INSTITUTION
WORKFORCE EDUCATION
are innovating to keep up with a changing workplace.
As the Covid-19 crisis abates and the nation moves to pick up the pieces, the new economy that’s emerging looks very different from the one that shut down in 2020, and it demands a different response. Resuming life after so many months of lockdown offers a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reboot.
Among the many momentous issues to be addressed, few loom as large as human capital development—equipping Americans with the skills they need to succeed in a rapidly changing economy.
The Covid crisis is amplifying and intensifying three long-term labor market trends. First, automation and digitization, ripping through the economy since the 1970s, have dramatically increased demand for postsecondary education and training. Second, also a product of the digital revolution, is the new premium on higher-order analytic and social skills—critical thinking, problem-solving, communication and teamwork. Still a third longer-term trend likely to become more pronounced in years ahead: growing interest in what some call “lifelong learning.”
The Covid economic shock is expected to accelerate all three of these shifts, unleashing a prolonged burst of automation and business restructuring with profound consequences for in-demand skills and lifelong learning. The bottom line for policymakers looking to rebuild for the future: they need to think differently—perhaps dramatically differently—about postsecondary education and job training.
There will be changes needed in many quarters to address this new reality. High schools, colleges, professional schools, government job training, employer-provided reskilling, disruptive education innovators and others all have a role to play.
But of all the assets at hand, few are as apt and versatile as the nation’s more than 1,100 community and technical colleges.
Community and technical colleges educate more people each year than coding boot camps, apprenticeship programs and government job training combined—nearly 11 million students a year before the pandemic, compared to just 18,000 at boot camps and 210,000 in government training programs.
Public two-year colleges are deeply rooted in their communities. Many instructors and administrators have experience meeting the workforce needs of local employers. And recent years have brought a burst of innovation, much of it centered on preparing learners for the workplace.
At a time of accelerating automation and shifting workforce needs, community and technical colleges are poised to come into their own as the nation’s premier provider of job-focused education and training. But this won’t happen by itself—without attention and support from policymakers, most importantly, at the state level.
Why a new survey?
Among the biggest challenges facing lawmakers seeking to make the most of community colleges is lack of information, particularly about the noncredit continuing education programs that exist alongside but separate from colleges’ traditional degree-granting divisions.
In early 2020, Opportunity America, Lumina Foundation and Wilder Research set out to address this gap with a new national survey of community college educators, inquiring about their credit and noncredit workforce programs and relationships with employers.
All of the nation’s public two-year institutions were invited to participate. More than 600 colleges answered at least one question, and 477 institutions provided more robust replies, for a 38 percent response rate.
Demand for workforce education is poised to explode in years ahead as automation and business restructuring transform the labor market. Some workers who need to change jobs will make do without reskilling. Others may be lucky—their new employer will train them. But many if not most will need to reboot on their own, and many will look to their local community college—particularly, if they’re in a hurry, to its noncredit workforce education division.
Public two-year institutions are poised to step up, but there is much work to be done to make community college workforce education all it can be for learners, employers and the regional economy.
The Covid economic shock was just the beginning. Even more dramatic change is on the horizon. State policymakers should start planning and building now. The future of work will not wait.
OUR PRINCIPAL FINDINGS
- More than half of the students at the community colleges that responded to the survey—54 percent—are enrolled in job-focused programs.
- Some states put more priority than others on workforce education, with the share of community college students in job-focused programs ranging from 32 percent to 93 percent.
- An estimated 3.7 million students are enrolled in noncredit programs—learners more interested in skills than academic credentials who are not included in federal education data and often invisible to policymakers.
- The noncredit division’s signature strength is workforce education: 57 percent of noncredit students at the colleges that responded to the survey are enrolled in job-focused programs, most of them shorter than a semester.
- Noncredit workforce programs vary dramatically in length, but three-quarters are shorter than 150 clock hours.
- Credit and noncredit programs are moving to prepare students for industry certification assessments, and between one-quarter and one-third of noncredit workforce students earn third-party credentials of some kind.
- Most community colleges know very little about their noncredit students, and even when they collect data, they often do not report them to the state.
- Midcareer adults seeking new skills for new jobs often look to noncredit college programs, and 75 percent of noncredit workforce students are 25 or older, compared to 44 percent of degree-seeking community college students.
- Noncredit workforce education can drive equity and economic mobility, but many noncredit divisions neglect to track students’ race or ethnicity, and on campuses that collect data, noncredit workforce students are more likely to be white.
- Many educators aspire to build bridges from noncredit to credit education, but relatively few colleges provide robust opportunities for moving between divisions, and few noncredit learners—at most colleges, fewer than 20 percent—take advantage of existing opportunities.
- As a practical matter, noncredit workforce education is ineligible for federal financial aid, leaving students and employers to carry the lion’s share of the burden—53 percent of the cost nationwide and more than 80 percent in some states.
- Colleges use a variety of tools to monitor the quality and labor market relevance of their noncredit workforce programs, with 92 percent looking to input from employers and 83 percent relying on regional labor market information.
RECOMMENDATIONS FOR POLICY
Our survey did not ask about public policy. But our findings highlight some clear needs to be addressed by state lawmakers. Although the area that needs most urgent attention is noncredit workforce education, most of our recommendations will have ramifications for both sides of the college.
Data
Policymakers seeking to make good on the promise of noncredit workforce education need more information—better data on college enrollments and outcomes.
Do learners land jobs in their field of study? Do they earn higher wages than before they entered a college program? Do they return to college later in life for more education or training? We don’t know and, in many states, can’t even estimate.
Exactly what’s needed will be different in every state, and change will not be easy. But virtually every state can do a better job than it is currently doing of collecting data on noncredit community college programs.
Funding tied to labor market alignment
Workforce education that isn’t aligned with the local labor market is worthless—a waste of learners’ time and taxpayers’ money.
States allocating funding for noncredit instruction should help educators stay abreast of industry trends, and they should reward programs—credit and noncredit—that meet this test more generously than those that do not.
Among the ways states can help: by providing support and incentives for more meaningful employer engagement, more effective use of labor market information, and programs that deliver value by preparing learners for high-demand jobs and high-growth industries.
Funding geared to employment outcomes
After decades of experimentation and debate, more than 30 states disburse some or all higher education funding based on student outcomes. But most look primarily to academic outcomes like completion and degrees. States allocating spending for noncredit programs should revamp funding formulas to take more account of employment outcomes—job placements and earnings.
Do graduates land better jobs? Do they increase their earnings as a result of their time in college? Do they hold onto jobs and move up over time? Programs that achieve these objectives should receive more funding than programs that produce poor results.
One way to move in this direction: broader use of Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) metrics to assess community college workforce programs.
States should also encourage better integration between community colleges and the public workforce system—not merging them but drawing on their comparative advantages to build a better statewide network of job-focused education and training.
Building bridges between credit and noncredit education
Noncredit workforce students seeking to advance their careers should be able to return to school later in life for more education—more short stints of job training or longer programs leading to degrees. Many colleges seek to build bridges between credit and noncredit education. But it’s rarely as easy as it should be to make the transition, and relatively few learners take advantage of the opportunities that exist.
What’s needed from policymakers: models, metrics and incentives to help educators create pathways for learners.
Among the tools policymakers can use to help colleges build better bridges: collecting data on crossover behavior, rewarding attainment of industry certifications recognized on both sides of the college, standardizing noncredit programs with a statewide common course numbering system and developing statewide articulation frameworks to guide decisions at the campus level.
Demand for workforce education is poised to explode in years ahead as automation and business restructuring transform the labor market. Some workers who need to change jobs will make do without reskilling. Others may be lucky—their new employer will train them. But many if not most will need to reboot on their own, and many will look to their local community college—particularly, if they’re in a hurry, to its noncredit workforce education division.
Public two-year institutions are poised to step up, but there is much work to be done to make community college workforce education all it can be for learners, employers and the regional economy.
The Covid economic shock was just the beginning. Even more dramatic change is on the horizon. State policymakers should start planning and building now. The future of work will not wait.
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