The Certification Data Exchange Project (CDEP) was launched in 2012 to provide a model for sharing industry-recognized credential attainment data. Increasingly, employers and education leaders are recognizing the value of industry credentials to verify the knowledge, skills and abilities that students bring to the workforce. As states take steps…

Economic projections show that skills-based technological change across industries and occupations will support rising demand for postsecondary education and training. By 2025, the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce projects that 68 percent of the jobs in Iowa will require some level of postsecondary education. A key…

Prior research has classified strategies to facilitate adult learners' transitions to postsecondary opportunities into five broad categories: advising, General Educational Development-plus (GED-plus), English as a second language, career pathways, and college preparatory (Zafft, Kallenbach, & Spohn, 2006). This two-part study relied on…

The Department of Education, Division of Community Colleges, will annually provide the State Board of Education with The Workforce Training and Economic Development (WTED) Fund Annual Progress Report. Administration and oversight responsibility for the fund was transferred from the Iowa Economic Development Authority to the Iowa Department of…

Drawing on data from six communities in Kansas and Iowa, we explore the factors that are related to community members' current levels of overall support for local ethanol plants. What are residents' opinions about the benefits and drawbacks of local ownership of ethanol plants? How does that awareness lead to overall support of plants? Our…

Assessment of specialized programs, such as logistics and supply chain management program described here, may pose challenges because previous experience are less widely shared than in the more mainline subjects. This case study provides one model that may guide other faculties facing a similar assignment. The report detailed the steps followed to…

Plants that bear less familiar names such as switch grass, "Miscanthus," and kenaf, are not much to look at, having weathered Iowa's winter snows. But Iowa State researchers see these crops as seeds of change in alternative fuels. Rows of experimental crops line the test plots at Iowa State University's research farm. Although corn is…

This qualitative research study utilized the grounded theory tradition to examine organizational structures and processes in a purposefully selected sample of American universities that have established and maintained partnerships with industry. Institutional leaders from the corporate relations offices from fifteen of the top research…

This document, Vol. I in a set, presents information obtained from a survey of industry in Iowa to determine the use and quantities, distribution, and treatment and disposal practices of hazardous waste generators. Additionally, it tabulated the number and manpower characteristics of employees who are in daily contact with such hazardous…

The research study was undertaken to provide data on skills and competencies to aid persons developing curricula for electromechanical technician training programs. Through a 73.8 percent return of 212 questionnaires distributed to Iowa electromechanical technicians, five occupational areas were identified as representative: residential appliance…

The extent to which conditions and experiences of the farm crisis have tempered or shaped farm operators' opinions about the role of the scientific community in economic development through university-industry linkages is examined in this paper. Eleven Likert-type items, designed to ascertain how these linkages are viewed, were included in the…

Since the burden of improving quality of life is often squarely placed on the shoulders of public decision makers, this report (one of the products of Project 2142) provides a basis for assisting county-level decision makers in the planning process. Statistics that "indicate" the social well being or quality of life experienced by people…