The Forgotten Workforce :: Time For Literacy Organizations To Be Brought In via Buffalo News

Editorial: The Forgotten Workforce

Buffalo News: 12.28.2019 by News Editorial Board

On one side, Buffalo is home to significant population that has graduated or otherwise left high school unable to read at a 10th-grade level.

On the other, we see a stable of local employers struggling to fill jobs with qualified candidates, a problem that threatens the health of Western New York’s revived economy.

Any ideas?

The match may not have been made exactly in heaven – making it work will be challenging – but it’s an obvious one: Buffalo needs to train its unemployable workforce to fill jobs that now go begging. It’s good for those who would land new positions, good for employers who need those workers and really good – make that necessary – for a region that needs to protect its improved economy from stalling.

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It begins with literacy. The inability to read is a slamming economic door. On one side is the possibility of success, while on the other is a guarantee of failure. Illiteracy makes prosperity all but impossible, taking with it the likelihood of good nutrition, good health and general stability.

How do you write a rent check or even open a bank account? How do you read a recipe or a prescription bottle, let alone understand how to use sophisticated job machinery? How do you avoid putting succeeding generations at the same educational disadvantage?

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State and local governments, economic developers and the private sector need to make a mission of focused job training and, where necessary, they need to begin that work with literacy. That requires funding and commitment.

It’s not as though the area is unequipped to provide that help. While job training programs in the area attract millions of dollars, little of it goes to literacy problems such as Literacy New York Buffalo-Niagara. That’s a frustration for its executive director, Tara Schafer.

“Emphasizing the missing link of that literacy piece has been a real challenge for us,” she told Watson. “So when funding gets to our community, we feel left out.”

It’s time for such organizations to be brought in.  READ MORE >>

National Literacy Directory

 Local Adult Literacy Programs!

Literacy Reports & Statistics

Workplace

2019: Global Skills Index, Coursera

2018: A Stronger Nation: Learning beyond high school builds American talent, Lumina

2017: UpSkilling Playbook for Employers, Aspen Institute

2015: Skills Gap Report, NAM-MI

2010: Literacy & The Entry-Level Workforce - The Role of Literacy and Policy in Labor Market Success, Employment Policies Institute

2008: Reach Higher America: Overcoming Crisis in the U.S. Workforce, NCAL

2007: America’s Perfect Storm, ETS

2007: Can California Import Enough College Grad's. Meet Workforce Needs?, PPIC

2007: Mounting Pressures: Workforce . . . Adult Ed, NCAL

Realism About Reskilling Upgrading The Career Prospects Of America's Low-Wage Workers via Brookings

Realism About Reskilling

Realism About Reskilling

Upgrading the career prospects of America's low-wage workers

Brookings: 11.07.2010 by Marcela Escobari, Ian Seyal, and Michael J. Meaney

Every person deserves the opportunity for dignified employment that provides living wages and potential for advancement. But for many in America today caught in a cycle of low-wage work, this is far from reality.

Low-wage workers are struggling—and not for a lack of new jobs. The coming flood of innovation will create new tasks and occupations, and the labor market will demand new skills just as quickly as it will shirk others. Robots may be unlikely to wholly replace America’s workers anytime soon, but new technologies will radically displace workers, eliminating jobs in some industries while expanding others.

Policy and company responses have failed to keep pace with this transformation. As the labor market splits into low-wage and high-wage work, lower tier jobs are precarious, marked by unpredictable schedules, reduced benefits, and stagnant wages. While reskilling alone will not be enough to lessen inequality or provide equal opportunity in the face of these trends, it must be an integral part of the solution to support workers without leaving anyone behind.

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WHO ARE AMERICA’S MOST VULNERABLE WORKERS, AND WHAT ARE THEIR PROSPECTS?

An estimated 53 million people—44 percent of all U.S. workers ages 18–64—are low-wage workers. That’s more than twice the number of people in the 10 most populous U.S. cities combined. Their median hourly wage is $10.22, and their median annual earnings are $17,950.

Low-wage work spans gender, race, and geography, but, women and members of racial and ethnic minority groups are disproportionately likely to be low-wage workers. A Black worker is 32 percent more likely to earn low wages than a white counterpart—that number jumps to 41 percent for Hispanic workers. Altogether, women are 19 percent more likely than men to be low-wage workers.

Low-wage workers switch jobs most frequently but are more likely to churn within a set of low-wage occupations. Workers in the lowest wage quintile have the highest likelihood to switch into another low paying job. Workers in the second lowest quintile have a 55% chance to remain or move downward, and even those in the middle quintile are more likely to move to a lower wage group than a higher one.

Certain occupations are likelier to lead to higher wages. Our near-term mobility index estimates whether workers departing an occupation are likely to see higher wages. For instance, telemarketers tend to transition to a much higher paid job, compared to cooks or housekeepers. Cleaners, cooks and hairdressers, are the most vulnerable; their occupations pay low wages and offer little opportunity for advancement.  READ MORE >>

Literacy Reports & Statistics

Workplace

2019: Global Skills Index, Coursera

2019: Realism About Reskilling - Upgrading the career prospects of America's low-wage workers, Brookings

2018: A Stronger Nation: Learning beyond high school builds American talent, Lumina

2017: UpSkilling Playbook for Employers, Aspen Institute

2015: Skills Gap Report, NAM-MI

2010: Literacy & The Entry-Level Workforce - The Role of Literacy and Policy in Labor Market Success,

 Employment Policies Institute

2008: Reach Higher America: Overcoming Crisis in the U.S. Workforce, NCAL

2007: America’s Perfect Storm, ETS

2007: Can California Import Enough College Grad's. Meet Workforce Needs?, PPIC

2007: Mounting Pressures: Workforce . . . Adult Ed, NCAL

Meet The Low-Wage Workforce via Brookings

Meet The Low-Wage 

Workforce

Meet The Low-Wage Workforce

Brookings: 11.07.2019 by Martha Ross and Nicole Bateman

Jobs play a central role in the lives of most adults. As forces like globalization and automation reshape the labor market, it is clear that some people and places are positioned to do well while others risk becoming collateral damage. The well-educated and technically savvy find ample employment opportunities, while those with lower levels of education face a labor market that is decidedly less welcoming, with lower wages and less potential for career growth. Meanwhile, some regions dramatically outpace others in job growth, incomes, and productivity, raising disquieting questions about how best to promote broad-based economic growth.

Against this backdrop, we provide in a new report extensive demographic and occupational data on low-wage workers nationally and in more than 350 metropolitan areas. It is a large and diverse group of people, and they play a major role in our economy.

Low-wage workers comprise a substantial share of the workforce. More than 53 million people, or 44% of all workers ages 18 to 64 in the United States, earn low hourly wages. More than half (56%) are in their prime working years of 25-50, and this age group is also the most likely to be raising children (43%). They are concentrated in a relatively small number of occupations, and many face economic hardship and difficult roads to higher-paying jobs. Slightly more than half are the sole earners in their families or make major contributions to family income. Nearly one-third live below 150% of the federal poverty line (about $36,000 for a family of four), and almost half have a high school diploma or less.

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The largest cluster, accounting for 15 million people or 28% of low-wage workers, consists of workers ages 25 to 50 with no more than a high school diploma.  READ MORE >>

Literacy Reports & Statistics

Workplace

2019: Global Skills Index, Coursera

2018: A Stronger Nation: Learning beyond high school builds American talent, Lumina

2017: UpSkilling Playbook for Employers, Aspen Institute

2015: Skills Gap Report, NAM-MI

2010: Literacy & The Entry-Level Workforce - The Role of Literacy and Policy in Labor Market Success,

 Employment Policies Institute

2008: Reach Higher America: Overcoming Crisis in the U.S. Workforce, NCAL

2007: America’s Perfect Storm, ETS

2007: Can California Import Enough College Grad's. Meet Workforce Needs?, PPIC

2007: Mounting Pressures: Workforce . . . Adult Ed, NCAL

The Philadelphia Platform :: Workforce Development and Education

Solomon and Hohenstein Talk About Harrisburg’s Philadelphia Delegation’s Plan for the City

Star Philly New: 4.30.2019 by Tom Beck

“The idea is to build accountability to what we are doing in Harrisburg each and every day and to make Harrisburg relevant,” Solomon said.

Pennsylvania State Representatives Joe Hohenstein, who serves the 177th district, and Jared Solomon, who serves the 202nd district, took to the Samuel Recreation Center in Port Richmond Thursday night to address community concerns and highlight the Philadelphia Platform, which is an outline of four policy areas that are the primary priorities of the Philadelphia Delegation during the 2019–20 Legislative Session.

“The idea is to build accountability to what we are doing in Harrisburg each and every day and to make Harrisburg relevant,” Solomon said.

Workforce Development and Education

According to the platform, which was handed out to each person in attendance, the vision and goal of this policy area is to support “young people, returning citizens, adult learners, and immigrants in fully participating in the labor force” by “pursuing family-sustaining careers, and creating a 21st century workforce in Philadelphia.”

Hohenstein said that officials have seen “a reduction in the number of available jobs” and have “also seen our schools suffer.” There’s a number of stats in the platform to back this up. Here’s a few:

Philadelphia ranks 96th out of the top 100 cities in labor force participation, and in some parts of the city it’s as low as 65%.

550,000 adults in Philadelphia, or nearly 50% of the adult population, lack the tools like literacy, computer skills, and credentials to succeed in the workforce.

An estimated 245,000 Philadelphians lack “basic” prose literacy skills, but there are only 569 classroom seats for these adults to learn.

By 2030, 600,000 Philadelphians (or 39% of the population) will not have the skills to secure the types of jobs available in Philadelphia.

Only 66 percent of the class of 2016 in District-run high schools graduated, which is well-below the national average of 82%.

27.4% of adults over 25 have bachelor degrees, and the geographic variation of educational attainment is extreme — Center City it is 75% and over, large parts of North, Southwest, West and Northeast Philadelphia is below 25%.

English language learning is increasingly a need, as nearly 200,000 people in Philadelphia (or 12.2 % of the population) are foreign-born, up from 100,000 or 6% in 1990.

To fix that problem, the plan highlights four main goals:

➤ equipping all young Philadelphians with 21st century skills for today’s workforce

➤ removing barriers for the formerly incarcerated to successfully re-enter society, get a job or start a business

➤ drastically improve adult literacy and numeracy deficits to enable adult learners to access new jobs

➤ support immigrants’ English proficiency and fluency to help them translate their skills and degrees from other countries to fully participate in the Philadelphia economy.

READ MORE >>

2019 Global Skills Index :: Coursera

@coursera

Introducing the Coursera Global Skills Index

Coursera Blog: 3.14.2019 by Emily Glassberg Sands, Head of Data Science, Coursera

Today marks the release of the inaugural Coursera Global Skills Index (GSI), an in-depth look at skill trends and performance around the world, made possible by the millions of learners who come to Coursera to learn and grow.

Skills are the foundation of human productivity and economic success. Yet the skills landscape as we know it is under transition. Technology is advancing faster than humans, and the skills that once fueled our economy will no longer suffice. Companies, countries, and individuals are grappling with a serious skills shortage, in addition to uncertainty on which skills they need to succeed in the changing economy.

Urgency around upskilling is a global one, but there is no one-size-fits-all solution. Each country has a unique set of circumstances – economic, political, social – that shape their skills landscape today. Industries, too, face challenges unique to their verticals that require tailored talent strategies. This first edition of the Coursera Global Skills Index looks closely at these trends, benchmarking 60 countries and 10 industries across Business, Technology, and Data Science skills.

Here are some of the key findings:

Two-thirds of the world’s population is falling behind in critical skills, including 90% of developing economies.

Countries that rank in the lagging or emerging categories (the bottom two quartiles) in at least one domain make up 66% of the world’s population, indicating a critical need to upskill the global workforce. Many countries with developing economies — and with less to invest in education — see larger skill deficiencies, with 90% ranking in the lagging or emerging categories.

Europe is the global skills leader.

European countries make up over 80% of the cutting-edge category (top quartile globally) across Business, Technology, and Data Science. Finland, Switzerland, Austria, Sweden, Germany, Belgium, Norway, and the Netherlands are consistently cutting-edge in all three domains. This advanced skill level is likely a result of Europe’s heavy institutional investment in education via workforce development and public education initiatives.

Asia Pacific, the Middle East and Africa, and Latin America have high skill inequality.

Consistent with the vast economic and cultural diversity that characterizes each region, Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa, and Latin America have the greatest within-region skill variance. Asia Pacific is at the extremes of the global Business rankings with New Zealand (#6) and Australia (#9) approaching the very top, while Pakistan (#57) and Bangladesh (#59) land near the bottom. In the Middle East and Africa, Israel is a leader in each of the three domains and #1 in Data Science, while Nigeria lags near the bottom of the rankings across domains, and is last in Data Science. In Latin America, Argentina’s #1 ranking in Technology is in stark contrast to Mexico’s (#43) and Colombia’s (#49) lower proficiencies in the field.

The United States must upskill while minding regional differences.

Although known as a business leader for innovation, the U.S. hovers around the middle of the global rankings and is not cutting-edge in any of the three domains. Within the U.S., skill proficiency is distributed non-uniformly while the West ranks ahead of other regions in Technology and Data Science, the Midwest shines in Business.

In addition to benchmarking countries, we also evaluated trending skills globally and skill proficiencies across 10 major industry verticals:

Demand for Technology and Data Science skills is growing, while demand Business skills is shrinking.

Across the board, enrollment numbers highlight fast-growing demand for Technology and Data Science skills from individuals and companies alike. While Technology enrollments increased by 13%, for example, Business enrollments decreased by 11%.

Technology industry professionals lack strong business skills.

Technology ranks 5th in Business out of the ten industries in our analysis.

Manufacturing shows skills resilience in the digital era.

Manufacturing ranks #1 in both Business and Technology and demonstrates an aptitude for tackling change successfully.

Telecommunications consistently ranks near the top.

Telecommunications is the only industry to rank consistently in the top three across Business, Technology, and Data Science (#3 in each).

Finance surprises with below-average skills performance.

Despite its pursuit of digital transformation, Finance ranks second to last in Business (#9) and Data Science (#9), and hovers near the middle in Technology (#5).  READ MORE  >>

Literacy Reports & Statistics

Workplace

2019: Global Skills Index, Coursera

2018: A Stronger Nation: Learning beyond high school builds American talent, Lumina

2017: UpSkilling Playbook for Employers, Aspen Institute

2015: Skills Gap Report, NAM-MI

2008: Reach Higher America: Overcoming Crisis in the U.S. Workforce, NCAL

2007: America’s Perfect Storm, ETS

2007: Can California Import Enough College Grad's. Meet Workforce Needs?, PPIC

2007: Mounting Pressures: Workforce . . . Adult Ed, NCAL

Randstad US Study Reveals Disconnect Between Employers and Employees in Upskilling Outlook

Randstad US Study Reveals Disconnect Between Employers and Employees in Upskilling Outlook

Markets Insider: 10.10.2017

Randstad US today announced the findings from its quarterly Randstad Workmonitor survey (Q3 2017). According to the survey data, there exists a discrepancy between employers' and employees' attitudes toward upskilling. While over 80 percent of employees feel they have a responsibility to upskill, many U.S. employers and employees are not taking action for upskilling opportunities in the workplace. In fact, over a third of U.S. employees report they have done nothing to upskill in the past 12 months, where upskilling is defined as attending workshops, completing online courses, receiving consultation from a specialist, participating in personal coaching sessions or pursuing further education.

The Upskilling Disconnect

When asked to consider a variety of types of upskilling opportunities over the last 12 months, survey respondents revealed:

➤ 67 percent of U.S. employees say they feel they need more training and skills to stay up-to-date.

➤ Nearly 40 percent of U.S. employees say their employers have not offered and paid for anything related to upskilling.

➤ 40 percent of U.S. employees say they wouldn't arrange for and pay out of their own pockets to upskill themselves.

Value of Skills Balance
The study also explored the types of skills employees seek to improve and revealed that prioritizing personal versus vocational skills runs along a generational divide:

➤66 percent of 18 to 34-year-olds feel they need to strengthen their personal skills.

➤Only 28 percent of those 45 years and older said they needed to boost their personal skills, with 70 percent reporting vocational upskilling was critical to their development.  READ MORE >>

Three Signs that the UpSkilling Movement is Gaining Momentum in 2018 via Aspen Inst

Three Signs that the UpSkilling Movement is Gaining Momentum in 2018

Aspen Institute: 2.15.2018 by Jaime S Fall

@upskillamerica

Across the country, businesses and investors are recognizing the value of investing in training and development programs for frontline workers. Here we are, just six weeks into 2018, and we have seen three encouraging signs that this upskilling movement is gaining momentum: businesses are creating and adopting new models of degree programs for their employees; investors are increasingly stressing the importance of employer investments in education and training; and programs are churning out positive results.

1. Businesses are adopting new college degree programs

Since releasing the UpSkilling Playbook for Employers last year, we have seen significant growth in the upskilling movement among businesses. Two of the most intriguing developments have been around the work employers are doing to provide access to learning for employees.

2. Investors are stressing the importance of employer investments in education and training

3. UpSkilling programs are churning out positive results

READ MORE >>

How Tech Companies Can Help Upskill the U.S. Workforce via HBR

How Tech Companies Can Help Upskill the U.S. Workforce

HBR: 2.20.2018 by Kausik Rajgopal & Steve Westly

Reskilling America

Software businesses are disrupting generations-old industries, from agriculture to entertainment. Programming wizards are amassing billion-dollar fortunes, and this may be just the beginning. Even average tech employees in their mid-twenties are raking in 6-figure paychecks.

Unfortunately, a huge section of the workforce cannot capitalize on these opportunities. In 2015, there were 7 million jobs that required some level of coding skills, and programming jobs are growing 12% faster than market average. But to meet this demand and address income inequality, we have to provide better access to technical learning for those who work in lower-paying industries.

It’s now time for business, particularly technology companies, to harness the power of technology to help turn the tide. Three key initiatives can help:

➤ Supplementing K-12 with vocational training programs

➤ Increasing access to job retraining for adults

➤ Empowering lower-skilled workers to continuously “upskill” on the job.

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By 2020, 65% of all jobs will require some college training. At current graduation rates, the U.S. will fall short of this goal by 5 million workers. Vocational Technical (VoTech) training programs for high school students are key to helping them specialize in in-demand technology-related fields, and be ready for the job market.  READ MORE >>