Skilled America National Skills Coalition

Host Rachel Unruh talks with National Skills Coalition CEO Andy Van Kleunen about the state of our workforce, the lessons we've learned from the recessions of our distant - and not-so-distant - past, and how National Skills Coalition envisions an inclusive economic recovery that benefits every worker and every industry in the post-pandemic economy.

Sign up for our post-election analysis webinar: https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_k6PkBcSEQWWsP2V5AM5Ulw

Learn more about Skills for an Inclusive Economic Recovery: https://www.nationalskillscoalition.org/covid19
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Juliet Ellis of SFPUC and Elizabeth Toups of JVS join us to talk about their efforts – which started long before the pandemic hit – to rethink the water utility workforce in the San Francisco Bay Area and how they're reshaping the workforce pipeline into a staple of the communities they serve. 
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Success with containing Covid-19 has been linked to investments in contact tracing in countries around the world.

With the more than 33 million workers that have filed new unemployment claims in the past two months – and millions more that were out of the labor market before the pandemic – investing in contact tracing capacity is not only essential to respond to our current crisis, but also an opportunity to get people back to into the workforce.

In an episode recorded as part of a virtual briefing for Congressional staffers, host Rachel Unruh talked to Rep. Andy Levin (D-MI 09) about the contact tracing proposal he and Sen. Elizabeth Warren devised that was incorporated into the House version of the HEROES Act. She then spoke to a panel of workforce experts - Diane Factor of California's Worker Education and Resource Center, Steve Jurch of the Community College of Baltimore County, and Luann Dunsford of Michigan Works! Association - about how to make contact tracer training effective while addressing the racially inequitable impacts of Covid-19.
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With unemployment numbers rising to near record levels as a result of Covid-19, a substantial investment in rebuilding our nation’s infrastructure could be necessary for reinvigorating our economy and creating new jobs.

For a clearer perspective on what a significant investment in infrastructure would mean for our economy - and what it would need to include to make the biggest impact for the most workers - host Rachel Unruh talked with Congressman Steven Horsford (D-NV 04) and Mark Kessenich of WRTP.
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Many job training and adult education programs at community-based nonprofit organizations and community colleges have had to move to digital learning in response to Covid-19.
But that transition has been complicated by the inequities in digital infrastructure, access, and literacy faced by program participants… as well as the instructors tasked with creating new learning environments.
We talked to Jerry Rubin of JVS Boston and Trevi Hardy of College of Western Idaho, two people dealing with those challenges in very different parts of the country to find out how they’re adapting and what their students need as they navigate their education in the face of a global pandemic.
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As cities and states seek to reduce their jail and prison populations to slow the spread of Covid-19, already stretched re-entry programs are working to address increased demand for their services.

We talked to Chris Watler of the Center for Employment Opportunities in New York and Jeff Abramowitz of JEVS Human Services in Philadelphia to find out how they're dealing with the increased demand and the challenges brought to bear by the pandemic.

We also chatted with Darnell Manuel, a participant of JEVS Looking Forward Philadelphia program, about his experience and what support men and women like him need both now and beyond our current circumstance.
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