ENGAGING MINDS TO BUILD A STRONGER WORKFORCE.

• Position: SPONSORED COMMENTS FROM NCEAST ALLIANCE

Nearly a dozen years ago, a team of organizations in eastern North Carolina started a collaborative effort to address workforce issues identified by leading employers about their ability to find qualified workers. ASPIRE (Assessing Skills for Performance In a Recovering Economy) was patterned after a program developed in Wayne County called WayneWORKS. Ulis effort, involving workforce development boards, community colleges, and others, was led by the regional economic development partnership (now known as NCEast Alliance) that appropriated $1.25 million over 5 years to promote ACT National Career Readiness Certificate (NCRC) testing and WorkKeys Profiles. The combination of efforts led to a dramatic increase in workers possessing NCRCs (from 1,000 per year to over 10,000 per year) and more than 150 employers developing WorkKeys Profiles that specified a preference for hiring individuals that possessed an NCRC. As a result, employers streamlined on-boarding of employees with improved screening of applicants, reduced time and cost of hiring, and, in many instances, dramatically reduced turnover due to better worker matches to job openings. As a result of that success, the region was selected, and largely funded by, the North Carolina Rural Center to launch the state's first Certified WorkReady Community demonstration project in November 2011; a program designed to increase local employment opportunities by improving high school graduation rates, employer and community engagement in ACT's WorkKeys Job Profiling and boosting the number of people obtaining the NCRC. The earlier partnership expanded to include, economic development, chamber of commerce/business, and K-12 leaders as well as the Corporation for Enterprise Development. In 2015, the pilot project was taken statewide and is now run by the North Carolina Chamber. Well over 50 counties are now participating in the program, and the east still has more certified counties and certified workers than any other region in North Carolina.

While considerable progress...