WCTF Project Summaries
June, 2007
Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center
Year Up, Inc.
Jewish Vocational Services
Asian American Civic Association
Community Works Services
Berkshire County Regional Employment Board
Greenfield Community College
Regional Employment Board of Hampden County
Skyline Technical Fund, Inc.
Cape & Islands Workforce Investment Board
North Shore Workforce Investment Board/City of Salem
Merrimack Valley Workforce Investment Board
Massasoit Community College
Greater New Bedford Workforce Investment Board
UMass Amherst-Labor/Management Workplace Education
Lead: Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center
Project Synopsis: Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Children’s Hospital Boston and New England Baptist Hospital are partnering with Bunker Hill Community College and the Boston Private Industry Council on an initiative to train current hospital employees to be Medical Laboratory Technicians. In an employer-designed and led response to a critical need to staff this profession, the hospitals are working with Bunker Hill Community College to build and accredit a Medical Laboratory Technician program in the greater Boston area, which currently has no such training program. This initiative, which will be offered in a model convenient for hospital employees, is a model of a community college and local employers working together to build a workforce development solution. Investment in this initiative could have a powerful impact for the state of Massachusetts – it is a training program designed to advance the careers of working adults, focused on an industry which employs 15% of the state’s working adults.
There is a national shortage of Medical Laboratory Technicians and Technologists. Participating employers are facing vacancy rates between 6% and 15% in these roles. The hospitals plan to market this program to hospital employees, select employees, and sponsor their participation this program that is designed for employees to pursue training yet continue to be able to support their families. For the first six semesters, employees will take on-site courses offered by BHCC that will lead to an Associate Degree in Medical Laboratory Technology and national certification. In the last 6 months of the program, employees will participate in clinical practicum on site at their hospitals for 40 hours a week. During this time, hospitals will continue to provide a salary and benefits for employees as they complete their training. An estimated 14 program graduates will take the national certification exam and be hired by their hospitals as Medical Laboratory Technicians.
Following the implementation of this pilot program, the hospitals intend to run future cohorts of this program. In addition, graduates of this program are positioned to move further up the career ladder to Medical Technologist roles, after 2 years on the job and the acquisition of additional course credits.
Amount Awarded: $500,000
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Lead: Year Up, Inc.
Project Synopsis: Thee goals of the project are to provide financial services institutions with a reliable source of entry level talent for positions that will lead to lower turnover and significant cost savings, and to provide opportunities for significant life improvements for a disconnected population (low-income, at-risk 18-24 year-olds) that is often locked out of the corporate workplace.
Amount Awarded: $500,000
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Lead: Jewish Vocational Services
Project Synopsis: The Hotel Career Institute (HCI) will meet the workforce development needs of the hospitality industry in the greater Boston region. The industry, consisting of hotels and restaurants, is the third largest and fastest growing industry in the state, with its largest concentration in the greater Boston region. A flat labor market and significant skill gaps between largely immigrant workers and the requirements of growing occupations highlight the industry’s enormous need for skilled employees. The HCI, led by Jewish Vocational Service, the International Institute of Boston, and nine major hospitality employers, will provide a continuum of pre-employment and career development services for hospitality employers and their entry-level workers. Services, delivered at the workplace and at the two Boston convention centers, will include lodging and culinary pre-employment training and placement; incumbent worker training including ESOL, math, computer skills; and career coaching and supervisory training that will help employees climb several career paths. The HCI’s impact will include filling vacancies; providing learning gains, promotions, and pay increases for employees; and improving quality and productivity for participating employers.
Amount Awarded: $500,000
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Lead: Asian American Civic Association
Project Synopsis: Partnership for Automotive Career Education (PACE) is an education, training, and employment project for entry-level automotive technicians. PACE provides an education and training pipeline customized to the automotive industry, recruits and screens participants, and provides English language and basic math education customized to the automotive industry; hands-on automotive training for employer identified entry level skills; job readiness skills; computer literacy; automotive service excellence test preparation training; supervisory training; career counseling, case management, job placement, and retention services. PACE trains new workers for the industry as well as provides education and training for incumbent workers to be able to move up the company career ladder.
PACE helps job seekers and workers attain and retain employment and advance to family sustaining wages. PACE assists employers in filling vacancies, reducing recruitment costs, increasing retention, and diversifying their workforce.
Amount Awarded: $499, 991.
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Lead: Community Works Services
Project Synopsis: The At Your Service program is a proven collaboration of not for profit service providers, public agencies, and employers aligned to ensure that Boston’s most vulnerable populations have access to exciting careers in Boston’s thriving hotel industry. With new partners and service options, At Your Service (AYS) now aims to serve homeless women who are transitioning from welfare and other adults who homeless or at risk of being homeless and are receiving or eligible for food stamp benefits.
Impact and Innovation: AYS offers many innovative and value-added features:
- Flexibility: The multiple track design responds to individual needs by providing many entry points to careers in hospitality.
- Industry: The responds to the Boston area hotel industry’s need for skilled, cross-trained workers and constant 40% vacancy rate.
- Builds on pilot: Expands an existing pilot previously funded by the Massachusetts Department of Workforce Development –All proposed components are in operation at varying scale and continuously being refined. This will greatly reduce start up time and maximize resources.
- Capacity Building: Beyond helping people get jobs, the project aims create a replicable template for working with employers to effectively recruit and retain individuals with barriers in the workforce.
- System Change: The program builds a much-needed bridge between the workforce development and the shelter systems. This could be used as a model for other providers to help individuals who are in shelter rapidly attach to employment services.
Amount Awarded: $498,595
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Lead: Berkshire County Regional Employment Board
Project Synopsis: Facing a dire shortage of Nursing Assistance, LPNs, RNs and other health care staff, this project’s goal is to recruit new staff and to improve the skills of existing staff. The design is to support staff by providing release time, paid tuition, child care and transportation while attending prerequisite and certificate classes and to prepare staff for training by providing a Readiness workshop. The design also provides for the development of recruitment materials, including a website to attract new employees. The impact will provide a model for facilitating the recruitment and retention of new employees into the Health Care Industry.
Amount Awarded: $500,000
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Lead: Greenfield Community College
Project Synopsis: The overall goal of the project is to build upon Franklin County’s unique position of leadership and strength in environmental stewardship to establish an awareness, education and training program in the critical emerging Renewable Energy/Energy Efficiency focus of the construction sector. The Sustainable Practices in Construction Project (SPC) will develop and implement a course-by-course curriculum along the spectrum of sustainable practices in the construction industry, culminating in a one-year certificate and two-year Associate Degree program. Over 1000 contact hours of instruction will be offered during the grant period. The project anticipated that each course will enroll at least twelve participants from among incumbent workers, pre-college special populations, and high school and current college students desiring renewable skill training for entry into the construction sector and related occupations.
Through linkages with area service agencies the project will recruit older workers, at-risk youth, adult learners, and ESOL learners and will provide adequate support through career coaching and other support services. It will also ensure articulation with secondary programs at each of the two vocational-technical schools and largest feeder high schools to Greenfield Community College. It will provide multiple entry and exit points for each of the populations targeted.
Overall project outcomes include enrollment of at least 240 unduplicated participants, completion of two or more courses for all participants, appropriate wage increases for skills attainment, and providing the construction sector with retrained and new workers able to improve the capacity of their business to respond to the emerging demand for renewable production and services from their residential and commercial customers.
Amount Awarded: $370,416
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Lead: Regional Employment Board of Hampden County
Project Synopsis: Precision Manufacturing Training Project (PMTP). Goal 1: To provide training in Machine Tool Technology to 40 unemployed/underemployed individuals. Goal 2: To establish 40 training slots per year to provide skills enhancement to 60 incumbent workers. This will increase the industry’s capacity to penetrate specific market demands in highly specialized and complementary markets.
Amount Awarded: $409,788
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Lead: Skyline Technical Fund, Inc.
Project Synopsis: Manufacturers need better-trained workers with higher skills in order to remain competitive. Workers need better skills to get into good jobs, and to advance their career paths. The goal of this project is to supply employer needs for new hires, improve the skills for incumbent workers, and train under or unemployed persons to fill this gap, thus improving family self-sufficiency and making businesses more productive and competitive. The Central Mass. Institute for
Workforce Development is designed to reduce barriers and to connect the dots between potential and incumbent employees, employers, and technical education and training providers, using the resources of Worcester Technical High School. The program implements successful models such as MOST (Machine Operator Skills Training) and builds on existing relationships and strengths to deliver basic workforce education and manufacturing training. Its expected impact will be to improve the economic status of individuals, families, and employers in Central Massachusetts, and to create the Institute to replicate the program to other industries and regions in the Commonwealth.
Amount Awarded: $500,000
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Lead: Cape & Islands Workforce Investment Board
Project Synopsis: This project will provide four trainings, covering two major areas in which our local healthcare employers need assistance: improving the skills related to information technology and expanding the skills of entry level workers. Worker shortages in the healthcare industry are well documented, and this training will allow the healthcare employers to fill in gaps in their workforce.
The four training courses will be in the following areas: Medical Information Technology, Health Unit Coordinator, Super User Medical Information, and Dementia Training.
Amount Awarded: $318,877
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Lead: North Shore Workforce Investment Board/City of Salem
Project: Health Care Learning Network-North Shore
Project Synopsis: Many health care employers have adopted “grow your own” strategy, because incumbent workers are familiar with working in a health care environment and have developed significant patient care skills, and because the investment increases worker commitment to the organization.
A collaborative of health care industry and health education executives have created the concept of a new education model, the Health Care Learning NetworkTM (HCLNTM) to prepare for post-secondary education programs. Using the latest in instructional and learning outcomes management technology, the HCLNTM will deliver health care industry-specific English language, basic academic and college preparatory coursework to front-line health care workers. It will be a blended web-based and face-to-face system available to any health care worker and low-income resident who aspired to a professional health care job.
Through this project, three industry partners representing seven extended care facilitated will implement the HCLNTM-North Shore as a strategy to address critical professional shortages and to improve overall customer service. From the employee standpoint, this project will dramatically increase employee wages, allowing many front line workers to become economically self-sufficient and move up the health care career ladder.
Amount Awarded: $500,000
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Lead: Merrimack Valley Workforce Investment Board
Project Synopsis: This partnership initiative is designed to meet the workforce needs of the regions manufacturing industry. The proposed project will provide education and training services to a minimum of 45
currently unemployed workers and a minimum of 125 currently employed workers. The goal of the project is to work with the regions employers and education providers to develop
career pathways, which will meet the stated needs of our industry partners and workers.
Course offerings will range from entry level to highly skilled giving employees opportunities
for advancement by upgrading skills and giving companies a more educated, market responsive workforce.
The project will have the following impacts:
- Assist area employers in meeting their workforce hiring and training needs
- Enhance the educational and occupational skills of the workforce to meet changing
business conditions
- Provide opportunities for employee advancement and/or wage increases
- Create a systemic career training pathway for employers and employees
- Expand training curriculum and availability
- Promote collaborations among businesses and education and training providers
- Develop industry recognized credentials
- Maximize training resources and reduce duplication
Amount Awarded: $500,000
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Lead: Massasoit Community College
Project Synopsis: Massasoit Community College, in collaboration with industry, community, and higher education partners, proposes the Jobs in Boating (JIB) project. The proposed project’s focus is the Marine Trades industry, a sector of the critical Travel and Tourism industry as defined in the WCTF legislation. The Marine Trades industry in Massachusetts generates nearly $2 billion in statewide spending annually. It comprises boat dealers, boatyards, and marinas, which span industry sectors such as Retail Trade; Other Services; and Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation –identified as critical industries in the Southeast Region of Massachusetts.
The Marine Trades industry faces a shortage of skilled and qualified workers, particularly marine technicians, nationwide. In southeastern Massachusetts, the inability to fill these jobs has hindered this industry’s growth and competitiveness. A shortage of training programs and qualified instructors, a lack of awareness of career opportunities, and retirements among the incumbent workforce – combined with industry expansion – have contributed to the shortage of qualified workers.
The JIB project will address the dual goals of 1) meeting the critical need for skilled technicians in the Marine Trades industry in southeastern Massachusetts and 2) providing the region’s residents – including youth; older workers; women, who are under-represented in the marine trades; low-income individuals; the unemployed; those with disabilities; and others who experience barriers to employment success – with access to sustainable-wage jobs and career ladders in this critical and emerging industry. The JIB project will accomplish these goals by expanding marine education and training to both community colleges in the region; developing advanced training curricula for the incumbent workforce; and increasing the pipeline of skilled workers by recruiting youth, older workers, and others for training and jobs in the Marine Trades.
Amount Awarded: $424,518
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Lead: Greater New Bedford Workforce Investment Board
Project Synopsis: As manufactures strive for global competitiveness and specialization in niche markets, they look for solutions to bridge traditional skills of their workers to new, more technical skills, and to train-the-trainer. This project focuses on training over 550 incumbent workers in demand-driven, lean manufacturing concepts that support career ladders within local employers. Participants will receive certificates upon course completion. This will also target 84 potential workers (including DTA clients) to prepare them for an advanced manufacturing environment by embedding lean concepts into work readiness training.
Amount Awarded: $499,923
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Lead: UMass Amherst-Labor/Management Workplace Education
Project Synopsis: This project brings together private and public employers, unions, the nationally-recognized Labor/Management Workplace Education Program, and two outstanding components of our regional workforce development system to launch industry-wide career ladders in education. Key to this effort is skills offerings essential for older workers to advance up these career ladders. With these workforce development offerings we address a marginalized workforce, older frontline employees (janitors, secretaries, trades people, cafeteria workers), who are falling behind in skill areas critical to the continued competitiveness of the education industry, a bell-weather and omnipresent employer for the Commonwealth.
Project Goals include:
- effective on-site program offerings that lead to career ladder advancement for older workers
- extensive recruitment with our labor and management partners.
- attention to underrepresented workforce populations
- exemplary career coaching design to meet needs of older and address their barriers to career development
- strong, collaborative evaluation, monitoring, and Project oversight
Key design aspects of the project include:
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participatory, inclusive needs assessments and site-specific designs focused on older workers;
- joint employer/union involvement in the creation of career ladders;
- joint oversight of career-related learning opportunities tailored to specific site needs;
- model and replicable career ladder supports specifically geared to older workers;
- shared knowledge between partners experienced in workforce development and partners new to the field.
Amount Awarded: $353,875
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