From CalMatters neighborhood school reporter Adam Echelman:
Gov. Gavin Newsom needs to coach extra Californians for “good-paying, long-lasting, and fulfilling careers,” he stated final yr, asserting his intent to create a Grasp Plan for Profession Schooling.
However many college students in one of many largest job coaching packages within the state find yourself in low-paying industriesCalMatters has discovered.
As a part of this system, referred to as the Workforce Innovation and Alternative Actlow-income and unemployed adults can obtain tuition help. Roughly half of those college students attend for-profit commerce colleges, which the state’s lawyer normal says can go away college students “under a mountain of debt” — with little assist discovering a job.
California’s Employment Growth Division helps vet these for-profit colleges and manages this job coaching program, which is run by means of workforce improvement boards and job facilities throughout the state. However the division violated its personal coverage by permitting native companies to ship college students to for-profit colleges beneath investigation by state training officers.
The employment division stopped recommending 4 such colleges solely after CalMatters requested about them.
Many of those colleges prepare nursing assistants, medical assistants and truck drivers. However wages for graduates of such medical packages are low — lower than $30,000 a yr, in accordance with pupil outcomes collected by the division. Truck driving is the most well-liked profession. It affords higher wages, however the working circumstances are so powerful that the majority new drivers give up throughout the first yr.
- Abby Snaydeputy secretary on the California Labor and Workforce Growth Company: “These jobs are a concern. We need to do better as a system in advising people.”
The cash for the Workforce Innovation and Alternative Act comes from the federal authorities, and Congress is contemplating a brand new invoice this yr that encourages states and regional workforce improvement boards to companion with neighborhood faculties, which are sometimes free in California.
The invoice would require California’s workforce boards to spend extra money on job coaching, however a former advocate for workforce boards, Bob Lanter, stated the invoice might backfire.
- Later: “Let’s not be so focused on how much money is spent. Let’s be focused on how many people are receiving services, and maybe, the type of services they’re receiving.”
