EMSI will be exhibiting at the 6th annual National Workforce Association conference, December 1-4 in St. Petersburg, Florida. Whether you’re a current or prospective customer, feel free to stop by EMSI’s booth to find out how we’re designing cutting-edge products and services to support workforce investment planning.
EMSI will also be presenting in two sessions at [...]

Recently, CLM Workforce Connection, Ocala Economic Development Council and Central Florida Community College—all located in Ocala, Florida—teamed up to initiate a shared, focused industry strategy for their region. In order to target the right industries and high growth, high wage occupations, they used integrated regional data and local knowledge to focus their resources on important [...]

Economic Modeling Specialists (EMSI) and consulting firm Maher & Maher have partnered with the Newton Transformation Council to create a regional revitalization strategy for Newton, Iowa, and the surrounding area following the loss of a major Whirlpool manufacturing plant. The work is being funded by more than $1 million from the U.S. Department of Labor [...]

The Community College Survey of Student Engagement (CCSSE) has just released their 2007 report, which studies many aspects of engagement from orientation and advising to instructional techniques and use of classroom time. It recognizes five key lessons learned:

“Be intentional” — For most community college students, engagement will not just happen.
Engagement matters for all, but it [...]

The Fund for Our Economic Future, a philanthropic organization in northeast Ohio, publishes a “dashboard” of the area’s economic health, as well as a detailed analysis of dozens of indicator variables used to generate the dashboard results.
The 2007 Full Report is an excellent resource for anyone interested in using socioeconomic indicators to track and improve [...]

We have all heard numerous policy reports that predict a grim future for U.S. competitiveness due to the lack of workers well-educated in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) disciplines. A new report from the Urban Institute, titled “Into the Eye of the Storm: Assessing the Evidence on Science and Engineering Education, Quality, and Workforce [...]

This chapter is an excellent introduction to the background, definition, and goals of “workforce development.” It is one chapter in a forthcoming book on technical/vocational education and training. Posted here by permission of the lead author.
Citation:
Jacobs, R., & Hawley, J. (2008). Emergence of Workforce Development: Definition, Conceptual Boundaries, and Implications. In R. MacLean & [...]

DoL/ETA Catalogue of Workforce Information Sources: A comprehensive list of public and private sources for labor market and related data.

A new study paints a grim picture of CA’s labor shortage in health care.
California needs to act quickly and dramatically to solve a serious health-care worker shortage, according to a study released today. Researchers with the Oakland-based Campaign for College Opportunity concluded that California’s 109 community colleges in particular need to expand classes in nursing [...]

We’ve just been reading an interesting study from the Institute of Urban and Regional Development at UC-Berkeley titled “Building Institutions from the Region Up: Regional Workforce Development Collaboratives in California.” Although the paper is over two years old and describes initiatives that began in 2001, its insights into the regional collaboration remain as relevant as [...]