This document contains a final report, evaluation, and curriculum materials from a project conducted at the RJR Nabisco plant in Indianapolis to upgrade the literacy and numeracy skills of the workers to facilitate technological changes to production lines. As the final report explains, although the goal of the project was to recruit and test 150…

This two-part report presents quantitative and qualitative data from a 1994 national study of community college participation in the Job Opportunities and Basic Skills (JOBS) program, a transitional welfare-to-work program. Following a preface, an executive summary reviews the study methodology, indicating that 277 colleges out of 1,170 surveyed…

Thirty training programs for paraeducators in the United States were identified through a literature search and from information gathered at national conferences. A comparison of program purposes and content revealed that, while motivation for program development may be similar among program developers, there is little apparent consensus on…

This volume contains presentations and workshop papers from the International Congress on "The European Dimension of Vocational Training--Experiences and Tasks" that provided those with responsibility for vocational training a forum for analyzing and discussing challenges that have emerged from European cooperation in vocational…

A four-stage feminist research project investigating European Social Fund (ESF)-funded vocational training for unemployed women used the grounded theory approach. Stage 1 involved the formation of the research questions and design. Steps included the ontological, epistemological, and methodological positioning of the researcher. Stage 2 was the…

This book addresses the goal of radically repositioning training from a peripheral role in the organization to that of a provider of bottom-line results, return on investment, and driver of performance. Each of five parts, and their respective chapters, begins with a changing mindset model that implies a shared perception, by both the individual…

These five papers are from a symposium that was facilitated by Elwood F. Holton, III at the 1995 conference of the Academy of Human Resource Development (HRD). "HRD Alignment: A Systemic Assessment of HRD in Organizations" (Richard J. Torraco) describes the HRD alignment model as a model for evaluation that offers a systemwide perspective on HRD…

These five papers are from a symposium that was facilitated by Darlene Russ-Eft at the 1995 conference of the Academy of Human Resource Development (HRD). "The Setting of Goals for Skill Acquisition" (Howard J. Klein, Peg Thoms) reports a study of hospital managers that found that goal manipulation did not lead to significant main…

The American Management Association's (AMA) 10th annual survey on workplace testing was mailed in January 1996 to a sample of its 9,500 member companies, resulting in 961 usable responses. The survey sought to determine how many firms test for "basic skills," how job applicants perform on these tests, how much the tests costs, and what firms do…

A study examined changing skill requirements for the occupation of sales assistant in the United Kingdom. Data were collected from four sources: a review of the existing literature; exploratory interviews with key contacts concerned with sales assistants' skills/training; in-depth interviews of 19 employers; and a seminar at which the study…

A study assessed the success of Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) programs by examining current approaches, featuring operational and experimentally based measures, all using the individual as the unit observation. The research used Program Year 1990 JTPA termination and associated program participation records in Illinois and Texas. Two…

A project analyzed the impact of Youth Credits, a new system for funding youth training. The system was introduced as a pilot project by 10 English/Welsh Training and Enterprise Councils (TECs). Focus was on early school leavers' participation in training and on their achievement of vocational qualifications. Data were obtained from the Youth…

This paper identifies federal social policy concerning tax credits as it applies to work force training--its history, participants, implications, and impact. The paper outlines five programs--the Targeted Jobs Tax Credit (TJTC) program of 1978, the National Individual Training Account Act of 1984, the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) of 1983,…

This final report describes a project to develop a secondary education program management guide for health occupations education in Iowa. Introductory material includes the following: a summary sheet on project objectives, a description of how the objectives were met, the audience served, an educational equity statement, a statement that the…

Gilbert (1978) developed a Potential for Improving Performance (PIP) formula based on worth, value, and cost. Worth related the value of a performance to its cost. The PIP related the worth of exemplary performance to the worth of average performance. This offered an opportunity for improvement by making appropriate changes through training or…