News

A job-ready workforce, lower cost of living, premier freight assets, growth potential and a lack of traffic congestion compared to other U.S. cities are among the top reasons given by several companies in the logistics industry as to why they have established businesses operations in the St. Louis, Missouri region. Representatives from Procter & Gamble, DNJ Intermodal Services, LLC, and Giltner St. Louis participated in a recent panel discussion hosted by the St. Louis Regional Freightway.

Two programs in Mississippi County are designed to bring more jobs to Northeast Arkansas.  Governor Asa Hutchinson went Blytheville Wednesday for the announcements, which center around the county’s growing steel industry. 

All four Delta Regional Authority counties in the Meramec Region, Crawford, Dent, Phelps and Washington, are now Missouri Certified Work Ready Communities (CWRC), thanks to a workforce development grant from the Delta Regional Authority (DRA).

Clark State Community College has collaborated with the Department of Job and Family Services/OhioMeansJobs and the Greater Springfield Chamber of Commerce to establish Clark County, Ohio, as a certified ACT Work Ready Community.

Learn how Carthage Water & Electric Plant uses the ACT WorkKeys National Career Readiness Certificate and ACT Work Ready Communities to strengthen the area's workforce and economic development efforts.

: The National Career-Readiness Certificate, more commonly known as the WorkKeys test, works to help identify aptitude of working-age adults. The WorkKeys test is similar to the ACT, best known for its literal rite-of-passage test administered to high-schoolers nationwide, as reported by the Monroe County Journal. The ACT WorkKeys National Career-Readiness Certificate is an assessment-based credential earned through scores on three ACT WorkKeys assessments – applied math, graphic literacy and workplace documents – which measure widely applicable foundational employability skills. It is awarded in four levels that correspond to the overall readiness levels of the individual worker. These certificates can be a powerful tool for Northeast Mississippi – both for employees and employers….Monroe County is showing that its designation of being a rural community won’t interfere with the goal of preparing this area’s residents to tackle the needs of current and prospective businesses. As Deloris Basham, workforce innovations and opportunities assistant at the WIN Job Center in Amory, put it best, “We’re going to be the best at being rural.” With that determination and a number of different resources available, Northeast Mississippi can continue on the path of offering a skilled and trained workforce to accomplish great things.

A computer with an internet connection and a cell phone are the only hardware devices many jobs require these days. That means that many residents of rural communities, like those in Quay County, could work for employers located all over the planet without leaving the county. That’s the idea behind Solowork, an idea that the New Mexico Economic Development Department, through its Job Training Incentive Program (JTIP), would like to develop, especially in rural areas….Vanderpool said there is even a company called Digitalworks that is interested in training remote workers. For every worker trained, Vanderpool said, JTIP would reimburse the city $3,500….“To me this is very exciting,” City Manager Jared Langenegger said. “It’s a good way to create economic-base jobs in the city.” Economic base jobs are those that provide products and services for markets beyond county borders. “This is a way to put people to work without infrastructure,” Langenegger said. Adding that work-at-home employment “is one of the fastest growing areas for economic-base jobs.”… Vanderpool linked the Solowork idea with efforts to maintain the county’s status as aWork Ready Community through ACT, the testing service. Trainees for Digital Works, he said, must score at least at a Silver level on theWork Keys assessments that ACT publishes to measure workplace-related knowledge. WorkKeys ratings range from bronze, the lowest level that qualifies for ACT’sNational Career Readiness Certificate, to platinum, which indicates qualification for top professional careers, according to WorkKeys information on ACT’s website, , to platinum, which indicates qualification for top professional careers, according to WorkKeys information on ACT’s website, ACT.com. WorkKeys assessments are free to New Mexico residents.

In early 2017 ACT® and the Corporation for a Skilled Workforce developed
a joint project to explore the possibility of a connection between
ACT WorkKeys® competencies and the beta Connecting Credentials
Framework. This paper is the summary of the findings, including a
major product of the project: a crosswalk between WorkKeys and the
beta Connecting Credentials Framework. The crosswalk can be used in
conjunction with the Framework to (1) determine entry-level WorkKeys
scores required for developed programs of study whose learning
outcomes have been profiled using the Framework, and (2) connecting
the ACT® WorkKeys® National Career Readiness Certificate® [NCRC®] to
other credentials that have been profiled using Framework.

TOPEKA, Kan. (KSNT) – Students at Wamego High School are being recognized for their skills. On Monday night at the Wamego USD 320 School Board of Education, eleven high school juniors were recognized for achieving platinum status after taking the ACT Work Keys Assessment.

South Central Planning and Development Commission in partnership
with St. James Works received a grant funded under LED Workforce
Development/Capacity Building Grant Program.