NSC submits comments on WIA draft bill.

On June 17, National Skill Coalition submitted a letter to the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor & Pensions (HELP) summarizing the Coalition’s comments on the staff discussion draft of the proposed Workforce Investment Act (WIA) reauthorization bill. NSC’s comments focused on five key areas—sector partnerships, career pathways, credential measurement, system-wide measures, and the workforce innovation fund. NSC also submitted detailed legislative language for each of these areas of comment, offering recommendations for strengthening key provisions of the bill.

National Skills Coalition believes it is critically important to move quickly and thoughtfully to reauthorize WIA. We commend the Senate HELP committee and staff for their bipartisan efforts over the last two years to develop reauthorizing legislation that better aligns workforce and education programs and systems to respond to the skill needs of U.S. workers and businesses. We look forward to working with the committee and Congress to quickly reauthorize this critically important legislation to ensure that U.S. workers and businesses have the skills they need to compete in the 21st-century economy.

We would like to thank all of our members who provided feedback and advice on the bill. Because of the very short timeline for submitting comments, it was not possible to address every issue that was raised. However, our hope is that this is the beginning of a process in which we will have several opportunities to provide input on the bill, and we will continue to work with our members to ensure that your comments are part of any on-going conversations about the bill. 

National Skills Coalition will continue to monitor developments on WIA—including mark-up of the proposal by the Senate HELP Committee which is scheduled for June 29.  For the latest news, subscribe to NSC’s RSS feed or follow us on Facebook and Twitter.