The National Association of Workforce Development Professionals will host a webinar on September 29, 2021 from 1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m. CT to discuss this fall’s emerging labor market as pandemic unemployment benefits are scheduled to end. This discussion-style webinar, led by Kirkland J. Murray of the Anne Arundel Workforce Development Corporation in Maryland and Elisabeth Sanders-Park, author of “No One is Unemployable,” will offer participants a perspective on this new reality. The webinar will also include steps to help workforce development practitioners prepare for these changes, and what tools they can offer to job seekers in the evolving and expanded labor market.

The Urban Institute hosted a virtual webinar on March 31, 2021 which covered findings from a new resource guide for practitioners highlighting how youth-serving organizations adapted their programs to engage youth virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Presenters from Jewish Vocational Service, i.c.stars, Baltimore’s Promise, and the Urban Institute illustrated strategies that the organizations used to provide education and training, employment, career readiness, and mental health services remotely to youth and young adults ages 16 to 24.

This report highlights findings from a process evaluation of the Urban Alliance’s High School Internship Program in Washington, DC, Baltimore, Northern Virginia, and Chicago. The Urban Alliance program model aims to empower economically disadvantaged high school seniors to aspire, work, and succeed. The program provides youth participants with workplace skills training, opportunities for internships to gain work experience, mentorship at the internship site, and coaching support from case managers during youths’ participation in the program as well as for program alumni. The findings of this first of three reports are drawn from interviews, focus groups, and surveys of participating students, case managers, and employers as well as a review of program and secondary data.

This brief reviews youthCONNECT, an initiative implemented in Prince George’s County, Maryland. The initiative integrates college and career preparation skills, life skills training, and connection with a caring adult to improve healthy behaviors, school engagement, and the social and emotional skills of participating students. The youthCONNECT initiative seeks to leverage these improvements into increased high school achievement and postsecondary educational enrollment and employment. The brief describes a survey of 721 students enrolled in the youthCONNECT program based on self-reporting as well as data from these students’ academic records (grades, attendance, and disciplinary actions taken).

This report by the Annie E. Casey Foundation emphasizes benefits and challenges of building an integrated data system to support two-generation programming and also highlights strategies adopted by several agencies to efficiently track and share information on families they serve. The report highlights field-tested lessons from different organizations in Maryland, New York, Texas, Atlanta, Minnesota, North Dakota, and Massachusetts; these sites develop, adopt, and refine integrated data systems to enhance their two-generation work. Despite the implementation barriers, their goal is to improve programs and program outcomes for parents and their children.

This blogpost highlights the National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation (NRAEF) apprenticeship program for restaurant managers and line cooks. The program, developed prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, features partnerships with restaurants and hospitality employers to provide training and employment opportunities for underserved populations, including Hispanic and Black American youth and adults. The program also builds alliances with YouthBuild and Job Corps as well as post-high school educational institutions in Maryland, Louisiana, Florida, Tennessee, Texas, and California. To date, the program has expanded to 70 restaurant and hospitality employer partners and 2,000 apprentices who also earn up to 18 credits toward a culinary arts or hospitality degree.

The two-generation (2Gen) approach to building stronger families is gaining momentum in several states, including Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Minnesota, Tennessee, and Washington. In these states, a 2Gen coordinator has been identified to work with frontline staff, families, community partners, and across statewide departments to advance 2Gen strategies. On July 28, 2020 at 3:00 p.m. ET, Ascend, an Aspen Institute initiative, will host a webinar which will cover how these states are working toward systems change to help families experience more equitable and positive outcomes.

This report highlights the MyGoals for Employment Success demonstration, an employment coaching program where participants are empowered to set and achieve goals by focusing on executive skills, which are the mental skills used to conduct tasks. These skills include stress tolerance, emotional control, time management, organization, perseverance, and mental flexibility. The use of executive skills affects how participants can navigate the labor market, acquire credentials, and work performance. The report presents findings on how the MyGoals model was operationalized and implemented among participants living in public housing in Baltimore, Maryland and Houston, Texas.

This research-to-practice brief identifies programmatic solutions to support reentry for young adults who have been involved in the juvenile justice or criminal justice system as they navigate employment and education pathways. The brief summarizes best practices from nine communities under the three-year U.S. Department of Labor-funded Compass Rose Collaborative (CRC). CRC communities are: Southeast Arkansas; Los Angeles, California; Denver, Colorado; Hartford, Connecticut; Louisville, Kentucky; Baltimore, Maryland; Boston, Massachusetts; St. Louis, Missouri; and Albany, New York.

This Office of Family Assistance-sponsored case study shares the experiences of the Department of Social Services of Anne Arundel County, Maryland in its use of OFA’s Online Work Readiness Assessment (OWRA) to improve the outcomes of its TANF participants. Maryland has been involved with OWRA since it was a pilot site in 2009. For this case study, county representatives recount the most useful parts of the tool in working with their participants towards self-sufficiency as well as potential places of improvement. They also detail the state’s data systems as well as the partnerships already established with two research institutions to explore avenues for determining OWRA’s impact.