A study examined the role of employer training in ameliorating skill shortages and enhancing productivity and competitiveness. The study established that formal training by specialized personnel accounts for only 5-10% of the time newly hired workers are engaged in training activities and that existing labor market research instruments fail to…

Technology and international competition have transformed business practices and employment patterns. The migration of high-paying jobs from manufacturing to services, the growing importance of small firms in the U.S. economy, and the development of new technical occupations characterized by often sophisticated technologies and the absence of…

A study examined the coordination of Minnesota vocational education and job training programs implemented with funding from the Perkins Act and Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA). A questionnaire regarding the coordination of job training and vocational-technical education was mailed to all of Minnesota's service delivery area (SDA) directors,…

For the past 8 years, Minnesota technical colleges have been offering customized training services to the state's employers. To gather data on what kinds of organizations use custom training (CT) programs, the State Board of Technical Colleges surveyed 600 public and private employers that had used CT services through at least one of the system's…

Since 1987, Dutchess Community College (DCC), in New York, and IBM Corporation have been forging a partnership which revolves around the Manufacturing Technical Training School (MTTS), a program designed to enhance the skills and education of IBM's production workforce. MTTS's three-phase curriculum has evolved to include the changing training…

The major negative factor to the full integration of televised instruction into the educational system has always been cost, either because of the initial investment or the time required to develop courseware. Resistance to change has always been and continues to be the greatest barrier to the use of all technologies in education. Countless…

This technical assistance guide is written to help practitioners and policymakers involve large numbers of employers in providing high quality learning experiences in the workplace. Section I discusses the challenge of the school-to-work transition and guiding principles for new efforts. Section II focuses on strategies for recruiting and…

This combination project report/resource guide describes the Milwaukee Nontraditional Employment Training (NET) Project, launched in 1991 to improve access to nontraditional training (NTT) and well-paid jobs for women through the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) system. Milwaukee NET has helped JTPA administrators and program providers make the…

A review of long-term international economic trends and the literature linking education and training (ET) to economic performance reveals no evidence of deindustrialization or falling labor productivity in the United States. Over the last 40 years, the nation has experienced lower growth rates in gross domestic product and productivity but…

A general outline is provided for the work experience program at Mayville (Wisconsin) High School that is open to seniors entering through the vocational, business, or special education programs. An introduction provides an overview of the program, including course of study, grading system, and contract. Other contents include goals of the…

This brief describes 14 national technical assistance organizations for work force and workplace literacy. Descriptions contain these types of information: specific areas of expertise, experience, or specialization; types of organizations with which it has worked; types of programs or services offered; geographic areas served; and clients. The…

A collaborative project involved Collins and Aikman, Inc., Pitt Community College, and the U.S. Department of Education in an effort to improve the literacy level of the company's work force in order to increase productivity. A pretest of about 400 of the company's 513 workers in 1 division uncovered educational needs in reading and mathematics…

Accessibility is widely implemented in community colleges through curriculum comprehensiveness and services designed to meet the needs of students with special or non-traditional needs. The current threat to open access in community colleges arises from general funding restraints, forcing colleges to slash programs that are not economically…

Achieving good quality in Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) training is hampered by the lack of a common definition of quality. Five ideas have been consistent in definitions: targeting programs; long-term, in-depth training; basic education; work skills training; and supportive services and guidance. A definition must include suggestions on how…

The National Association of Counties (NACo) conducted a mail survey of service delivery areas (SDAs) to disprove allegations that 40 percent of them had not been audited since the start of the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) in 1983. A questionnaire was developed and mailed to every third SDA on a list of all SDAs. Of 244 SDAs, 235 or 96…