'm a blogger," I thought, a little embarrassed at being called "lackluster." But perhaps this explains one of my fundamental blogging principles that's in conflict with nearly every other hard-core blogger I've ever met. That is, I'd rather write three or four good posts a week than seven lousy ones. I'd rather read a few good posts than waste my dwindling eyesight on a lot of garbage. I've been told that if I want lots of hits, then I have to post at least once a day, and preferably more. (For an alternative point of view, read this excellent article by Eric Kintz.)

Do I want lots of hits, or do I want to create good content that's well targeted to my audience? Truth is there are only 24 hours in every day, and I refuse to spend them all online posting to my blog. Aha, perhaps I feel a little lackluster after all.