Washington, DC
February 6, 2024
Hello, everyone. And Rich, thank you for that kind introduction.
It's great to see all of you here in our nation's capital. Usually, I'm traveling to you, visiting your campuses.
Over the past couple of years, I've toured community colleges across the country, from New Orleans to Norwich, from Valparaiso, to Vegas, to last week when I was in Pittsburgh with Education Secretary Miguel Cardona.
In Pittsburgh, I met Parker. Parker came to meet me between classes at Community College of Allegheny County, or CCAC. He said when he was in high school, he didn't think he'd ever go to college. He wanted to find a good job where he could use his hands. He found his place at CCAC because of a pre-apprenticeship program that connects young people to advanced manufacturing jobs, while providing classroom instruction relevant to the field.
Like so many students I've met, Parker said that now, he can see his future job, which keeps him motivated to stay in the program and get a degree—an option he never thought possible.
I know that everyone here knows someone like Parker, a student who came to your campus, doubtful about where he belonged, unsure what the future would hold.
Today, we are creating opportunities for those young people all across America—opportunities to build things, to make an impact in their communities, to protect our planet.
President Biden's Investing in America agenda is about repairing roads and bridges, modernizing airports, building electric vehicle charging stations from coast to coast, making sure that every American who turns on the faucet gets clean drinking water, and every family that powers up their computer at home has access to high-speed reliable affordable internet.
In short, it's about building our nation's infrastructure. And this means good jobs.
I think of our workforce system as infrastructure, too. It's the roads and bridges that connect people to the good jobs they want and need and employers to the people that they want and need. But just like our physical infrastructure, our workforce system has some cracks. It's got some potholes. It does not reach every community the way that it should. For too long, far too many people have been left out of the promise of a good job.
Not this time.
In President Biden's America, we are building workforce infrastructure that's as strong as our physical roads and bridges, a system that gives everyone a fair shot in our economy, and that reaches all communities.
To do this, the Biden-Harris administration is investing in training programs connected to the jobs, not training for skills that might be useful or opportunities that might materialize.
Training programs shouldn't end in a job search; they should end in a job. In the language of economists, workforce development programs should be demand-driven. For too long, the focus has been on the skills-deficiencies of workers, rather than the need for good jobs.
In President Biden's America, we are flipping that on its head. And we're already seeing the results. Just last week, we had a jobs report that crushed expectations, bringing the total jobs created since President Biden came to office to 14.8 million! And we are just getting started.
Today I want to talk to you about the critical role of community colleges in a strong, connected workforce infrastructure.
You are the onramps, the critical entry point to a secure future.
When students think about their future, they're not just picturing themselves in a cap and gown at graduation. That's not the destination they're dreaming about. And, as you all know better than anyone, that's not enough to keep them, not enough for student retention, if they don't see a clear path that's better than whatever option they have in front of them at the moment.
They want to see themselves in a good job. One that will let them use their talent, feel a sense of purpose, and give them real security—the ability to support themselves, buying a home one day, support a family. A good job that they can build their life around.
To do this right, community colleges are building partnerships with employers, unions, state and local workforce boards, non-profit organizations that serve those who are routinely left out, the rest of the school system, and more.
These partnerships are key.
Because workforce infrastructure isn't about creating individual programs. It's about creating a connected system. And community colleges have the reach to serve the people who've been left out of good jobs in the past. I'm talking about Black workers, Latino workers, women, young people who are disconnected from school and work, those with disabilities, justice-impacted individuals, and many more. You are their onramp.
But I also want to be honest about the challenges.
At times, the educational system has been too slow to adjust to the changing needs of the workforce. Employers are looking for workers to quickly learn new skills in a changing economy. But lengthy training programs—where a student has to invest lots of time on basic educational requirements or earns a new credential that's not tied to the local labor market—isn't going to cut it.
And when it comes to equity, we have to do better across the board.
A couple of weeks ago, at Gateway Community College in New Haven, Connecticut, I met a young woman named Lexi, who's studying biomedical engineering. And she told me that in many classes, she's the only woman. That makes her feel like she has to make sure she's 110 percent right before speaking up in class. But she's noticed that in more diverse settings, she and her classmates are more comfortable raising their hands and sharing ideas.
Lexi knew that I'd be talking to a room full of community college leaders from across the country. And she said that if there's one thing she could tell all of you, it'd be this: "Keep pushing on diversity." Not just in STEM, but in every field.
Of course, there's another reason that inclusive classrooms and workplaces are so important. At a time when our economy is growing, and good jobs are coming to your communities, we can't leave diverse talent untapped. Building an inclusive economy is not just the right thing to do. It's also the smart thing to do.
So this moment requires us to align the entire workforce system to meet that demand. And this moment requires us to act urgently.
Congress needs to not only protect WIOA programs, but increase funding for our workforce system and the grants that support workers and communities. Unfortunately, we know that the House bill slashes funding dramatically—the opposite direction of where we should go.
At the Department of Labor, we're pushing for a reauthorization of WIOA that builds and invests in demand-driven training programs tied to quality jobs. We also want it to target resources to communities where workers face the greatest barriers to good jobs and provide access to support services. And we're pushing for WIOA reauthorization that doesn't measure success just by if a worker gets a job but whether the most vulnerable workers get connected to good jobs.
We also want to partner with you so you can better serve as onramps to those good jobs.
We're awarding grants like one in Birmingham, Alabama, where partners, including Lawson State Community College, will provide a pre-apprenticeship program in industrial maintenance and machine tool technology. That project is focused specifically on increasing the number of Black women in advanced manufacturing.
We also have invested nearly $135 million in "Strengthening Community Colleges Training Grants" to help build up your capacity to train workers for the skills they need right now and to strengthen your partnerships with employers, unions, and other local stakeholders to strengthen workforce infrastructure in your communities.
Savannah Technical College is using this grant money to make it easier for students to get "just enough" training to meet the demands of the local workforce—and fast. They're calling this new program "The Future is Now." And I think that's exactly the right mindset for the urgency that's required of this moment.
Los Angeles Mission College, in my home state of California, also has a "Strengthening Community Colleges" grant. They're using that funding to increase the number of Latino workers in good-paying jobs as Licensed Vocational Nurses and EKG Technicians. To do this, the college is solidifying a partnership with the SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West union. Because when it comes to security, purpose, and a pathway to the middle class, there's nothing like a union job.
The Department of Labor expects to award a new round of Strengthening Community Colleges grants this Spring. We're just waiting for Congress to finalize funding for this fiscal year.
But until then, you can see examples of how community colleges are doing this and how the Department of Labor can support you.
We've created a map—I call it the "High Road to the Middle Class Map"—to showcase successful training partnerships all across America—all of them with real onramps created by those of you in this room and your counterparts.
We also want to make it as easy as possible for you to learn about federal workforce funds that become available for community colleges and your partners. If you haven't already, go to—and visit often—WorkforceGPS.org. That's the one-stop hub for information, guides, webinars and best practices on how to access and use federal workforce dollars in your community.
I also encourage you to reach out to your local workforce board. That's the "front door" to partnering with the federal workforce system to access funding to create pathways for workers who have historically been left behind and to work with employers to align coursework and programs with local labor market needs.
We know that students aren't just dreaming about graduation. They're looking to the future and want to know that there is a good job there to meet them. And similarly, when I think about the kind of workforce system we're building, the destination is not one, single training program or one partnership.
In the Biden-Harris administration, we're creating an entire system that strengthens the roads, bridges, and onramps that connect people—promising, talented people like your students—a to good jobs, putting them on the path to a future they didn't even know was possible.
That's the bridge from poverty to prosperity, the bridge from uncertainty to real opportunity, that gives people the power to change their lives and transform communities. That's the bridge that those of us in this room can build, the bridge that our young people deserve. So let's build.