• NTJN will present at the 2nd Annual National Offender Workforce Development Conference April 11-13, 2006 in St. Louis, Missouri. The conference is hosted by Productive Workforce Development L.L.C., Area Resources for Community and Human Services, U.S. Probation Office Eastern District of Missouri and National Institute of Corrections and has become one of the premiere workforce conferences in the country with regards to ex-offender populations. The NTJN will present Transitional Jobs strategies for successful reentry on April 11th from 9-11:00 a.m. CST. To access conference materials click here.
  
• Apply to attend the Sector Skills Academy: the Sector Skills Academy is a unique leadership institute that emphasizes a collegial environment, peer exchange, skills acquisition and professional growth. The Sector Skills Academy was launched in mid-2005 by three well-known organizations in the sectoral workforce development field: The Aspen Institute Workforce Strategies Initiative, the National Network of Sector Partners, and Public/Private Ventures.The Academy consists of three workshops over a 12-month period that allow participants to acquire new skills, engage in peer exchange and benefit from relationships with mentors. Faculty and mentors are drawn from experienced leaders in the field of sectoral employment development. To apply and learn more information click here.
  
• Working Ventures, an initiative of Public/Private Ventures is offering a workshop series of four half-day sessions in Chicago, Denver, New York and Boston, to assist workforce development organizations in using outcomes data to improve program performance. The workshop series will include:
  • Presentations from leading practitioners on strategies that have worked;
  • Practice using tools to help identify critical outcomes, analyze factors that might influence performance and setting key process milestones; and
  • Opportunities to share progress and challenges as well as gain insights from leading practitioners and other participants.
    Click here for more information on cities and session topics.
    
• SAVE THE DATE: The 2006 Transitional Jobs Conference will be held in Atlanta, Georgia, October 12-13, 2006. More information on registration will be coming soon. Conference speakers will include Michael L. Thurmond, Commissioner of the Georgia Department of Labor and Dennis Schrantz, Director of Policy and Planning for the Michigan Department of Corrections.

This work is beginning to attract attention. Keep your eyes open for an announcement concerning new proposals to increase national resources for Transitional Jobs. As the March NTJN Newsletter is released, Senators Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) are working on legislation that would strengthen federal support for Transitional Jobs programs. The NTJN will provide more information as it becomes available.

Reform or Dismantling? President’s Workforce System Proposal Raises Serious Concerns, Abbey Frank and Evelyn Ganzglass - Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP). CLASP's response to President Bush's 2007 Budget Proposal that calls for a drastic reduction in funding for training and employment services and the consolidation of Workforce Investment Act and Employment Service programs into a single block grant to states.

A Sweet Reward for a West Side Program, Robert Felton, Austin Weekly News 2/15/2006. The North Lawndale Employment Network's Sweet Beginnings Transitional Jobs program is highlighted for their TJ program in North Lawndale.

Georgia GoodWORKS! is a statewide TJ program in Georgia that helps TANF applicants, recipients, and non-custodial parents become employed and move towards self-sufficiency. It is the beginning of a continuum of lifelong learning and career development services provided through Georgia’s broad workforce development system.

Through the GoodWorks program, the Georgia Department of Labor provides or coordinates workforce services to its participants like: job search workshops, referral, placement into transitional work, and monitoring of participants in unsubsidized employment and intensive services for participants who have multiple barriers to employment that require an intensive service strategy.

Georgia GoodWorks' TJ programming begins with assessment of participants' skill level and needs. Participants are matched with a TJ employer and receive intensive case management services - often available 24 hours a day. Generally, participants work 32 hours a week and receive training and skills classes. The case management staff work with partipants to transition them into unsubsidized employment.

A study of the program published by Mathematica Policy Research, Inc. in December 2002, found that participants generally were in the program for nine months. In the five sites studied in-depth, 54 to 85 percent of those who completed the program were able to obtain regular unsubsidized employment. As of June 30, 2005, over 4,400 persons participated in the Georgia GoodWorks TJ program.

Contact Info:
Linda Johnson
Georgia Department of Labor
Lindat.Johnson@dol.state.ga.us

Q: How can I advance my organization's capacity to effectively communicate Transitional Jobs programs in the community?
A: Visit www.frameworksinstitute.org to download a free copy of the FrameWorks toolkit. The mission of the FrameWorks Institute is to advance the nonprofit sector's communications capacity by identifying, translating and modeling relevant scholarly research for framing and re-framing the public discourse about social problems. FrameWorks conducts communications research to aid nonprofit organizations in expanding their constituency base, build public will, and further public understanding of specific social issues. In the past, FrameWorks has worked with Lifetrack Resources, a Transitional Jobs program located in Minnesota. For more information, please contact Jan Mueller at janm@lifetrackresources.org.

Email us your Transitional Jobs program technical
assistance questions to be featured in the newsletter:
ntjn@heartlandalliance.org

Fair Use Policy
Please feel free to forward our alerts as long as you credit the National Transitional Jobs Network with a link to our website: www.transitionaljobs.net.

To unsubscribe to this Newsletter, please email: ntjn@heartlandalliance.org

Coordinated by Heartland Alliance
4411 N. Ravenswood
Chicago, IL 602640
Phone: 773.728.5960 x.6286 Fax: 773.728.4907