Workforce Development Story Archives - West Virginia Public Broadcasting

High School Pre-Apprenticeship Program To Enhance Career Pathways

A newly announced public-private effort to enhance career training for West Virginia high school students is also aimed at strengthening the talent pipeline for Mountain State industries and improving the state’s workforce participation rate.

There is a public-private effort underway to give West Virginia high school students enhanced career training, strengthen the talent pipeline for Mountain State industries and improve the state’s workforce participation rate.

For several years, the West Virginia Department of Education’s Classroom2Careers initiative has helped high school students gain practical work experience in various trades and industries through apprenticeship opportunities. Separately,Marshall University’s Advanced Manufacturing Center (MAMC), trained nearly 1,000 manufacturing workers and did projects with 324 companies last year.

Now, a partnership between these two entities creates pre-apprenticeship vocational training. MAMC Director Derek Scarboro said aligning manufacturing trade programs at the state’s Career Technical Education (CTE) programs to registered apprenticeships will streamline career pathways.

“We’re going to help build those connections between the industry and the schools,” Scarboro said. “When these high school students finish these pre-apprenticeship programs, they’re going to be able to become very, very attractive employees to these companies that are doing registered apprenticeships, and they’re going to be able to enter those at a jump started level.”

About 2,000 students across West Virginia will be eligible to earn pre-apprenticeship credits. The state’s CTE centers currently offer 77 eligible training programs including fields such as welding, robotics and aviation maintenance. State Superintendent of Schools Michele Blatt said the program gives high schoolers real world job experience early on.

“It gives them the opportunity to save time and money as they move forward and graduate,” Blatt said. “Anytime we can have our students engaged in real world learning with hands-on opportunities the better.”

Diana Barnette operates Logan County’s Mining Repair Specialists, now expanding into parts manufacturing. She said the pre-apprenticeship program will help keep home grown talent working in West Virginia.

“It’s been difficult over the years,” Barnette said. “I think we lost a generation of tradesmen, and we lost a generation of well, machinists, welders, mechanics. The vo-tech center all along has tried and tried and tried, but the industry has changed. Now it’s all computers and technology. We have to change with it, and I think this is one of the first steps to get everybody where we need to be. We will be competitive.”

All parties involved, including Marshall University President Brad Smith, believe this education-manufacturing partnership is a major step forward for workforce development.

We want students who don’t choose to go to a college, but instead want to come out and participate in a high paying manufacturing job, to have that same opportunity,” Smith said. “There are almost 500,000 jobs in the nation right now that need manufacturing. Some estimate that could be as high as 2 million in the next five years. There are a lot of opportunities for our students to go out, put their hands to work and help advance this nation.”

Much of the funding for the partnership comes from a $7.1 million federal Department of Labor, Office of Apprenticeship Grant.

HEPC Launches Microcredential Initiative To Prepare Workforce For Changing Economy

State education leaders hope to prepare the state’s workforce for big economic changes with short courses called microcredentials. Microcredentials are short, focused courses that educate and certify learners in a particular subject.

Schools like West Virginia University already offer such courses. But the Credential WV program from the Higher Education Policy Commission is working to expand and standardize microcredential offerings across the state to meet the growing demands of industry and economic development.

Corley Dennison, vice chancellor for Academic Affairs for the West Virginia Higher Education Policy Commission, said teams from all of the state’s institutions, as well as industry leaders, came together for a microcredential summit earlier in October.

“What are best practices? What’s the best advice that you can give to the institutions that want to offer these?” he said. “We had presentations from some of the institutions that are already offering these, and they were able to talk about what worked for them and what didn’t work for them. Primarily, it’s providing support at a state level, working towards some uniformity in offering credentials and advising institutions and best practices.”

Also in attendance were representatives from other states like New York, where Dennison said microcredentials are helping medical workers increase their earnings by thousands of dollars.

“There can be immediate impact off these microcredentials, and I really think it’s something that will, over time, really help the state of West Virginia,” he said.

Dennison said more than half of the workforce will need retraining in the coming decade.

“There’s a huge demand for relearning, for retraining, for giving workers new skills,” he said. “The idea is, by going to micro credentials, it will be easier and faster for institutions to be able to answer this workforce need.”

Dennison said there are fewer students of college-going age in the state every year, and many are wary of committing to a traditional degree program. Microcredentials can offer them a more affordable way to continue education and gain useful skills.

“These micro credentials, they can be standalone, but they also can be stackable,” he said. “Someone might come in and say, ‘Well, I don’t want to commit to a degree, but maybe I’m willing to go for a microcredential,’ and then they go for another, and then they go for another, and then an academic advisor can say, ‘Hey, you realize you’re getting close to a degree program.’”

W.Va. To Receive $68 Million For Economic Development

These are part of the latest round of recipients of ARC’s POWER grants, or Partnerships for Opportunity and Workforce and Economic Revitalization.

The Appalachian Regional Commission has awarded $68 million to dozens of economic development projects throughout the region.

They include job training programs, the promotion of outdoor recreation and improvements to health care access.

These are part of the latest round of recipients of ARC’s POWER grants, or Partnerships for Opportunity and Workforce and Economic Revitalization.

“The investments announced in this round of POWER will help train workers, advance new industries, and build upon the progress already being made toward a brighter future full of economic opportunity for our region,” said Gayle Manchin, the commission’s federal co-chair.

West Virginia received 14 such grants. Among them are $2 million for West Virginia Health Right in Charleston and nearly $2 million for STEM education at Fairmont State University.

The West Virginia Department of Economic Development will receive nearly $2 million to increase affordable child care services.

Another $2 million will help promote tourism in 12 gateway communities to the Monongahela National Forest. And $2 million will support a new Wheeling visitors center.

See a complete list of awardees.

Making Childcare More Affordable, Accessible

On this episode of The Legislature Today, leaders from both sides of the aisle have declared that childcare for the working men and women of West Virginia is a priority regarding economic and workforce development. So far, there has been plenty of talk but little legislative action. Randy Yohe spoke with Del. Joey Garcia, D-Marion, and Del. Evan Worrell, R-Cabell, to explore the issue.

On this episode of The Legislature Today, leaders from both sides of the aisle have declared that childcare for the working men and women of West Virginia is a priority regarding economic and workforce development. So far, there has been plenty of talk but little legislative action. Randy Yohe spoke with Del. Joey Garcia, D-Marion, and Del. Evan Worrell, R-Cabell, to explore the issue.

In the House, the controversial Women’s Bill of Rights, House Bill 5243, was put back on the active calendar for third reading. And, yet another call for a legislative oversight committee to monitor yet another state government agency. Randy Yohe has more.

There was also a public hearing held in the House on a bill that would remove a sunset clause from the current oil and gas personal property tax. Briana Heaney has more.

In the Senate, the chamber is building momentum now that it is well into the second half of the legislative session. Ten bills were passed and sent to the House, two bills were passed and sent to the governor’s desk. Briana Heaney has more.

Finally, it was Childcare Advocacy Day at the Capitol. Childcare is one of the hot topics in the 2024 regular session, directly related to the state’s economic development. Randy Yohe has more.

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The Legislature Today is West Virginia’s only television/radio simulcast devoted to covering the state’s 60-day regular legislative session.

Watch or listen to new episodes Monday through Friday at 6 p.m. on West Virginia Public Broadcasting.

‘WVU Day’ At Capitol Focuses On Workforce Development

Tuesday was WVU Day at the Capitol, and the growing public, private and academic partnership in workforce development was the leading theme on display.

Adorned in blue and gold, many of the capitol rotunda displays focused on technology advancement, a key component to the state’s desire to develop a workforce ready to meet the demands of a high tech future.

However, WVU President Gordon Gee said, contrary to popular opinion, a WVU liberal arts education has not taken a back seat to workforce development.

“We’re a very balanced institution,” Gee said. “We have 300 plus programs across the spectrum, but we think that it’s important, whether you’re a liberal arts graduate, or whether you’re an engineering or STEM graduate, that you stay in West Virginia and take the jobs we have. We have over 30,000 jobs available for young people. And so that is really our focus. We can’t grow West Virginia without growing our workforce.”

Gee did agree there are two tiers to academic workforce development. The high tech tier, a high demand degree in cybersecurity for example, and the vocational trades tier, the skilled jobs on the ground that combine tech and tools at places like NUCOR Steel and Form Energy.

“Some jobs are really available for people who really just want to go out and make certain that they have a good opportunity,” Gee said. “Unlike other jobs that require a lot of education. And the thing that is very important about West Virginia is the fact that we’ve crossed the digital divide with LG coming here. We have both hands on jobs with our steel mills coming or our energy programs, but now we have cybersecurity jobs and jobs that are unusual for an energy state.“

Gee said people can expect to see a lot more public-private-educational partnerships in West Virginia’s future.

“I think it will grow because of the fact that no one has enough money to do everything,” Gee said. “What we have to do is we all have to draft off from each other. Besides, I think it’s important, with the private sector, they tell us what they need, and the public universities need to produce. And it’s that partnership that I think will prevail.”

The Road To A Second Chance On This West Virginia Morning

On this West Virginia Morning, a criminal record can follow a person forever – and keep them from job and housing opportunities. More than a quarter of West Virginia adults have a criminal record, even for cases with no conviction or jail time. In the latest episode of Us & Them with host Trey Kay, we look at the road toward a second chance. In this excerpt, Kay talks with 37-year-old Amber Blankenship who hopes to expunge her record.

On this West Virginia Morning, a criminal record can follow a person forever – and keep them from job and housing opportunities. More than a quarter of West Virginia adults have a criminal record, even for cases with no conviction or jail time. In the latest episode of Us & Them with host Trey Kay, we look at the road toward a second chance. In this excerpt, Kay talks with 37-year-old Amber Blankenship who hopes to expunge her record.

Listen to the latest Us & Them episode “Expungement — Between Hope and Danger” on West Virginia Public Broadcasting Thursday, Jan. 25 at 8 p.m. or on Saturday, Jan. 27 at 3 p.m. Or listen to this episode now at wvpublic.org.

Also, in this show, new companies and new jobs are coming to West Virginia. And with those jobs comes the need for workforce development and new sources of energy. On our latest episode of The Legislature Today, Curtis Tate spoke with Bill Bissett, the president of the West Virginia Manufacturers Association, and Dan Conant, founder and CEO of Solar Holler, about these issues.

West Virginia Morning is a production of West Virginia Public Broadcasting which is solely responsible for its content.

Support for our news bureaus comes from Shepherd University.

Eric Douglas produced this episode.

Listen to West Virginia Morning weekdays at 7:43 a.m. on WVPB Radio or subscribe to the podcast and never miss an episode. #WVMorning