United States Senator Patty Murray of Washington State recently introduced The Promoting Innovations to 21st Century Careers Act in Congress. The legislation (a summary of which is available here) is intended to help address critical education and workforce needs with:
New Resources - Establishes $912 million in federal competitive grants that can be used by state and regional partnerships to help students move from high school to a wide array of post-secondary education options, to skilled careers.
Strong Partnerships - Requires state and regional partnerships applying for funding to include representatives from high schools, post-secondary education, businesses, labor, workforce, and economic development organizations.
Supporting Innovations - Encourages state and regional partnerships to develop career pathways for high school students that include counseling, mentoring, work-based experiences, and support to obtain degrees, apprenticeships, and other postsecondary credentials.
Real Accountability –Incorporates measures to evaluate success of state and regional efforts, including reports to Congress.
The proposed bill, which goes by the informal title of Careers Pathways, is similar to the Career Pathways policies advocated by the National Skills Coalition (NSC) during the just concluded National Workforce Week of Action. However, from the summary provided, the proposed bill appears to lack components recommended by the NSC to serve the training needs of out-of-work or underemployed adults. I am currently seeking clarification on this.
Murray is chair of the influential Senate subcommittee on Employment and Workplace Safety, part of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions committee. She was also appointed to the highly important and potentially powerful "Super Congress" tasked with coming up with a workable debt-reduction plan to help break the political stalemate in Washington, DC.
If you would like to help create a better future by getting more training to more people in our region, contact me at governmentaffairs@astdps.org.
