Strengthening Evidence-Based Workforce Training | The AIR Equity Initiative
In a rapidly changing work environment, access to timely, effective workforce training opportunities is critical for ensuring economic mobility and prosperity for underserved individuals and communities.
The AIR Equity Initiative supports grants focused on reducing barriers to workforce training. Through collaboration with partners, these efforts aim to strengthen workforce systems and scale promising strategies from place-based, sectoral workforce development programs. These awards include: a long-term learning and capacity building agenda to build more inclusive and robust skill training; tests of approaches designed to offer skill training opportunities to youth from economically stressed families and communities; and investments in community-driven efforts to advance racial equity in the workforce.
Project Highlight
The PROMISE Center: Promoting Resilience, Opportunity, and Mobility in Support of Equity
Helping Displaced Workers Find New Pathways in the Future of Work
Disruptive shifts, such as technology and automation, have affected the stability of the U.S. workforce in recent years. The COVID-19 pandemic has amplified these pressures on the economy, displacing many workers.
AIR researchers from the PROMISE Center conducted a landscape analysis to assess the knowledge base on strategies to support displaced worker needs, identify promising strategies that may attend to their specific needs, and consider potential programs for partnership in support this population. The team found that many programs designed to support displaced workers overlook the skills and experiences that workers bring with them from prior employment and are not tailored to meet their specific needs, such as rapid reentry into the workforce.
