The Chancellor of the Oklahoma state system of higher education has focused on two overarching objectives: expanding workforce development efforts and creating paths to a better life for Oklahomans. Oklahoma public institutions and elected officials are partners in developing an educated, engaged workforce prepared to meet the state's current and…

Capacity building for advancing climate-change leadership has become a critical workforce development requirement for both professionals and front-line workers. As the World Economic Forum Jobs 2020 report noted, there is an increasing need to provide short-timeframe opportunities for reskilling and upskilling that will keep step with the…

In this chapter, we discuss how the workforce development mission has evolved over the past 10 years, how the mission plays out at community colleges today, what it may look like in the future, and questions that need to be considered.

Disruptions due to the pandemic present partnership opportunities for districts and educator preparation programs (EPPs) to strengthen the educator workforce and support student learning. This document share ways that states, districts, and EPPs can collaborate during recovery from COVID-19 to strengthen systems and relationships. These include:…

This chapter describes and documents anticipated areas of federal community college advocacy. Changes in Congressional behavior are described with specific illustrations of federal legislation, specifically the Higher Education Act. Discussion on the role of the college president and CEO in advocacy focuses on the role of the president and the…

This article highlights two competency-based coaching and mentoring models for the incumbent infant-toddler workforce, designed and implemented at two Illinois institutions of higher education. Each model has been intentionally developed with an antibias and equity lens, focused on cultivating a diverse workforce of practitioners through…

The Federal Student Aid (FSA)'s Five-Year Strategic Plan for Fiscal Years 2023-27 presents tangible goals and objectives to help ensure that Americans can have broad access to higher education, without regard to any perceived limitations of socioeconomic status. The plan incorporates the Next Gen FSA initiative, which is designed to deliver…

This appendix documents the methodology used by the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce to project educational demand within the US economy. The methodology produces forecasts using data from two private analytics companies. The authors use occupational forecasts provided by Lightcast that are calibrated to total employment…

The staggering highs and lows of the recent US economy and their effect on the labor force has been deeply unsettling. The US has come through the COVID-19 recession, the deepest economic downturn since the Great Depression, followed by the quickest recovery ever. One trend in the workforce has remained unaltered throughout this historic change:…

The transitioning of veterans, specifically as mature workers, from the "military world" to the "civilian world," and by extension, the civilian workforce is the ultimate career transition. Despite their motivation and resilience, veterans still encounter a multiplicity of challenges when transitioning to the civilian…

Immigration is a topic of utmost concern for colleges and universities in the United States. International students and the institutions they attend are often caught in the middle of rapidly shifting policies, powerless to do more than try to keep up with the immigration times. Although the Immigration Act of 1952 and subsequent legislation laid…

In 2014, the federal Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) thrust adult educators into a dramatically new landscape of service expectations and partnership requirements to increase the ability of providers to meet the employment needs of students and employers. The coronavirus pandemic created an accelerating demand for adult education…

The COVID-19 pandemic has generated an unprecedented wave of challenges for students, faculty, and staff. In March 2020, a thousand community colleges in the United States shifted to online instruction, which affected around 10 million students. Community colleges are used to responding to their communities during times of crisis. But individual…

Social capital describes students' access to, and ability to mobilize, relationships that help them further their potential and their goals. Just like skills and knowledge, relationships offer resources that drive access to opportunity. Most schools and programs wholeheartedly agree that relationships matter. But far fewer actually measure…

Many companies that are striving to expand their development and production are finding it difficult to do so successfully. This is due to the shortage of qualified employees to help sustain their competitive edge in the global market. This dilemma is due to skills gaps; more importantly a mismatch between available jobs and skills. It is…