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Youth Workforce Task Force Releases Report
By Wisconsin School Administrators Alliance staff | August 31, 2016
From The Wheeler Report . . .
The Speaker’s Task Force on Youth Workforce Readiness released its final report today. The committee held five meetings between September 2015 – March 2016. The report says several themes emerged during their meetings and hearings. Those themes included:
- Importance of Student Participation in Technical Education and Training
- Importance of Private Sector Participation in Youth Training Programs.
- Relative Expense of Technical Education
- Importance of Soft Skills (nontechnical workplace capabilities like promptness, professionalism, and communication)
- Importance of Engaging Youth at an Earlier Age
- Shortage of Qualified Technical Education Instructors
- Importance of Math Skills
- Importance of Emphasizing the WorkKeys Test
- Transportation is a Barrier to Participation
The Task Force has made the following recommendations:
- School report card. Modify the state school report card to value technical education course enrollments and the placement of graduates in technical college programs.
- High school entrepreneurship programs. Encourage the replication of programs like the Cardinal Manufacturing program at Eleva-Strum High School, located in Strum, Wisconsin, in high schools in other locations.
- Exception to levy limits. Consider providing an exception to general local levy limits for the purchase of equipment used in technical education programs.
- Math skills. Encourage the integration of math skills in technical education curricula, and the integration of technical education projects in math curricula.
- DWD grants. For grants provided by DWD to technical colleges, grant outcome goals could be modified to be tied to regional workforce needs, utilizing regional reports rather than statewide reports. The grants would also be structured to allow for the funding of students’ travel costs, particularly in geographically large technical college – 6 – districts. In addition, grant criteria could be modified to allow technical colleges to enroll students during the summer between their junior and senior years.
- Technical education curriculum clearinghouse. Direct the Department of Public Instruction to implement a clearinghouse for technical education curricula.
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