OCTAE Tackles Adult Skill Deficiencies

The need to upskill adults is the focus of a new Office of Career, Technical and Adult Education (OCTAE) report.

Encouraged by the recent OECD Survey of Adult Skills and informed by the White House’s Ready to Work report and elements of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), OCTAE has been spearheading a national response to adult skill deficiencies through a full-year study and engagement with key stakeholders. Making Skills Everyone’s Business: A Call to Transform Adult Learning in the United States recommends seven strategies for improving adult skills—recommendations not focused on specific agencies or policies, but founded in cross-collaboration:

1. Act collectively to raise awareness and take joint ownership of solutions.
2. Transform opportunities for youth and adults to assess, improve and use foundation skills: Methods include competency-based models, online delivery and other options that are flexible and/or accelerated.
3. Make career pathways available and accessible in every community: The report cites the joint letter between the Departments of Education, Labor and Health and Human Services supporting career pathways. It also describes the OCTAE Moving Pathways Forward project, as well as its Advancing Career and Technical Education project to provide technical assistance and coaching to five states to build the capacity to integrate CTE programs of study within their career pathways systems.
4. Ensure that all students have access to highly effective teachers, leaders and programs: The publication suggests professional development that supports teachers with evidence-based instructional techniques, best practices for teaching online and the latest industry-specific knowledge and skills.
5. Create a “no wrong door” approach for youth and adult services:  To support the goal of people receiving the help they need, no matter where they enter the system, cross-collaboration is again encouraged, such as through the WIOA unified state plan.
6. Engage employers to support upskilling more front-line workers: Apprenticeships and on-the-job training are key methods outlined here.  
7. Commit to closing the equity gap for vulnerable subpopulations.

The publication features a number of local, state and national examples of initiatives that support these recommendations.