COMMUNITY COLLEGES = OPPORTUNITY

Today, economic success depends on bold and innovative action to build a highly skilled workforce. Jobs for the Future collaborates with community colleges to make the most of their unique institutional position and move more Americans through high school to postsecondary credentials and family-sustaining careers.

Achieving this vision requires a multifaceted approach.

One strand of our work focuses on preparing students for college and careers. For example, the transition to college—even community college—is a major barrier to postsecondary success. Students in early college high schools earn a high school diploma and up to two years of college credit—tuition free. In 24 states, school systems partner with community colleges and other postsecondary institutions to build this effective pathway to graduation and careers.

The second strand of our work in this area focuses on helping students succeed in community college. JFF manages the policy component of the Developmental Education Initiative and works with policymakers in six states to encourage colleges to take actions that promise better results.

The third strand is serving adults returning to college. Community colleges are essential to Jobs to Careers, which supports 17 partnerships that bring together employers, educational institutions, and other organizations to create advancement opportunities for frontline workers in health care.

This issue of Newswire highlights JFF’s participation in Achieving the Dream through which over 100 community colleges, 16 states, and many partner organizations are improving outcomes for students, particularly those from low-income and underrepresented backgrounds. This national initiative’s policy component, which JFF manages, is designed to make it easier for participating colleges to succeed in broadly institutionalizing and sustaining change. The policy efforts also move lessons from participating colleges to all institutions in a state and nationally.

—Marlene B. Seltzer, President and CEO, Jobs for the Future

GOOD DATA. STRONG COMMITMENT. BETTER POLICY. IMPROVED OUTCOMES.

When Achieving the Dream began in 2004, few states placed a priority on improving success among community college students. A central goal of the initiative has been to demonstrate that states could shift this dynamic. JFF’s “Good Data” report documents the state policy work around this goal.

HOW VIRGINIA IMPROVES STUDENT SUCCESS

Virginia illustrates concrete strategies for moving toward data-driven student success. Altered State, by Kay Mills, summarizes the progress of the Virginia Community College System in Achieving the Dream and provides a powerful example of how one system has leveraged participation in the initiative to make student success a central focus across all of the state’s community colleges.

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THE EARLY COLLEGE SUCCESS STORY

CONNECT TO COLLEGE: STATE STRATEGIES

Inclusion of college courses in the high school curriculum is a growing strategy for improving the success of low-income high school students and others with low educational attainment. In April, JFF convened Connect to College, a conference to help states that are interested in developing, sustaining, or expanding college-connected approaches, with a focus on financing and ensuring program quality.

This meeting highlighted two statewide efforts to create supportive pathways that integrate college coursework and expectations into high school. North Carolina has created 70 early colleges since 2004. Texas uses a variety of settings to promote completion of college-level courses by low-income high school students. Three recent JFF reports detail the work of these states:

Policies Paved the Way: Early College Innovation in North Carolina

College and Career Readiness for All Texas High School Graduates

Lessons from the Lone Star State: Designing a Sustainable Financial Model

READYING BLACK AND LATINO YOUNG MEN FOR COLLEGE

The 210 early college high schools are showing promising results in preparing black and Latino young men for college success, write JFF’s Michael Webb and Nancy Hoffman in the April issue of Education Leadership. The authors address a central question about the success of early college high schools: why students considered particularly vulnerable to school failure—black and Latino males—respond so well to academic challenge.

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BUILDING ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITY

RX FOR A NEW HEALTH CARE WORKFORCE: PROMISING PRACTICES AND THEIR POLICY IMPLICATIONS

JFF’s Randall Wilson describes what is needed to match the demands of a reformed health care system with a supply of skilled professionals and supporting occupations. Wilson draws on promising models from several JFF initiatives, including Breaking Through, Jobs to Careers, and the National Fund for Workforce Solutions. Wilson prepared the report for a March JFF convening that brought together health care policymakers, funders, workforce experts and practitioners, and industry leaders committed to expanding access, lowering costs, and improving the quality of health care.

CAREER NAVIGATION FOR WORKING LEARNERS

A New National Approach to Career Navigation for Working Learners, a report prepared by Jobs for the Future for the Center for American Progress, details the inadequacy of the career navigation assistance now available. The report showcases promising models of career navigation and envisions a more robust national approach to career navigation services for working adults. It concludes with recommendations of next steps and federal policy actions that would move the nation closer to achieving that vision.

REGIONAL GROWTH AND OPPORTUNITY INITIATIVE

JFF, with support from the U.S. Department of Labor, the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, and the Walmart Foundation, is collaborating with the Council on Competitiveness and FutureWorks to examine what’s working in regional growth efforts—and what’s getting in the way of them. With support from the Walmart Foundation, we are applying what we’ve learned so far by establishing a Regional Growth and Opportunity Learning Network, convening 10 to 12 regions that are leading the way, along with others that want to follow suit.

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WORKFORCE SOLUTIONS

WORKFORCE SOLUTIONS WEEK: REBUILDING AMERICA’S WORKFORCE

During Workforce Solutions Week 2010, JFF’s partners around the country mounted local events that highlighted and promoted efforts to build a highly skilled workforce. For example, in the Philadelphia area, the Job Opportunity Investment Network and District 1199c Healthcare Industry Partnership sponsored “Celebrating Success, Standing Up for Change,” with U.S. Assistant Labor Secretary Jane Oates and economist Paul Harrington as lead speakers. In Massachusetts, Crittenton Women’s Union released “Hot Jobs 2010,” identifying the occupations that offer opportunity for low-wage workers. And the University of Alaska-Fairbanks and Norton Sound Health Corporation hosted “Work-Based Learning for Behavioral Health Workers in Rural Areas,” a Webinar on work-based learning as a model for recruiting and preparing workers who have had limited access to formal education and training.

PROFILE: FRED DEDRICK NATIONAL FUND FOR WORKFORCE SOLUTIONS ANNOUNCES DIRECTOR

Fred Dedrick has joined the National Fund for Workforce Solutions as its first executive director. Most recently the Deputy Secretary for Workforce Development in Pennsylvania, Dedrick brings two decades of experience implementing the types of strategies that form the foundation of the National Fund.

In Pennsylvania, Dedrick was responsible for $150 million in federal and state workforce funding. He championed, designed, and implemented the very strategies that guide the National Fund: organize workforce partnerships that create long-term relationships between employers and service providers; develop strategies for specific industry sectors, with a focus on those that are important to the local economy; build career pathways that offer entry-level workers and people seeking employment real opportunities for advancement; and align and coordinate the many programs, organizations, and funding sources that together make up a community’s approach to preparing people for new careers.

“Nationally, we can do a better job of helping jobseekers and employees succeed in today’s economy by focusing on and understanding what the employer and the worker in that industry need to be successful,” says Dedrick. “Joining the National Fund is a great opportunity to work with people throughout the country committed to helping low-wage workers build a career.”

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Jobs for the Future identifies, develops, and promotes new education and workforce strategies that help communities, states, and the nation compete in a global economy. In nearly 200 communities in 41 states, JFF improves the pathways leading from high school to college to family-sustaining careers.

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