March 23, 2017
Secretary of
Education Betsy DeVos was among those present at the recent signing of two bills—the
Promoting Women
in Entrepreneurship Act and the Inspiring
the Next Space Pioneers, Innovators, Researchers, and Explorers (INSPIRE) Women
Act. The new laws are intended to encourage women t o follow careers in
the STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) professions in
order to help alleviate the gap of women in these fields, and promote the
nation’s global competitiveness.
The first bill, Promoting Women in
Entrepreneurship Act, authorizes the National Science Foundation to support
entrepreneurial programs aimed at women. And the second, INSPIRE Women Act, directs NASA to encourage women and girls to
study STEM and pursue careers in aerospace to advance the nation’s space
exploration efforts.
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A suite of new Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act
(WIOA) resources are posted on the Disability and Employment Community of
Practice on the Department of Labor’s Workforce GPS technical assistance site. The Playlists: Disability
Resources for WIOA Practitioners are organized as an online learning portal for public
workforce-system staff and partners, community-based organizations, grantees, the
business sector, and others who provide services and programs to people with
disabilities and/or who have other challenges to finding employment.
Providing high-quality services
to individuals with disabilities is a critical goal of WIOA partners and practitioners. These playlists help to fulfill
this important goal by offering a wealth of technical assistance resources.
Each playlist is a carefully selected set of links to resources, such as tool kits,
reports, online courses, and videos, on a specific topic related to improving
service to individuals with disabilities.
To learn more, please access each playlist below.
-
Playlist 1: Guidance for WIOA Programs,
Service Providers, and Practitioners Working With Individuals With
Disabilities
-
Playlist 2: Including Individuals With Disabilities in Outreach
and Recruitment
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Playlist 3: Disability Etiquette—Effective Communication With
Individuals With Disabilities
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Playlist 4: Physical Access for Individuals With
Disabilities
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Playlist 5: Technology Access for Individuals With Disabilities
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Playlist 6: Employer Engagement Strategies to Recruit and Retain
Individuals With Disabilities
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Playlist 7: Individuals With Disabilities—Partnerships to
Support Education, Training, and Employment
-
Playlist 8: Legislation Relevant to Individuals With
Disabilities
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Playlist 9: Guidance for Employers and WIOA-Related
Service Providers Working With Students With Disabilities
-
Playlist 10: Guidance for Employers and WIOA-Related Service Providers
Working With Veterans With Disabilities
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The
Improved Reentry Education grant program, managed by OCTAE’s Office of Correctional
Education,
is in its second of three years, with nine grantees operating across the
country to deliver a range of correctional education services and options for
participants. One of the grantees, the Miami-Dade County Corrections and
Rehabilitation Department, operates a 16-month boot camp program—an intensive
and highly structured paramilitary rehabilitation program for sentenced and
adjudicated individuals between the ages of 18 and 24. Through this grant,
Miami-Dade County is bringing together a network of education, training, and
employment services for individuals who complete the boot camp and reintegrate with society.
It
was recently announced that HBO is releasing a documentary focused on the young
people who participate in this program and the second chances that the program
affords them. The show, Rock and a Hard Place, debuts on
Monday, March 27, at 10 p.m. ET and will be available on demand shortly
thereafter.
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After
six years of hard work researching the connection between postsecondary education
and the labor market, the Center for the Analysis of Postsecondary Education
and Employment (CAPSEE), an NCER-funded research and development center, is
ready to share its findings with all interested researchers, policy makers, and
college advocates. You can get an overview of CAPSEE’s work here, https://ies.ed.gov/blogs/, on such topics
as estimating returns on a broad set of postsecondary credentials, the Federal
Work Study program, and for-profit college.
The
2017 CAPSEE Conference: Making the Right Investments in College will be held April
6–7, at the Capital Hilton Hotel in Washington, D.C. The conference will
include a combination of policy-relevant plenary sessions and breakout sessions
with presentations and discussions of findings from CAPSEE’s research
initiatives. It will address the following three main questions:
- Are
students’ investments in programs and awards yielding rewards in the labor
market?
- Is
the financial aid system helping students to succeed in college?
-
What
college characteristics are associated with labor market success?
You
can learn more about all of the conference sessions here, http://capseecenter.org/2017-capsee-conference/
Federal
employees can register for the conference at the reduced rate of $75 (excluding
meals).
Please
feel free to forward this information to others within and outside of the
federal government who are interested in the connection between postsecondary
education and the labor market.
If
you have any questions about the conference, or if you need additional
information for potential registrants outside the federal government, please
feel free to contact James Benson at ED’s National Center for Education
Research by phone at 202-245-8333 or by email at James.Benson@ed.gov.
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ED’s Strengthening Institutions Program
is accepting applications for fiscal year 2017 now through April 17. According
to the Federal Register announcement,
“The Strengthening Institutions Program (SIP) provides grants to eligible
institutions of higher education (IHEs) to help them become self-sufficient and
expand their capacity to serve low-income students by providing funds to
improve and strengthen the institution’s academic quality, institutional
management, and fiscal stability.
“The
Department of Education is conducting two separate competitions for SIP grants
in 2017. In competition 84.031F, applicants
must address an absolute priority for moderate evidence of effectiveness. The
separate competition under CFDA number 84.031A does not
include any priorities. Each competition is announced in a separate Federal Register notice.
Applicants may apply for grants in both the 84.031A and 84.031F competitions
but can only receive one grant.”
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