Workforce Development Board, Herkimer, Madison, Oneida Counties, Inc.
High Skill Training Program
In Upstate New York, where America’s Transportation Revolution began and the Industrial Revolution launched a once-vibrant chain of manufacturing communities, public and private partners are developing a new economy built around advanced manufacturing linked to clean energy investments spurred by the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to transform a region staggered by economic blows into a region of innovation.
As advanced manufacturing companies make the products that are basic to clean energy reforms, they face workforce limitations. To fully grow, the region’s employers – particularly small businesses that make up the bulk of the region’s employers -- need a new workforce development pipeline that can supply the highly skilled workers they need.
Employers have relied upon networking to fill jobs that can lead to H-1B occupations, but data shows that leads to a self-limiting workforce shorn of diversity that does not tap the potential of under-represented and historically marginalized young adults who represent the future of the workforce. This project will develop a new pipeline that connects small employers with a diverse pool of workers, helping employers adapt to a new workforce through outreach to make workplaces more worker-centered to retain young workers.
Transforming the future requires making connections that have remained unmade.
In a largely rural region of minimal diversity, the region’s most diverse emerging workforce is in a community of extensive refugee resettlement as well as high poverty among Black and Hispanic populations that is also one of low educational achievement. To address this, the project will work with Mohawk Valley Community College, which created compressed-time training programs targeting other key sectors, to develop one that will be called Fast Track Plus, including basic skills that employers want and that trainees need before they begin the technical training that will also be shaped to employer demands. Because it requires a collaborative partnership to connect populations that are under-represented in the sector, the project will join forces with local community-based organizations that support Black, Hispanic and refugee citizens who can help recruit for the training this project offers and make connections in ways agencies outside the neighborhoods cannot. These groups will also work with employers unused to broad racial, ethnic and gender diversity to help them understand the new workforce and how to succeed in using worker-centered strategies and the Good Jobs principles to develop a workforce of the future.
As the project’s training focuses on eligible adults, it will develop partnerships that reach into the community and K-12 educators to address deficiencies employers have noted in high school graduates and also develop both classroom-based and community-based activities that can develop a stronger workforce by increasing the skills of target populations on the grounds that as individuals realize they can succeed in a sector that is growing and offering good-paying jobs, more members of under-represented and historically marginalized populations will enter the sector. Through this project, not only can employers get the workers they need, but the region can develop a broader pipeline that provides the workers employers need, and the opportunities that can truly transform the lives of the under-represented and historically marginalized workers who will not have the gates of opportunity wide open.
Targeted Populations: Unemployed, underemployed workers with a focus on historically marginalized and underrepresented populations, including women in nontraditional occupations (particularly single mothers) people of color and refugees.
Targeted Infrastructure Sectors: Renewable energy generation and storage (NAICS 22111, 221116, 221117); Wind and solar energy production (NAICS 222115 and 222114); Renewable and sustainable fuels (NAICS 32512); Electric motors and hybrid engines (NAICS 335312 and 3336); Battery manufacturing (NAICS 33591); Electrical vehicle manufacturing (NAICS 3361) and Semi-conductor manufacturing (NAICS 3344 and 333242).
H-1B occupations: Training leads to H-1B positions such as Quality Control Analyst; Project Manager / Technical Project Manager. Engineer (Manufacturing Engineer. Mechanical Engineer; Production Engineer. Material Engineer Engineering Manager.)
Recognized Postsecondary Credential(s) Offered: State-granted certificate, AAS degree
Serving: Chenango, Delaware, Fulton, Hamilton, Herkimer, Lewis, Madison, Montgomery, Oneida, Otsego, and Schoharie Counties
For More Information, Contact:
Sarah Barcomb, Project Director
315.207.6951 ext. 150
The total cost of the Building Pathways to Infrastructure Careers project is $1,999,341.(100% funded by a U.S. Department of Labor – Employment and Training Administration grant.)
Please Note: We cannot fund or provide services to any male over the age of 18 who has not registered for selective service.