Expanding Your Credit and Non-Credit Offerings Through Sector Specific Partnerships

1. Expanding Your Credit and Non-Credit Offerings Through Sector Specific Partnerships October 16, 2013 Carol Weigand, Project Director

2. Air Washington Overview • $20M (100%) DOL funded project supporting aerospace workforce education • 11 Community and Technical Colleges • 7 WDC Partners • 50 Industry partners to date • Total participants – 2615 • Numerous statewide stakeholders

3. The 30,000 Foot View

4. Why Aerospace? • Largest aerospace cluster in the world • $70B impact on Washington State’s economy • 450 aircraft produced annually

5. Workforce Demand • Over 1000 aerospace companies operate in Washington State • Aging workforce • Fierce competition for talent

6. Air Washington is helping support the workforce needs by….. Increasing training capacity Providing innovative strategies for low skilled and TAA eligible workers Developing short term opportunities that meet industry need Creating new relationships with educators, industry and community partners across the state

7. How have sector specific partnerships helped us define our offerings and created sustainability?

8. Who are our partners? Industry Workforce Councils Education Numerous agencies Other stakeholders

9. Industry Partnerships Have Provided Input • A reliable workforce and a workforce pipeline • Skilled workforce • workplace basics, computer basics, math skills, soft skills • Experience • Increased training capacity

10. How we responded….. • Created a plan that prioritized the most immediate industry needs • Quickly engaged partners and stakeholders -seeking assistance • Communicated our progress regularly • Monthly meetings with industry • Quarterly project advisory board meetings • Weekly consortium calls • Quarterly face-to-face consortium meetings • Quarterly newsletters

11. Mobilized Quickly • Created a college specific (statewide) non-credit “on ramp” to aerospace careers program • Used a non traditional assessment, aligned traditional assessment and created PLA guidelines • Focused on TAA, English language learners, females and Veterans • Imbedded short / stackable certificates

12. Immediate barriers…. Capacity expansion was difficult – SME’s can be hard to find Aerospace has its own language – engaging low skilled workers was a challenge New industry skills emerged– NDT, FARO, composite repair Student aptitude and attitude College processes

13. Regular communication removed many of these barriers…. Colleges supported faculty recruitment Student recruitment strategies and placement practices shared IBEST “ish” programs were created and ELL aerospace workplace curriculum was developed and shared New skill sets embedded within existing programs or tested in CE Best practices emerged and were immediately shared Nothing created was mandatory

14. Workforce Navigator/Concierge Partnership • Intelligence/Aerospace industry specialist • WorkSource expert • College program expert • Student retention specialist • Employment expert

15. Other Partnerships Serve on advisory board Create additional branding opportunities Utilized them for exposure – helped us cast a wider net

16. Educational Partnerships Aligned curriculum Shared curriculum Articulation with K-12 Brought in other colleges Transparent Outreach

17. What have we learned? Relationships are crucial to a successful project We must respond quickly – create multiple options – best practices emerge Branding is crucial Importance of data collection - BLUF Industry feedback keeps the project dynamic

18. Project Sustainability Efforts Industry - localized College Presidents Aerospace Pipeline Committee Labor Professional Organizations Additional Educational Partnerships

19. Questions ?