Blogging the National Network of Sector Partners National Conference

Washington, D.C. – This week I’m at the national conference of the National Network of Sector Partners. The conference will cover a wide range of topics related to industry driven workforce development initiatives, including sector case studies, policy and systems change, green jobs and other emerging industries, and program sustainability. Dinner Thursday night is being [...]

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A Marriage Penalty I Didn’t Know About

Conservatives are often big proponents of ending the “marriage penalty” on federal income taxes. Basically, the “penalty” refers to the higher tax rates that married couples face than if they have filed their taxes individually as “heads of household.”
Yesterday, the Innovation Lab team met with our free tax preparation team, who are planning their 2010 [...]

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Fablab in KW Neighborhood

So, awhile back we posted about our experience at the Boston Fablab and how we might work to bring one to Tulsa. Well, fast forward and Kendall Whittier Inc is seriously pursuing the idea of putting one in the KW neighborhood. There will be a community presentation on Oct 5 at 7pm at Educare at [...]

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President Calls for Tax Savings Pioneered by CAP

I was pleased to see recent news that President Obama used his weekly address to announce new initiatives to promote savings. (White House, New York Times, New America Foundation). Among other ideas, he charged the IRS with implementing a checkbox on tax returns that would allow you to save a portion of your refund in [...]

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CareerAdvance: New Pathways to Economic Security

The Tulsa Initiative is getting set to launch a new pilot program to help our Head Start and Early Head Start parents advance their careers and secure a better economic future for their families.
The project, called CareerAdvance, is a multi-faceted approach to job training and supportive services. It includes:

Sector-Driven – Our initiative will be sector-driven, [...]

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Apprenticeships: They’re Not Feudal

For some reason every time I hear the term “apprenticeship” I think of feudal workshops of blacksmiths and shoe cobblers. In my role as coordinator of a sector-based career advancement project, I’ve been hearing the term quite a bit more lately but I still haven’t known a lot about them. So here are some things [...]

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Hispanics in the Workforce

According to the National Council of La Raza, “Latinos have the highest labor force participation rate in the United States (68.7%), yet they earn the lowest median weekly wages at only $545 per week.”
I also didn’t know that NCLR has a workforce division with a Health Care Career Pathways Initiative:
The NCLR Health Care Career Pathways [...]

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Workforce Wonkery Received

Matt Yglesias, of the Center for American Progress Action Fund, took in stride my comment that policy writers missed the point of that CEA report – it was about reforming workforce programs, not about the growth of healthcare and education jobs (which we already knew all about).
He writes:
But Micah Kordsmeier explains that the important part [...]

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In Need of More Workforce Wonkery

Washington Post writer Ezra Klein must be reading too, because he clicked over to that Council of Economic Advisors report on the jobs of tomorrow and had a thing or two to say:
The first is that the private sector is not projected to do a lot of job creation on its lonesome over the next [...]

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Quote of the Day

“The most important ‘post-high school’ education and training reform is a strong early childhood and elementary and secondary education system.”
- From the Council of Economic Advisors report “Preparing the Workers of Today for the Jobs of Tomorrow“
By the way, you are owed a substantive post from me and you shall get it. Get excited!

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