View original document

The full text on this page is automatically extracted from the file linked above and may contain errors and inconsistencies.

Regional Talent Pipelines:
Collaborating with Industry to Build Opportunities in Texas
December 2016

Federal Reserve
Bank of Dallas

“It is critical for industry to actively engage in
programs that promote workforce development.
I applaud efforts by companies to partner with
educational institutions, industry peers, regional
workforce boards and chambers of commerce
in order to foster these programs. These efforts
will help create career pathways to middle- and
highly-skilled jobs that pay attractive wages and
help build our middle class. The engagement of
business and community leaders in this effort is
critical to our economic vitality, resilience and
competitiveness.”
Robert S. Kaplan
President and Chief Executive Officer
Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

“The jobs story in Texas has always been more
complex than some folks claim. The shrinking
middle class helps explain why strong job growth
in Texas hasn’t led to equally strong reductions
in poverty and inequality. Instead of hoping for
miracles, we need to work together to enact
smart public policies that make Texas the best
state for hard-working people and their families.”
Ann Beeson
Executive Director, Center for Public Policy Priorities

Center for Public Policy Priorities

2

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Table of Contents

SECTION ONE

Labor Market Trends...............................................................................................5
The Shrinking Middle Class ...................................................................................................................................6

SECTION TWO

Building Regional Pipelines in Texas: A Guiding Framework.................................8
Industry Clusters.......................................................................................................................................................9
Sector Partnerships................................................................................................................................................ 12
Career Pathway Development............................................................................................................................. 15
Regional Talent Pipelines: Collaborating with Industry to Build Career Pathways ............................... 17
Building Regional Talent Pipelines to Opportunity Occupations .............................................................. 19

SECTION THREE

Workforce Development Activities in Texas: Survey Results............................... 21
The Texas Workforce System: General Observations ...................................................................................22
The Texas Workforce System: Promising Practices ...................................................................................... 23
The Texas Workforce System: Opportunities for Improvement .................................................................27

SECTION FOUR

Case Studies of Promising Practices in Texas...................................................... 31
Houston .................................................................................................................................................................... 31
West Central Texas ............................................................................................................................................... 33
Dallas–Fort Worth ................................................................................................................................................. 35

SECTION FIVE

The Path Forward: A State’s Role in Supporting Regional Efforts.......................38
The Vision: A World-Class Texas Pipeline ......................................................................................................40
The Data: The Texas Talent Pipeline Report ................................................................................................... 41
The Blueprint: State Technical Support and Resources .............................................................................. 43

Acknowledgments............................................................................................... 46
Notes.....................................................................................................................47

Center for Public Policy Priorities

3

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Abstract

Over the past three decades, the share of middle-skill jobs has been shrinking in the U.S. economy.
These are jobs that require workers to perform repetitive and procedural tasks, such as those performed
by assembly line workers at a manufacturing company or typists at an accounting office. This form of
job polarization has forced millions of American workers to make a choice: either get more education
and workforce training to develop the skills and build the knowledge required for new middle- and
high-skill occupations, settle for a lower-wage job in a low-skill service or manual labor occupation, or
drop out of the labor force. Across the U.S., regional workforce development systems are responding to
this pressing issue by building career pathways that create advancement opportunities for lower-skilled
workers and help job seekers maximize their value in the changing labor market.
To assess how Texas communities are addressing this challenge, the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and
Austin-based nonprofit Center for Public Policy Priorities reviewed national best practices to provide
a guiding framework for analysis and then, in partnership with the Texas Association of Workforce
Boards, surveyed the 28 regional workforce boards in Texas. The workforce boards were selected for
the survey because their mission places them at the center of much of the activity in their regional
workforce system. The purpose of the survey was to identify the most innovative and robust efforts
to align workforce development activities across each region in the state, and all 28 workforce boards
responded to the survey.
This report concludes with a set of recommendations on how some of Texas’ state-level entities can
help guide and support world-class career pathways to middle-skill, middle-wage jobs and beyond.
The recommendations are intended as a resource to complement Governor Greg Abbott’s Tri-Agency
Workforce Initiative, led by the Commissioners of the Texas Education Agency, Texas Higher Education
Coordinating Board and Texas Workforce Commission.

Authors
Elizabeth Sobel Blum, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas
Garrett C. Groves, Center for Public Policy Priorities and
scholar-in-residence of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Editor
Carol Dirks, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Graphic Designers
Gene Autry, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas
Emily Rogers, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Center for Public Policy Priorities

4

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

SECTION ONE
Labor Market Trends
Over the past three decades, the share of middle-skill jobs has been shrinking in the U.S. economy. These
are jobs that require workers to perform repetitive and procedural tasks, such as those performed by
assembly line workers at a manufacturing company or typists at an accounting office.1 While the share
of middle-skill jobs is still the largest share of jobs in the economy, job growth for middle-skill jobs is
slowing. This is happening largely because computers and other machines are increasingly doing these
routine tasks more efficiently and effectively and because some of these jobs are moving overseas.2
A result is increasing job polarization. The U.S. economy’s share of middle-skill jobs is shrinking while its
shares of low- and high-skill jobs are growing. High-skill occupations require analytical ability, problemsolving and creativity, while low-skill occupations require service-oriented and manually intensive labor.
Chart 1 illustrates the shifting share of occupations by skill level since 1979.

Chart 1
Employment Shifts from Middle-Skill Occupations
Percent of U.S. workforce by occupation skill level
100

25%

39%

80

60
61%
43%

40

20
14%

18%

0
1979 1981 1983 1985 1987 1989 1991 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2003 2005 2007 2009 2011 2013 2016
Low-skill occupations

Middle-skill occupations

High-skill occupations

NOTE: Data are restricted to workers ages 16 to 64 who are not self-employed and are not employed in military or
agricultural occupations.
SOURCE: The original chart is from “The Vanishing Middle: Job Polarization and Workers’ Response to the Decline
in Middle-Skill Jobs,” by Didem Tüzemen and Jonathan Willis, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, Economic
Review, First Quarter 2013. The original chart has been updated to begin in 1979 and end in September 2016.
Data were provided by Didem Tüzemen.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

5

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

The Shrinking Middle Class
The narrowing share of middle-skill occupations is shrinking the middle class in Texas and the rest of
the U.S. Chart 2 shows that from 1979 to 2014 the share of jobs in the lowest-wage quartile grew by 15.5
percent in Texas and 13.4 percent in rest of the U.S.3 At the same time, the share of jobs that paid middle
wages dropped in Texas and the rest of the U.S., and the share of jobs in the highest-wage quartile
increased by 6.2 percent in Texas and 6.7 percent in the rest of the U.S.
Chart 2
Wage Polarization, 1979–2014
Change in employment shares by wage quartile, 1979–2014
20
15

Texas

15.5

U.S. minus Texas

13.4

10
6.2

6.7

5
0
–5
–10
–15

–10.7
Lowest-wage
quartile

–9.2

–11.0

Lower-middle
wage quartile

–10.8

Upper-middle
wage quartile

Highest-wage
quartile

NOTES: Calculations include workers over age 15 with positive wages and exclude the self-employed. Quartiles
based on the Texas and U.S. wage distributions from the 1980 decennial census, which refers to 1979 wages.
SOURCES: 1980 Census; 2015 American Community Survey; “Employment Growth and Labor Market
Polarization,” by Melissa LoPalo and Pia Orrenius, in Ten-Gallon Economy: Sizing Up Economic Growth in
Texas by Pia M. Orrenius Jesús Cañas and Michael Weiss, eds., New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2015, pp. 91–105.

The decline of middle-skill jobs requiring routine tasks and the growing demand for analytical, criticalthinking and creative tasks in the labor market have occurred at the same time as an increase in levels
of educational attainment—in Texas and the rest of the U.S. Chart 3 shows the increase in educational
attainment among the Texas civilian workforce. Half a century ago, less than a quarter of Texas workers
aged 25 and older had more than a high school diploma. By 2015, almost two-thirds of Texas workers
aged 25 and older had more than a high school diploma.
A higher education has become paramount to getting higher-wage jobs. For example, according to the
Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, “the economy has added 11.6 million
jobs since the recession bottomed out—11.5 million, or 99 percent of them, have gone to workers with at
least some college education.”4

Center for Public Policy Priorities

6

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Chart 3
Majority of Texas Workers Continue Their Education After High School
Percent
100
13%
80

35%

10%

60
28%
40
77%

20

0
1965

36%

1970

1975

High school or below

1980

1985

1990

1995

Some college or associate degree

2000

2005

2010

2015

Bachelor’s degree and above

NOTE: These data refer to the civilian workforce aged 25 and older.
SOURCE: Center for Public Policy Priorities’ analysis of Current Population Survey iPUMS data, IPUMS-CPS,
University of Minnesota, www.ipums.org.

One result of these trends in job polarization and educational attainment is that low-, middle- and highskill occupations are increasingly defined simply by the level of educational attainment required rather
than the skills, knowledge and abilities those credentials are intended to convey. Low-skill occupations
typically represent jobs that do not require more than a high school diploma. High-skill occupations are
those that require a bachelor’s degree or more. In the middle are occupations that require education
beyond a high school diploma—such as an associate degree, industry-recognized certification,
apprenticeship program, on-the-job training or other workforce credential—but not a bachelor’s degree.5

Center for Public Policy Priorities

7

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Ongoing Debate Among Some Labor Economists
There is disagreement among some labor economists about how employers are driving
increases in educational attainment among the civilian U.S. workforce. Do more employers need
a greater share of their employees to have postsecondary levels of education?6 Or, do employers
find it difficult to assess the knowledge, skills and abilities that their workforce needs, so they
use a bachelor’s degree, for example, as a proxy for a job candidate’s qualifications even when
this degree is not necessary? A consequence of unnecessarily inflating job qualifications is that
some employees and job seekers respond by pursuing potentially unnecessary degrees, credits
or training.7
This debate highlights that businesses, workers, job seekers and the workforce development
system would benefit from:
• Employers communicating their talent needs more precisely—in terms of knowledge,
skills and abilities
• Educational institutions and training providers precisely communicating how their
services align with employers’ job requirements
• Students and job seekers easily identifying the return on investment of their training
and educational choices to help decrease their opportunity costs.8
Given the growing need to seek educational and training opportunities beyond a traditional high school
diploma—in large part to earn higher wages that can provide a family-sustaining wage—many job
seekers are deciding to spend their savings, take out student loans and/or forego time that could be
spent earning a wage and gaining valuable work experience. These are opportunity costs. And while it is
important that all students receive a well-rounded education, it is essential that they also increase their
value in the labor market and decrease their opportunity costs.

SECTION TWO
Building Regional Talent Pipelines in Texas: A Guiding Framework
Regional workforce development systems (Box 1) across the country have worked for decades to
create advancement opportunities for lower-skilled workers and job seekers. More recently, these
efforts have focused on the critical role of workforce intermediaries, which focus on a dual-mission of
helping low-income individuals find a job and advance in a career, while also working with businesses to
increase their productivity and improve their bottom line. In “Workforce Intermediaries for the TwentyFirst Century,” Robert Giloth identifies a number of intermediaries, including partnerships that have
emerged out of business associations, community colleges, unions, workforce boards and various other
community organizations.9
Regions that leverage the efforts of workforce intermediaries to build world-class talent pipelines
must accomplish three important tasks:
1.

Identify businesses driving regional economic growth through industry cluster analysis.

2. Convene these business leaders with education and training providers through a sector 		
partnership that identifies skill gaps and other labor market challenges for their industry.
3. Work together to create and strengthen career pathways, where needed, to provide a skilled
workforce for their region and employment opportunities for their residents.10

Center for Public Policy Priorities

8

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Box 1
Entities in Regional Workforce Development Systems11
• Local workforce development board: Lead, coordinate, implement and evaluate workforce
initiatives to meet regional labor market needs
• Community or technical college: Provide training and education to prepare students for
employment
• University: Provide education and research to support regional economic development
• K–12 school: Provide foundational skills and knowledge, exposure to career opportunities and
infrastructure for workforce programs targeting in-school and out-of-school youth
• Chamber of commerce: Identify and represent the workforce needs of businesses
• Business, business association or industry group: Help ensure that the local talent pipeline
meets business needs and provide data on hiring needs to educators regarding the skills,
knowledge and credentials required for jobs, and training and employment opportunities.
• Social service agency: Provide a wide range of support to individuals—e.g., transportation,
child care, health care, English as a Second Language (ESL) and adult basic education (ABE)—
as they obtain or maintain employment
• Community-based organization: Provide training, job placement services and support
services that connect to workforce development initiatives (e.g., food banks can provide food
scholarships)
• Labor group: Represent and support the development of trained, skilled workers
• Officials/administration of city, county, state and federal agencies: Coordinate public
resources to fulfill agency commitments toward workforce development goals
• Philanthropic entity: Provide financial and other support to pilot and scale workforce
initiatives
• Other community partner: Connect mission and program activities to workforce development
initiatives
NOTE: These definitions are from a workforce development vantage point, highlighting each entity’s primary function
within the system, and are not comprehensive.
SOURCE: “Engaging Workforce Development: A Framework for Meeting CRA Obligations,” by Elizabeth Sobel Blum and
Steven Shepelwich, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, December 2016.

This section provides a broad descriptive framework of high-quality elements and outcomes of
identifying industry clusters and developing sector partnerships and career pathways. When regional
workforce development systems fully integrate these elements, they are building world-class regional
talent pipelines.

Industry Clusters
In economic development research and practice, an industry cluster is a geographically concentrated
group of businesses linked by the technologies they employ, the markets they serve, the goods and
services they produce and the labor skills they require.12 They generally include multiple interrelated
industries and are critical to economic development practitioners because they provide an effective
approach for analyzing the drivers of regional economic growth.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

9

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

An industry cluster can be made up of several small, medium and large businesses (Figure 1). They
include large anchor firms that attract similar companies to the region, as well as small start-up
businesses that may spin off from larger companies or seek to replicate and innovate based on
their products and services. These companies share a common geography that does not adhere to
government boundaries such as city or county lines.
Figure 1
Identifying World-Class Industry Clusters

Small
Businesses

Medium
Firms

Startups

Large/Anchor
Firms

Support
Sectors

Suppliers

Includes transportation, utilities, broadband, etc.
Includes access to university and federal lab
research and development.
Includes education and training systems graduating
job seekers with skills for entry-level, mid-level and
advanced-level occupations.

SOURCE: “State Sector Strategies Coming of Age: Implications for State Workforce Policymakers,” by Lindsey
Woolsey and Garrett Groves, Corporation for a Skilled Workforce, National Skills Coalition and the National
Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Jan. 16, 2013.

Industry clusters often form naturally and do not need to rely on any organizing entity to exist. Some of
the most well-known include the information technology cluster in California known as Silicon Valley, and
the oil and gas industry in the Houston and Midland–Odessa metropolitan areas. Each industry cluster is
unique to its region and does not conform neatly to any general data set or simple definition. However,
several industries are present in many economic regions across a state, such as health care, energy,
information technology and advanced manufacturing.13
The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas’ publication “At the Heart of Texas: Cities’ Industry Clusters Drive
Growth” highlights the industry clusters of eight of Texas’ largest metros: Austin–Round Rock, Dallas–
Plano–Irving, El Paso, Fort Worth–Arlington, Houston–The Woodlands–Sugar Land, McAllen–Edinburg–
Mission, Midland–Odessa and San Antonio–New Braunfels. “Together, the eight accounted for 73 percent
of the state’s population, 76 percent of its employment and 82 percent of its economic output in 2014.”
It shows that in Austin–Round Rock, for example, “the underpinnings of [its] economy are government,
which includes [the University of Texas] UT, and the technology industry. Computer manufacturing
boasts four times the concentration in Austin than in the U.S. due to the significant presence of
manufacturers of personal computers and related parts such as Dell, Apple, Advanced Micro Devices and
Applied Materials.”14

Center for Public Policy Priorities

10

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Industry Clusters’ High-Quality Elements
There are several common elements of the most well-connected businesses in a regional industry cluster.
These include:
• Common markets and buyers: Businesses in an industry cluster have a common set of markets
and buyers. Whether it is oil and gas firms, auto manufacturers or residential and commercial
construction companies, businesses within each industry are subject to the same business cycles
and external elements that affect supply and demand within their common markets.
• Supply chains: Businesses in an industry cluster rely on a common supply chain. For example,
manufacturing clusters purchase similar raw materials from a common set of supply or support
sectors. Fluctuations in price or shortages of goods, services or labor from an interdependent
supply chain can have a direct impact on everyone in that cluster.
• Infrastructure: Every industry requires infrastructure of some kind to operate. In today’s
economy, this is as likely to include modern infrastructure needs for internet access or a low-cost
supply of energy as well as a more traditional reliance on a transportation network. For example,
businesses in a regional information technology cluster share a common need for high-speed
internet access, and local manufacturing clusters are highly sensitive to changes in energy prices.
• Innovation and technology: Nearly every industry must spend time developing the products and
services that will drive its growth in the future. Few companies are large enough to do this on
their own, and instead may pool their resources or take advantage of public investments in the
form of university centers or private research parks that specialize in industry-focused research
and innovation. For example, the Houston petrochemical industry is able to use the research
conducted at the Institute for Energy Research, the University of Houston Energy Research Park
and the Advanced Energy Consortium to develop new commercial products and services.
• Labor: One of the most critical elements binding an industry together is its common workforce
needs. Businesses in the same industry cluster will employ many of the same occupations
and require many of the same skill sets. For example, it is no coincidence that the Houston
metropolitan area, home to the nation’s largest oil and gas industry cluster, exceeds the
national average in engineering occupations, including chemical, marine, petroleum, mining and
geological engineering.15

Industry clusters were brought to national attention during the 1990s, in part by the work of Harvard
economist Michael Porter.16 As a state, Texas began to emphasize industry cluster analysis as a key part
of its economic and workforce development systems at least as early as 1995, when the Texas workforce
system prioritized industry sectors and key growth occupations for training.17 This focus was reinforced
in 2005 when then-Governor Rick Perry launched the Texas Industry Cluster Initiative, a statewide
effort that aimed to allocate state resources to advance long-term growth in six target industry clusters:
advanced technologies and manufacturing, aerospace and defense, biotechnology and life sciences,
information and computer technology, petroleum refining and chemical products, and energy.18
Today, the 28 local workforce boards in Texas each conduct an analysis of industry clusters as part of
their strategic plan for regional workforce development. Depending on the size of the region, several
other public and private entities may conduct their own analyses of industry clusters specific to their
unique geographic regions, whether that is a city, county or larger economic region.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

11

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

High-Quality Outcomes of Identifying Industry Clusters
According to Texas workforce boards’ survey responses and interviews, there are three high-quality
outcomes of a regional industry cluster strategy. Further research is recommended to identify additional
high-quality outcomes and to quantify their impact. The high-quality outcomes identified include:
• Coordinated analysis of regional industry clusters: A set of industry clusters has been identified
for a specified economic region or regions that most education, workforce and economic
development partners in the region use to prioritize and organize their business engagement
activities and their education and training efforts.
• Identification of in-demand occupations: A set of criteria has been established for identifying
high-demand occupations within one or more industry clusters, and several regional workforce
development entities use these occupations to guide their business engagement activities and
their education and training efforts.
• Shared implementation of a regional workforce development plan: Industry clusters are
prominently featured in a regional workforce development plan that has been co-created by
several regional partners. The plan is not simply the workforce board’s plan that other partners
have signed on to or contributed to. Instead, each regional partner has direct ownership or
oversight of portions of the plan, and those elements are built into their own internal plans and
documents.

Sector Partnerships
Despite the presence of industry clusters in every region of the country, the businesses that make up
those industries don’t typically come together as a group to address a common problem, such as the
absence of a supply of high-quality local talent or to help determine what career readiness means for
a specific occupation. A sector partnership is a regional approach for organizing multiple businesses
from one or more industries and connecting those businesses with education, training, economic
development, labor, government and community organizations to collaboratively address economic and
workforce needs.
Sector partnerships are an evidenced-based approach to workforce development that produce positive
outcomes for both businesses and job seekers. A rigorous evaluation of three of these partnerships
from 2003–05 found that job seekers trained through a sector partnership approach were more likely to
earn higher wages and exit poverty than participants in other workforce training programs. They were
also more likely to find employment in higher-quality jobs that provided access to health care, paid sick
leave and vacation time.19 Businesses reported reductions in turnover costs, increases in productivity and
overall satisfaction in their participation in the partnership. For example, a 2009 survey in Pennsylvania
of businesses engaged in a sector partnership found that 84 percent reported increases in worker
productivity.20
In Texas, various sector partnerships exist throughout the state. When the 28 local workforce boards
in Texas were surveyed in early 2016, 19 of them reported that sector partnerships are included in their
strategic planning documents or at least one of their grant proposals for which they have won funding.21
Across the U.S., sector partnerships have been gaining prominence as a local strategy for identifying and
clarifying unmet skill needs of employers and aligning them with workforce training programs serving
low-skilled unemployed individuals and underemployed workers. The reauthorization of the federal
workforce development programs through the passage of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity
Act (WIOA) also emphasizes sector partnerships as a key strategy for local workforce boards, noting
that it should be an approach that is included in every state’s plan for engaging employers. According

Center for Public Policy Priorities

12

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

to nonprofit organization Corporation for Economic Development (CFED), 21 states have such policies
in place to support the local development of sector partnerships22 (Texas is not included in this list), and
national networks such as the National Fund for Workforce Solutions and the National Network of Sector
Partners work to advance sector partnerships across the country.23

Sector Partnerships’ High-Quality Elements
There are six quality elements of highly effective sector partnerships that can help local partners
assess the strength of their business partnership strategies and identify areas for deepening business
engagement (Figure 2).24 These include:

Figure 2
Developing World-Class Sector Partnerships

Community
Partners

Community
colleges

K-12

Universities
Adult basic
education
Community-based
organizations

Business
Table
Business
Champions

Economic development
organizations
Workforce
solutions

Convener

SOURCE: “State Sector Strategies Coming of Age: Implications for State Workforce Policymakers,” by Lindsey
Woolsey and Garrett Groves, Corporation for a Skilled Workforce, National Skills Coalition and the National
Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Jan. 16, 2013.

• A common need or incentive to work together: There is an opportunity or need that motivates
several businesses to collaborate. This is particularly important for businesses that are more
accustomed to competing against each other. Some challenges are so large that individual
businesses are unable to address them on their own. In these cases, a sector partnership is the
ideal approach for building trust and arriving at a solution that requires the involvement of
several public, private and nonprofit partners.
• A business table: Business leaders convene regularly (usually from a single industry cluster)
to discuss their common challenges and needs, while other community partners from the
regional workforce development system (workforce boards, employers, chambers of commerce,
community colleges, etc.) listen for opportunities to collaborate. Too often, the opposite
dynamic unfolds in workforce partnerships: Business partners are invited to meetings led by
education or workforce training partners, and the space is not provided for a business consensus
to emerge on their most critical workforce challenges and potential solutions.
• Nonworkforce needs: In addition to discussing workforce shortages and skill gaps, the business
partners have also identified industry challenges that may not be related to workforce needs.
For example, supply chain problems, transportation costs, access to new markets, energy costs

Center for Public Policy Priorities

13

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

or burdensome regulations could all be more urgent industry challenges. Working together to
address the most critical need of businesses helps build trust and creates momentum within
a new sector partnership for addressing other difficult problems.
• Business champions: Clearly identifiable business leaders are promoting the partnership’s
efforts and encouraging other businesses to participate. It is sometimes the case that one of
these business champions may not be part of the same industry cluster, especially during the
formation of a new sector partnership. Because companies within the same industry cluster are
likely accustomed to competing against each other, they may be hesitant to trust one another
when discussing the wages they pay their employees or the specific skill sets they are seeking. A
prominent business leader from a different industry may avoid these concerns and have greater
influence in the beginning of the partnership’s formation.
• A convener: A single organization manages the partnership’s activities and provides critical
support by coordinating meetings and ensuring that activities are executed and progress is
monitored. The convener is not the individual or organization receiving public recognition for
leading the partnership. Instead, the convener is most likely operating behind the scenes to
ensure that meetings are efficient and activities are effective. Several types of organizations may
serve as the convener, including a local workforce board, a chamber of commerce, an industry
association, a community college or nonprofit organization. Some sector partnerships may also
decide to create their own support organization.
• A support team of community partners: A fully coordinated, comprehensive team of educators,
community-based organizations, economic development organizations, workforce boards and
other community partners act in unison and in joint support of the needs of industry and on
behalf of students and job seekers.
While any organized group of businesses can organize its activities to function as an effective sector
partnership, these quality elements help demonstrate how sector partnerships differ from most other
business groups. Box 2 highlights examples of how sector partnerships are different from chambers of
commerce, industry associations and advisory councils at a community college.

Box 2
Distinguishing Sector Partnerships from Other Business Groups
• Sector partnerships differ from a chamber of commerce, where activities and discussions are
generally focused on the business community at large, and individual companies are rarely
asked to discuss their specific growth challenges or hiring needs with other similar companies
in great detail.
• Sector partnerships differ from industry associations, where education and training providers
rarely participate or observe.
• Sector partnerships differ from advisory councils at a community college, where business
representatives critique and review curriculum. While these councils can be effective at
making incremental changes to classroom instruction materials and processes, they are
generally not designed or intended to address large-scale challenges such as closing regional
skills gaps, identifying missing occupational training programs or reallocating education and
training resources to ramp up capacity or create a new program with shorter completion times
and greater job placement rates.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

14

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

High-Quality Outcomes of Developing Sector Partnerships
According to Texas workforce boards’ survey responses and interviews, there are three outcomes of
highly effective sector partnerships. Further research is recommended to identify additional high-quality
outcomes and to quantify their impact. The high-quality outcomes identified include:
• Common goals and measures of success: Business partners have agreed upon a common set
of goals and identified ways to measure progress toward attaining those goals. Examples of
workforce goals and measures could include a target number of incumbent workers or job
seekers trained to fill specified skill gaps, the identification of a set of skill standards that are
used to modify course curriculum across the region or the creation of new apprenticeship
positions and other learn-and-earn opportunities. These goals and measures are revisited
regularly to identify where positive changes are occurring and to inform future activities.
• Business systems change: Business partners can identify how they are working together in
new ways and changing how they do business. For example, they may be working together to
share internal hiring practices, alter recruiting processes, change partnership agreements with
contractors, donate equipment to schools or allocate resources to provide more internships for
students, teachers and faculty.
• Business engagement practices change: Local education and training providers, economic
development groups and other entities decide to alter their business engagement practices to
better support or take advantage of sector partnership activities. For example, a community
college may dissolve an advisory council and instead work with a new sector partnership to
receive more detailed information on modifying programs or curriculum. Similarly, a chamber
of commerce or workforce board may hire coordinators or staff to directly support a highly
effective sector partnership or to help convene a new partnership.

Career Pathway Development
A career pathway is an approach to education and workforce development that connects students to
progressive levels of course work, training and support services that lead to one or more credentials for
a specific set of occupations.
Like a sector partnership, the career pathway approach has gained considerable national attention
during the past decade. Various entities have sought to define the essential elements of high-quality
career pathways. Some of these models advance an academically focused framework for building
pathway programs, such as Complete College America’s Guided Pathways to Success (GPS)25 or the
American Association of Community Colleges Pathways Project.26 These models tend to emphasize
aligning educational courses within a school or institution into programs or fields of study, creating
clear pathways between institutions to ensure that students can transfer their academic credits from
one school to another and advancing strategies to reduce the time required to attain a credential.
Other national organizations emphasize a strong focus on the career or employment aspect of these
models. The U.S. Departments of Labor, Education, Health and Human Services and eight other federal
agencies that issued a joint letter support career pathways that emphasize partnerships with businesses,
create on-ramps for various underrepresented populations and ensure that the credentials produced
have value in the labor market.27

Career Pathways’ High-Quality Elements
Regardless of the specific model used, there are several cross-cutting quality elements of highly
effective career pathways that maintain a dual focus on improving academic pathways and ensuring
that those pathways provide access to employment and career advancement. These are perhaps best

Center for Public Policy Priorities

15

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

summarized by the Alliance for Quality Career Pathways, a multistate effort led by the Center for Law
and Social Policy (CLASP) to identify common criteria for high-quality career pathways. The alliance
identified three primary elements (Figure 3):28
Figure 3
Developing World-Class Career Pathways

Career &
technical
education

Workforce
training

Enter workforce

in a variety of careers

(certificate)

(certificate
and degree)

University
High School

Enter workforce

in a variety of careers

(degree)

(diploma or
equivalent)

Adult basic
education

Community
& technical
college

Enter workforce

in a variety of careers

(certificate
and degree)

(credential)

Organized
labor training
apprenticeships
(certificate)

Enter workforce

in a variety of careers

After being in the workforce, a person may choose to go back for more credentials
to make an upward or lateral career move.

SOURCE: “State Sector Strategies Coming of Age: Implications for State Workforce Policymakers,” by Lindsey
Woolsey and Garrett Groves, Corporation for a Skilled Workforce, National Skills Coalition and the National
Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Jan. 16, 2013.

• Well-connected and transparent education and training: A career pathway consists of a set
of education and training programs at successively higher levels of education that align with
the employment and promotion requirements of several related occupations in an industry or
industries. They also provide support services that help students persist along the pathway,
transfer between institutions as needed and enter progressive levels of education and
employment.
• Multiple entry points: Educators, trainers and other community partners ensure that career
pathway programs are designed to enable well-prepared students, as well as targeted
populations with limited education, skills, English or work experiences, to successfully enter the
career pathway.
• Multiple exit points: Each student within a career pathway has access to exit points at
successively higher levels that lead to self- or family-supporting employment. Each exit point is
also aligned with subsequent entry points, allowing students to stop and restart their education
and training as they are able.
In Texas, there are several local, state and nationally funded initiatives underway that are building
academic and career-oriented pathways across the state. For example, Texas has a representative team
of state and local officials that participate in the Pathways to Prosperity cross-state network supported
by Harvard University and Jobs for the Future.29 Together they are working to identify ways that statelevel agencies and organizations can help support local partners in building career pathway programs,
as well as align many of the disparate pathway efforts taking place in kindergarten through 12th grade
(K–12) and postsecondary programs across the state.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

16

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

There are also several career pathway efforts taking place at the state level. Some of these include
the Texas Association of Community Colleges Career Pathway Project and the Texas Regional STEM
Degree Accelerator led by Educate Texas and Accelerate Texas, a joint initiative of the Texas Workforce
Commission and Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board.30

High-Quality Outcomes of Building Career Pathways
According to Texas workforce boards’ survey responses and interviews, there are four high-quality
outcomes that can help local partners develop career pathways that include both an academic and
career-focused framework. Further research is recommended to identify additional high-quality
outcomes and to quantify their impact. The high-quality outcomes identified include:
• Education and training systems’ responsiveness to industry: Educational institutions and
training partners are changing their practices as a direct result of feedback from businesses (e.g.,
new curriculum and instruction that incorporate the specific skill needs of industry, changes in
postsecondary credentials, the realignment of educational programs and staff).
• Improved recruitment and support services for students: Student barriers to enrollment,
program completion and job placement have been identified and addressed through the
targeted deployment of outreach and support services (e.g., transportation, child care, job
search, career counseling, financial counseling or coaching, academic tutoring outside of official
class instruction, individual mentoring).
• New work experience opportunities aligned with education and training programs: Business
partners and education and training providers are collaborating to create new opportunities for
students to simultaneously improve their education and gain relevant work experience or earn
a wage (e.g., paid or unpaid internships, apprenticeships, college work-study positions).
• Documented completion and employment outcomes: Education and training providers
can document how many of their program graduates earn the degrees, industry-recognized
certifications and other education and training demanded by industry, as well as how many
graduates progress into employment opportunities in the field that they have been trained in
and how many are earning a family-sustaining wage.

Regional Talent Pipelines: Collaborating with Industry to
Build Career Pathways
While it is common to see industry cluster analysis, sector partnerships and career pathway approaches
in education, economic and workforce development practice across the state, it is rare to see them
achieve their full potential because entities in a region’s workforce development system typically do not
weave them together into a comprehensive workforce development strategy. When they do so, however,
they are able to work on a broad scale to drive change across a regional education and training system,
expanding the potential for economic growth and improving the prosperity of hundreds or thousands of
job seekers and workers.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

17

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

The National Governor’s Association, National Skills Coalition and Corporation for a Skilled Workforce
jointly wrote “State Sector Strategies Coming of Age: Implications for State Workforce Policymakers,”31
which identified the following high-quality elements of world-class regional talent pipelines (Figure 4):

Figure 4
Developing World-Class Regional Talent Pipelines

Sector Partnership
Strategic
partners

Input from Industry

Strategic partners
create a career
pathway system
based on
industry needs

Career &
technical
education

Industry
members

Convener
Partnership synergies
reverberate back

Workforce
training
(certificate)

(certificate
and degree)

University

Career
Pathways

(degree)

High School

Industry
Clusters

(diploma or
equivalent)

Adult basic
education

Community
& technical
college
(certificate
and degree)

(credential)

Organized
labor training
apprenticeships
(certificate)

SOURCE: “State Sector Strategies Coming of Age: Implications for State Workforce Policymakers,” by Lindsey
Woolsey and Garrett Groves, Corporation for a Skilled Workforce, National Skills Coalition and the National
Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Jan. 16, 2013.

• Sector partnership approach: There is a credible convener who has brought business leaders
together to discuss challenges and barriers to growth, and also education and training providers
who are prepared to respond to those industry needs for skills required in their businesses.
• Industry cluster representation: The business leaders who are designing the training and
education programs to meet hiring needs through the sector partnership are also part of at least
one industry cluster that has been identified by local partners as driving economic growth in the
region.
• Career pathway development: The education and training partners that are working with
business to identify specific skill needs are also working with secondary and postsecondary
institutions in the region to create career pathway programs and initiatives to help students
advance into higher-wage jobs.
When these quality elements come together, the potential exists to create powerful regional talent
pipelines to help drive the local economy. These pipelines can dramatically improve the availability of
a highly skilled workforce for an entire industry, while also moving many low-skilled or underemployed
individuals into higher-paying jobs.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

18

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

When effectively organized, sector partnerships can also become the principal connection point in their
economic region for several programs and initiatives. There are several state initiatives emerging in Texas
that could help strengthen regional talent pipelines. Some examples include:
• House Bill 5, 83rd Texas Legislature: State legislation in 2013 created new graduation paths for
high school students with five new endorsement tracks designed to create greater college and
career relevance for students. Several of these endorsement tracks require business involvement.
Research from Texas A&M elevated the specific need for greater workforce partnerships with
independent school districts.32
• Texas Industry Cluster Innovative Academies: Governor Greg Abbott announced a new
initiative in 2016 and requested $7.2 million in funding to provide students in early-college high
schools with greater access to applied learning opportunities, such as internships, externships,
apprenticeships, mentorship programs and career counseling in high-demand occupations.33
• Texas College Work-Study Program: Legislation passed during the 2015 session required
postsecondary institutions to begin moving a portion of their state-supported work-study
positions off campus and create opportunities for students to work with private employers.34
Complying with this new legislation and creating a significant number of new, off-campus
internships across the state will require new partnerships between colleges and local businesses.
They will need to work together to ensure that each position advances both the student’s career
goals and the employer’s workforce development goals.
Sector partnerships are often the missing piece that can ensure that each of these initiatives is driven
by the hiring needs of a particular industry, that they are kept up to date in a continually changing
economy, and that all relevant initiatives and programs are coordinated to create a regional talent
pipeline for that industry.

Building Regional Talent Pipelines to Opportunity Occupations
Critical to the success of career pathway and sector partnership development is the identification of
high-wage, high-demand occupations that help drive economic growth in a region. The Federal Reserve
Banks of Philadelphia, Cleveland and Atlanta released a joint paper in 2015 that identified opportunity
occupations as those that pay a wage at or above the national median and require less than a four-year
college degree.35 Their analysis shows that while middle-skill opportunity occupations exist in every
metro area, both the prevalence and type of occupations vary dramatically across economic regions.
For this reason, regional workforce development systems must analyze information on opportunity
occupations, or other similar data on both middle- and high-skill jobs in their region, to identify where
career pathway programs are needed to help move more individuals into higher-paying jobs. Economic
development data can also be included—such as location quotients that help determine the regional
industries or occupations with a competitive advantage compared with the national average—to identify
target occupations that are also likely to help grow the economic prosperity of the region. (See Chart 4
for examples of opportunity occupations in the Austin–Round Rock metro area.)

Center for Public Policy Priorities

19

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Chart 4
Ten Most Dominant Opportunity Occupations in Austin–Round Rock
Metro Area
Location quotient
6
5
4

Electrical and electronics
engineering technicians, 4,510

Environmental science
and protection technicians,
including health, 510

Civil engineering
technicians, 1,410

Surveying and mapping
technicians, 1,000

Insurance appraisers,
auto damage, 350

3
2
1
0
$15

Glaziers, 650
Eligibility interviewers,
government programs, 1,720
$17

$19

Computer network
support specialists, 2,690

Web developers,
1,870

Computer user
support specialists, 7,710
$21

$23

$25

$27

$29

$31

$33

Median hourly wage
High school diploma with moderate on-the-job training

Apprenticeship

Postsecondary nondegree award

Associate degree

SOURCE: Center for Public Policy Priorities’ analysis of data from “Identifying Opportunity Occupations in the
Nation’s Largest Metropolitan Economies,” by Keith Wardrip, Kyle Fee, Lisa Nelson and Stuart Andreason, Federal
Reserve Banks of Philadelphia, Cleveland and Atlanta, Sept. 9, 2015.

In Chart 4, each bubble represents an opportunity occupation, and the size of the bubble is relative
to the number of workers employed in that occupation. The 10 middle-skill opportunity occupations
included in the chart have the highest location quotient in the Austin–Round Rock metro area. A location
quotient of one signifies that the occupation has the same share of workers in the regional labor market
as the United States economy. A location quotient of two signifies that the regional labor market
has twice the concentration of workers in that occupation as the country as a whole. Occupations
with location quotients greater than 1 can be used to identify areas where the regional economy has
specialized and may be helping drive regional economic growth.
In the Austin–Round Rock metropolitan statistical area (MSA), 25.6 percent of jobs are opportunity
occupations. Chart 5 shows the share of jobs that are opportunity occupations in each of Texas’ largest
MSAs. Opportunity occupations account for 15.5 percent to 30.1 percent of jobs in these MSAs. This chart
also shows that the share of jobs that require a bachelor’s degree and pay higher wages account for 14.6
percent to 24.1 percent of total jobs in these MSAs, and the share of jobs that do not require a bachelor’s
degree and pay lower wages account for 47.6 percent to 68.3 percent of total jobs in these MSAs.
The variance in MSAs’ employment distribution by education and wages highlights the importance of
regional workforce development systems understanding their regional context and identifying their
opportunity occupations so that they know where to target their industry-led career pathways.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

20

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Chart 5
Presence of Opportunity Occupations Varies Across Texas Metros
San Antonio–
New Braunfels

26.1

McAllen–
Edinburg–Mission

15.5

19.2
14.6

Houston–
Sugar Land–
Baytown

68.3

Dallas–Fort Worth–
Arlington

25.7

Austin–Round Rock–
San Marcos

25.6
10

64.9

15.9

17.6

0

47.6

21.5

30.1

El Paso

53.8

52.5

21.0

49.8

24.1
20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

Percent of jobs
Opportunity occupation

Lower wage, bachelor's not required

Higher wage, bachelor's required

Lower wage, bachelor's required

NOTE: Opportunity occupations are those that require more than a high school diploma but less than a bachelor’s
degree.
SOURCE: Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas’ analysis of data from “Identifying Opportunity Occupations in the
Nation’s Largest Metropolitan Economies,” by Keith Wardrip, Kyle Fee, Lisa Nelson and Stuart Andreason, Federal
Reserve Banks of Philadelphia, Cleveland and Atlanta, Sept. 9, 2015.

SECTION THREE
Workforce Development Activities in Texas: Survey Results
To identify how local communities are addressing job polarization and the associated challenges, the
Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and Austin-based nonprofit Center for Public Policy Priorities reviewed
national best practices to provide a guiding framework for analysis, and then, in partnership with the
Texas Association of Workforce Boards, sent a survey to the executive directors of the 28 regional
workforce boards in May 2016.36 The purpose of the survey was to identify the most innovative and
robust career pathways in the state. It consisted of multiple-choice questions and a few open-ended
questions that enabled the respondents to give more in-depth information. All 28 workforce boards
responded to it, and responses were aggregated to preserve anonymity and enable the authors to see
patterns in the data.
The workforce boards were selected for the survey because their mission places them at the center of
much of the activity in their regional workforce system. They are charged with helping meet the labor
needs of regional employers, creating good-quality jobs for the regional labor force and promoting
regional economic development and competitiveness. Their major roles and responsibilities are to
collect, analyze and share labor market data and other relevant information, contract with organizations
that provide services to lower-skill/lower-wage individuals, convene workforce development entities and
coordinate and leverage the activities of the workforce development system.
Workforce boards are mostly funded by the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC), which is governed by
three commissioners. One commissioner represents employers, another represents labor and another
Center for Public Policy Priorities

21

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

represents the public. TWC sets the state’s workforce development parameters, policies and priorities.
Through performance-based contracts, TWC provides grants to the workforce boards, which decide how
to implement WIOA within their regions.
The survey asked the boards about their goals and objectives, how they meet them and if and how they
measure them. Specific questions asked about their areas of emphasis, the populations they serve, which
education, training and service providers they partner with, the strategies they use, if they are increasing
the availability of learn-and-earn opportunities and support services and which technical assistance they
are interested in accessing.
This section gives general observations of the boards’ activities and then highlights the most promising
practices and opportunities for improvement in the state of Texas.37

The Texas Workforce System: General Observations
Observation No. 1

Workforce Boards’ Goals and Objectives Continue to Emphasize Their Roles 			
as a Convener and Intermediary
The workforce boards’ most common goals and objectives include:
• Transforming into an employer-driven/market-driven system
• Increasing communication, partnership, alignment, coordination, leverage or integration with/
between employers, chambers of commerce, educational providers and other workforce
development partners
• Continually improving the quality of service to both employers and job seekers.
Observation No. 2

Workforce Boards Provide Services to Populations Who Face Major Hurdles to Advancing
Along Career Pathways
The populations that Texas’ workforce boards most commonly focus on are veterans, low-education
attainment populations, opportunity youth and young adults (youth and young adults disconnected from
education and employment), low-income populations and formerly incarcerated populations (Chart 6).
Chart 6
Workforce Boards Serve Veterans, Low-Educated Populations and
Opportunity Youth
Veteran populations

19

Low-education attainment populations

17

Opportunity youth and young adults

17

Low-income populations

15

Formerly incarcerated populations
(re-entry services or training programs
for them)

12

Other

6
3

Individuals with disabilities
0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

20

Number of workforce boards
NOTES: “Opportunity youth” refers to youth and young adults disconnected from education and employment.
Respondents could check more than one box.
SOURCE: “Promising Practices in Workforce Development in Texas,” a survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of
Dallas and Center for Public Policy Priorities in partnership with the Texas Association of Workforce Boards, 2016.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

22

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Observation No. 3

Workforce Boards Partner with Key Workforce Development Entities
Twenty-three of Texas’ 28 workforce boards report that they are partnering with organizations to
create, design or implement a regional strategic plan for workforce development at the regional level.
The most commonly cited partners are education providers (community or technical colleges and K–12
school entities), industry (business associations or industry groups and chambers of commerce) and
government (city or county officials or administrators) (Chart 7).
Chart 7
Workforce Boards Partner with Educators, Industry and Government
21

Community or technical college
20

Business association or industry group

20

Chamber of commerce
K–12 school entity

18
15

City official or administrator
14

County official or administrator
12

University

12

Other key partner
11

Other workforce board
6

Labor group

6

United Way
Economic development entity

5
4

Goodwill Industries

4

State official or administration
0

5

10

15

20

25

Number of workforce boards
NOTE: Respondents could check more than one box.
SOURCE: “Promising Practices in Workforce Development in Texas,” a survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of
Dallas and Center for Public Policy Priorities in partnership with the Texas Association of Workforce Boards, 2016.

The Texas Workforce System: Promising Practices
There are a number of ways that Texas’ workforce boards are planning or implementing the high-quality
elements of world-class regional talent pipelines. These promising practices are detailed below.
Promising Practice No. 1

In Their Strategic Planning Process, Most Boards Use a List of Industry Clusters—
a Fundamental Element of Building Regional Talent Pipelines
In Texas, 24 workforce boards use a list of industry clusters in their region for strategic planning
purposes, which can help prioritize employer outreach or identify in-demand occupations or skills gaps.
The industry clusters with the greatest number of active sector partnerships are health/health care,
manufacturing and construction. In this case, an active sector partnership means that multiple employers
are 1) meeting as a group to identify and discuss workforce development needs or challenges that they
share in common, and 2) working with education, training and/or other service providers to address
those needs or challenges.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

23

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Promising Practice No. 2

Their Strategies Prioritize Sector Partnerships, Career Pathways and Other High-Quality
Elements of Regional Talent Pipelines
While Texas workforce boards’ strategic plans differ, their most common areas of emphasis are sector
or industry partnerships, skills gaps and career pathways (Chart 8). Twenty-four workforce boards are
familiar with sector partnership approaches to workforce development, and 19 boards include sector
partnerships in their strategic plans or grant proposals for which they have won funding.
In addition, 23 boards include career pathways in their strategic planning documents or at least one of
their grant proposals for which they have won funding. When asked how many career pathway initiatives
they are currently part of, their responses varied widely, from “just getting started” to “16 initiatives” to
“multiple.” The industries or occupations that are most commonly targeted by these career pathway
initiatives are mostly in health/health care and information technology, followed by manufacturing,
welding, education and construction.
Chart 8
Workforce Boards Emphasize Sector Partnerships, Skills Gaps and
Career Pathways
Sector or industry partnerships

21

Skills gaps

20
18

Career pathways
Learn-and-earn approaches or other
work-based learning opportunities

13
11

Other approaches
3

Two-generation approaches
0

5

10

15

20

25

Number of workforce boards

NOTE: Respondents could check more than one box.
SOURCE: “Promising Practices in Workforce Development in Texas,” a survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of
Dallas and Center for Public Policy Priorities in partnership with the Texas Association of Workforce Boards, 2016.

Promising Practice No. 3

Regional Sector Partnerships’ Work Aligns with Regional Workforce Development Plans
The workforce boards identified a total of 52 sector partnerships in their regions. While the survey
did not assess how robust these sector partnerships are, the boards reported that 44 of them have
a common agenda, goal or objective that is specific to workforce development, and their respective
agendas/goals/objectives align with their regional plans. Alignment is critical to regional workforce
development entities working in concert with each other toward a common goal.
Promising Practice No. 4

Many Partnerships Offer Learn-and-Earn Opportunities and Support Services
Regional sector partnerships throughout Texas are developing and supporting career pathways that
are industry-led. Table 1 shows that they are doing so by increasing the availability of learn-and-earn
opportunities and support services.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

24

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Table 1
Sector Partnerships Support Learn-and-Earn Opportunities and Services
Number of
partnerships

Types of opportunity or service

47

Identify specific in-demand occupations or skills gaps that employers are having
difficulty filling

40

Create a list of in-demand degrees, certificates or licenses according to employers’
input

40

Assess the capacity of regional education and training programs to provide skilled
workers for specific in-demand occupations

40

Verify the precise skills, knowledge, competencies or work functions employers require
for certain occupations for use in an educational or job training program

32

Increase the availability of wraparound support services to help individuals in targeted
education or training programs (e.g., transportation, child care, job search, career
counseling, financial counseling or coaching, academic tutoring outside of official class
instruction, individual mentoring)

24

Increase the availability of paid or unpaid internships

24

Increase the availability of transitional jobs programs (subsidized temporary jobs
designed to teach workplace skills and provide work experience)

23

Increase the availability of technology or equipment needed in instructional settings for
specific occupations

18

Increase the availability of summer employment opportunities for youth

18

Increase the availability of apprenticeships

16

Increase the availability of job shadowing opportunities

10

Increase the availability of college work-study positions outside of the college

8

Increase the availability of other learn-and-earn opportunities (e.g., on-the-job training)

8

Participate in other career pathway activities

SOURCE: “Promising Practices in Workforce Development in Texas,” a survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and Center
for Public Policy Priorities in partnership with the Texas Association of Workforce Boards, 2016.

Promising Practice No. 5

Workforce Boards Plan, Implement or Expand Learn-and-Earn Programs
Even if they are not part of a sector partnership, all of the workforce boards are planning, implementing
or expanding programs to increase the number of employers offering learn-and-earn opportunities. The
most popular types of these opportunities among the boards are transitional jobs programs, internships,
apprenticeships and summer employment opportunities for youth (Chart 9).

Center for Public Policy Priorities

25

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Chart 9
Workforce Boards Expand the Number of Learn-and-Earn Opportunities
Transitional jobs programs

23

Internships

20

Summer employment opportunities for youth

20

Apprenticeships

19

Job shadowing opportunities

12

College work-study positions outside of the college

5

Other

3
0

5

10

20

15

25

Number of workforce boards
NOTES: Respondents could check more than one box. Transitional jobs are designed to teach workplace skills and
provide work experience.
SOURCE: “Promising Practices in Workforce Development in Texas,” a survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of
Dallas and Center for Public Policy Priorities in partnership with the Texas Association of Workforce Boards, 2016.

Promising Practice No. 6

Workforce Boards Participate in Collective-Impact Initiatives
Twenty-one boards are engaged in at least one collective-impact initiative (Chart 10). In this model,
community members work together to address a specific problem. They identify a common goal, decide
on shared metrics to monitor their progress and coordinate efforts to address that problem.38 Of the 44
collective-impact initiatives in which the boards are leading or participating, 20 of the initiatives focus on
educational attainment, 12 of the initiatives focus on employment gains and 10 of the initiatives focus on
wage gains.

Chart 10
Most Workforce Boards Are Engaged in Collective-Impact Initiatives

Educational attainment

20

Employment gains

12

Wage gains

10

Other

2

0

5

10

15

20

25

Number of workforce boards
NOTE: Respondents could check more than one box.
SOURCE: “Promising Practices in Workforce Development in Texas,” a survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of
Dallas and Center for Public Policy Priorities in partnership with the Texas Association of Workforce Boards, 2016.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

26

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

The Texas Workforce System: Opportunities for Improvement
While there are a number of ways that Texas’ workforce boards are planning or implementing the
high-quality elements of world-class regional talent pipelines, there are a number of opportunities for
improvement. Some of them are detailed below.
Improvement Opportunity No. 1

Identify a Baseline and Set Metrics to Track Improvement
Benchmarks are critical because activities that are measured are generally more likely to get done
than activities that are not measured. In addition, it is difficult to attract more businesses, chambers
of commerce, educators and other key entities into partnerships without established benchmarks and
demonstrated success.
Only 13 workforce boards have identified program or project outcomes beyond those required by the
federal or state government. Examples of such outcomes include increasing the number of customers
who earn a target wage after training or improving the percentage of individuals receiving training who
then obtain training-related employment. Of the workforce boards that have identified such outcomes,
only four established or are establishing benchmarks to track improvement on any of these outcomes.
Improvement Opportunity No. 2

Develop a Process to Allow the Number of Industry-Recognized Certifications 		
to Grow to Scale
A primary element of high-quality career pathways is the identification of industry-recognized
certifications that have value in the local labor market. But to increase the number of programs offering
students certifications with labor market value, businesses must be able to identify or provide feedback
on new certifications and convey that information to area schools, colleges and training programs that
are providing the education and training required for these credentials.
Eighteen workforce boards have a process for creating and/or updating a list of industry certifications
that are recognized by employers in their region. In addition, five workforce boards reported that they
are working on implementing a process to create a list of industry-recognized certifications. There is a
variety of criteria that boards use to determine if an industry certification is “recognized” (Box 3). When
asked how many industry-recognized certifications are part of their lists, their responses varied widely,
from indistinct (e.g., “not sure” and “varies due to market demand”) to several, about a dozen, over 20,
over 40 and hundreds.
What matters more than the number of certifications is their quality: Regardless of how many industryrecognized certifications the boards have, what’s most important is how they determine that the
certifications are used by employers to make their hiring decisions. More workforce boards need to
communicate with employers to determine which certifications are most valuable to them.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

27

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Box 3
How Workforce Boards Determine if an Industry Certification is “Recognized”
•

Accepted by multiple employers as required or preferred criteria for employment

•

Endorsed by a local trade or industry-led group

•

Approved by state or U.S.

•

Recognized by local community colleges

•

Recognized or conditionally recognized by the Texas Skill Standards Board

•

Identified through labor market indicators and statistics, then modified based on employer 		
requests and foot traffic coming into workforce solution centers

Improvement Opportunity No. 3

Develop Career Pathways to Each Region’s Strong Regional Industry Clusters
One opportunity for regions’ improvement is to develop career pathways that are aligned with sector
partnerships in each of their strong industry clusters, especially those in which they have a regional
competitive advantage and are projected to grow.
In “At the Heart of Texas: Cities’ Industry Clusters Drive Growth,” the Dallas Fed identifies industry
clusters in eight Texas metropolitan areas and categorizes them as mature, transitioning, emerging or
star.39 A mature industry cluster has a regional competitive advantage because it is more dominant
locally than nationally; it is growing slowly. A transitioning industry cluster does not have a regional
competitive advantage because it is less dominant locally than nationally; it is growing slowly. An
emerging industry cluster does not have a regional competitive advantage but is growing fast. A star
industry cluster has a regional competitive advantage and is growing fast—this type of cluster is ripe for
career pathway opportunities. Chart 11 highlights San Antonio–New Braunfels’ industry clusters.
Chart 11
San Antonio–New Braunfels Industrial Composition Is Diverse
Location quotient in 2014

1.6

Mature

1.4

Star

Government

Transportation equipment manufacturing

Biomedical

Business and
financial services

Defense and
security

1.2

Recreation and
food services

Retail

1

0.8

Health

Construction

Education
Information technology
and telecomunications

0.6
0.4
0.2
Transitioning

Emerging

0
–1.5

–1

–0.5

0

0.5

1

1.5

2

Percentage-point change in employment share, 2006–14
NOTE: Bubble size represents cluster share of metropolitan statistical area employment.
SOURCES: Texas Workforce Commission; Bureau of Labor Statistics, as used in “At the Heart of Texas: Cities’
Industry Clusters Drive Growth,” by Laila Assanie, Kristin E. Davis, Pia M. Orrenius and Michael Weiss, Federal
Reserve Bank of Dallas, February 2016, https://dallasfed.org/research/heart/dallas.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

28

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

In the survey, Texas’ 28 workforce boards were asked to identify their most innovative and/or robust
sector partnerships. The most common industry listed was health/health care. This is good news because
this industry has a regional competitive advantage and/or is growing fast in all but one of the state’s eight
largest metros.
There are a number of other industries that also are ripe for partnership opportunities—especially those
that are star industries. The star industry clusters in Austin–Round Rock include information technology
and telecommunications; in Dallas–Plano–Irving they include business and financial services; in El Paso
and McAllen–Edinburg–Mission they include retail; in Fort Worth–Arlington, Houston–The Woodlands–
Sugar Land and Midland–Odessa they include mining and energy; and in San Antonio–New Braunfels
they include recreation and food services. Untapped opportunities in all of Texas’ regional star industries
serve as opportunities for improvement.
Improvement Opportunity No. 4

Partner with Other Groups to Develop Both Strategic Plans and Metrics
Twenty-three workforce boards report that they are partnering with other groups to create, design or
implement a strategic plan for workforce development at the regional level. Virtually all of these plans
have an overarching goal or set of objectives, but only 12 of them include a set of metrics or indicators
that are used to measure progress on the goals or objectives. Metrics are important because they
indicate progress or lack of it and make it easier to communicate the purpose of the plan to potential
partners.
Improvement Opportunity No. 5

Expand Partnerships with Employers in Their Regions and Access Technical Assistance
A majority of the workforce boards expressed interest in receiving technical assistance (TA) on how to
incentivize employers to partner with them. This interest suggests that the full potential for employer
engagement is not yet realized, particularly when it extends beyond responsive forms of employer
engagement to proactive and strategic forms of engagement, such as creating sector partnerships and
building industry-led career pathways. Table 2 shows a detailed list of the types of TA that the boards
would like to receive.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

29

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Table 2
Workforce Boards Are Interested in Accessing Technical Assistance
Number of
workforce
boards

Types of technical assistance

15

Incentivizing employers to partner with them

13

Having a process to create or update a list of industry certifications that are recognized
by employers in their region

13

Implementing career pathways that are aligned with sector partnerships

11

Establishing benchmarks for tracking continuous improvement

11

Planning, implementing or expanding programs that increase the number of employers
offering learn-and-earn opportunities

10

Creating, designing or implementing a regional strategic plan for workforce
development

10

Supporting existing sector partnerships or creating new partnerships in their region

8

Using two-generation approaches

6

Redesigning how they deliver services to clients

5

Identifying occupations or industries to focus on

5

Providing financial coaching or counseling for workforce participants

4

Participating in collective-impact initiatives

1

Offering apprenticeships

SOURCE: “Promising Practices in Workforce Development in Texas,” a survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and Center for Public Policy Priorities in partnership with the Texas Association of Workforce Boards, 2016.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

30

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

SECTION FOUR
Case Studies of Promising Practices in Texas
The following case studies show how some Texas regional workforce development systems are building
regional talent pipelines. This is not an exhaustive list. It was selected based on the quality of information
gathered from survey responses and follow-up interviews with the boards that indicated that they
were putting quality elements of a regional talent pipeline into action. Of these strong examples, three
from different environments were chosen to show how workforce development systems from various
environments can learn from each other’s successes.

Houston
The Gulf Coast Workforce Board has helped lead the development of sector partnerships since the late
1990s. Over the years, it has supported several partnerships focused on solving workforce challenges
for industry, including working with health care, major integrated oil companies, industrial construction,
aerospace and school districts. Currently, the Gulf Coast Workforce Board has partnered in a new
workforce development effort led by the Greater Houston Partnership (GHP) titled “UpSkill Houston.”
Though specific to the Houston area, this project provides a helpful illustration of the development of
a regional talent pipeline in practice.
Upskill Houston is currently identifying workforce challenges and helping to organize or support
activities in three industry clusters: health care, industrial construction and petrochemical industries.
This case study will focus on the petrochemical partnership, which serves as a strong current example of
businesses working with education and training providers to build talent pipelines for their industry.

Petrochemical Industry Cluster
The petrochemical industry in southeast Texas manufactures resins used in chemical and plastic
products around the world. There are more than 700 small, medium and large establishments in the
industry, which formed around the oil and gas exploration and extraction infrastructure of the Texas
Gulf Coast region.40 Because of advancements in technology, including fracking, which opened up new
oil and gas resources throughout the region, many of these companies changed their business strategy
four years ago. Rather than ride out the existing life of their buildings and infrastructure and then move
overseas, they instead began to reinvest in their facilities to modernize and expand their production
capacities. More than $50 billion has been invested in new plants and infrastructure in 2016 alone. This
shift created a new and urgent workforce challenge. The existing workforce was aging and approaching
retirement, and the new plants and technology coming online required new skill sets and training
programs that weren’t readily available in the region.

Sector Partnership–EHCMA
The East Harris County Manufacturers Association (EHCMA) represents 130 large and small companies
in the region’s petrochemical industry.41 In response to these growing workforce challenges, EHCMA’s
workforce subcommittee began to coordinate its activities with the local regional economic
development entity, the Economic Alliance Houston Port Region and the San Jacinto and Lee Colleges,
which provided most of the education and training programs for the industry.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

31

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

“In the past, industry didn’t want to share proprietary information on hiring
and skill sets. But now these companies are seeing that their workforce
challenges are bigger than any one company, and that by working together,
everyone can win.”
Allatia Harris

Vice Chancellor of Strategic Initiatives, San Jacinto College
These partners began working together to conduct a survey of EHCMA members on workforce
challenges and hiring projections. At about this time, ExxonMobil funded a grant for all nine colleges
in the Greater Houston region to work together to coordinate and align their work as part of the
Community College Petrochemical Initiative (CCPI). CCPI supported the colleges in recruiting people
to the industry and in strengthening their curricula and the development of their faculty. The Greater
Houston Partnership also began building bridges with the petrochemical effort through its Upskill
Houston project. Together these partners all came together and provided the means to identify and
consolidate industry feedback on specific workforce challenges and then connect with area community
colleges that were prepared to reevaluate their programs and respond in a new way to industry demands.

Industry-Led Career Pathway
EHCMA and its partners identified student awareness of job opportunities in the industry as a major
obstacle and began expanding and coordinating student recruitment efforts, primarily at high
schools across the region. With the support of JPMorgan Chase Foundation, EHCMA developed
PetroChemWorks.com to help students explore careers in the industry and to connect to education and
training. They also worked directly with the colleges to increase tracking of enrollment and completion
data. For example, Chart 12 shows the number of enrollments and the progress during the past three
years in nine occupations identified as high-demand areas by EHCMA’s members.
Chart 12
Community College Petrochemical Initiative Increases Enrollments
Fall enrollments
Fall 2012

3,500
3,000
2,500
2,000

Fall 2013

Fall 2014

Fall 2015

ria

l

ng

us
t
it
in
d

sp

re
d
nc

ra
fti
ng
/

ls
CA

DD

/d

No

pr
oc

m
ys
te

es

ac
m
s/

te
du
st
In

ip
i

hi
ni
n

g

gy
ch
no

lo

y
el
di
ng

te
tti
ng
efi

W

ria

lo
ec
Pi
p

lt
ca
tri
El
ec

n
tio
en
ta

In
st

ru
m

hn
o

hn
ol
te
c

ch
no
te
ne
rg
y

/e
um
le
tro
Pe

ch
no
lo
g

y
og

y
lo
g

gy
lo
hn
o
ec
lt
ica
m
he
/c
ss
ce
Pr
o

gy

1,500
1,000
500
0

NOTE: CADD is computer-aided design and drafting.
SOURCE: Data provided by all nine colleges participating in the Community College Petrochemical Initiative in
the Texas Gulf Coast Area: Alvin Community College, Brazosport College, College of the Mainland, Galveston
College, Houston Community College, Lee College, Lone Star College, San Jacinto College and Wharton County
Junior College.

A second challenge was a shortage of trained faculty. Qualified teachers could earn more in the industry
than the classroom, and a solution required partnering with businesses in new ways. This included
recruiting retirees into the classroom, encouraging current employees to teach a lab or other course
on a regular basis and providing externships for current faculty to increase their awareness of the job
skills required.
Center for Public Policy Priorities

32

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

The progress and momentum earned from these initial and successful activities have begun to transform
the way that colleges in the region are operating. For example, EHCMA and its college partners realized
that a new education facility and training equipment were needed. As a partial response, San Jacinto
Community College included these items as a major component of a successful $459 million bond
campaign in November 2015. Working with industry was critical to winning approval of the bond,
because the industry represents 51 percent of the college’s tax base.

“This approach to working with industry is different than how we’ve done it
my entire career, and it’s working.”
Allatia Harris

Vice Chancellor of Strategic Initiatives, San Jacinto Community College
San Jacinto Community College then formed a chancellor’s advisory group after the bond passed and
hired an industry representative as a liaison to work closely with petrochemical businesses to create the
new training center and facility. This work includes a subcommittee that is looking at credentials, aligning
them with industry-based in-house training and identifying equipment needs and upgrades required for
the colleges. The subcommittee’s initial focus is on six high-demand occupations that industry partners
identified (e.g., instrumentation, nondestructive testing).
Through this process, the largest petrochemical companies have seen their employment practices of
hiring away the best talent from their supporting contract companies is disruptive to the industry, as
well as to workers seeking a smooth, steady and logical advancement process. The industry is now
talking collaboratively about hiring practices and figuring out how to formalize employee advancement
pathways that benefit the industry as a whole. In addition, the petrochemical manufacturers are
engaging with their industrial contractors about key practices and obstacles that affect the ability of
the construction firms to train and develop their workforce. The collaboration among the petrochemical
manufacturers themselves and with the key supplier of construction services is something the region has
never done before.
EHCMA is formalizing the governance for this work and creating critical work groups to address these
key challenges. This structure is intended to increase the effectiveness of its work and engage more of
EHCMA’s membership to participate in and support its collective workforce efforts.

West Central Texas
A large regional workforce partnership has formed in west central Texas. Three local workforce
development boards (Concho Valley, Permian Basin and West Central Texas) have coordinated their
efforts in support of more than 1,200 companies in the oil and gas, wind and solar energy sectors
covering 60,000 square miles in rural west Texas. Together the industry employs a civilian labor force of
a half million and includes 49 counties, eight community colleges, 118 independent school districts and
the cities of Midland, Odessa, San Angelo and Abilene.42

Energy Industry Cluster
Due in part to its large rural geography, the west central Texas energy industry has difficulty recruiting,
training and retaining skilled workers. Companies might find qualified employees working for a
competitor and recruit them with a pay raise or better benefits, but this does little to increase the overall
pool of talent for the region. Employers also report challenges navigating and coordinating training
courses at each of the community colleges serving the region. Energy industry employees in West
Texas are often asked to relocate. However, each college has different curriculum, course requirements
and rules for accepting credits from other colleges. This means that when employees move 50 or more
miles to a new job site, they may discover that few if any of their college credits transfer to the new

Center for Public Policy Priorities

33

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

community college program. Furthermore, several companies report that they aren’t sure which college
programs provide the best alignment with the skill sets needed for specific occupations, nor do they
have a way of assessing the difference between a certificate from one college and another without
talking to each one individually and working extensively with their graduates.

“We’re not able to draw a lot of people to our region. We’re going to have to
grow our own, and to do that we must build our own talent pipeline.”
Mary Ross

Executive Director, Workforce Solutions of West Central Texas

Sector Partnership—West Texas Energy Consortium
The West Texas Energy Consortium is a membership organization created in 2013. It originally formed
because a number of energy companies had received economic incentives to locate or expand their
operations in the region, and they were having difficulty meeting the hiring targets specified in those
agreements. However, after coming together and discussing labor shortages, the member companies
soon realized that they might also work together to address several other issues.
These companies were very clear that while they needed to coordinate their activities to address some
of these larger workforce challenges, they also needed a separate organization to provide a home for
their activities and prevent the impression that any one company wasn’t telling others what to do. As
often happens with the creation of new sector partnership efforts, the business champion who initially
convened the early consortium members was from outside the regional industry. Though he was an
executive in the oil and gas sector, his company didn’t operate in the West Texas region. That was
important because he wasn’t seen as a direct competitor, which helped create trust among the other
business leaders and allayed concerns that anyone might be trying to win a competitive advantage. It
also helped that he not only had earned the respect of his business peers, but that he also had existing
relationships with many city officials, county judges, railroad commissioners and others. This helped
bring together the necessary partners and move the consortium forward during the first 12 to 18 months.
Today the consortium promotes public awareness of the careers and training opportunities available
in the industry, encourages community and economic development and facilitates communication and
partnerships among business, education, government, economic development, community leadership
and workforce development partners across the West Texas region. The consortium’s business members
provide financial support to staff an executive advisory board, run the consortium’s committees and
execute agreed-upon activities. Workforce Solutions of West Central Texas also serves as the fiscal agent
and grant administrator.

Industry-Led Career Pathway
One of the first workforce challenges the consortium addressed was a shortage of skilled welders across
the industry. Companies reported they were having difficulty not only recruiting and retaining skilled
welders, but also working with colleges across the region to train and hire new skilled welders.
Through the consortium, these businesses were able to identify their specific skill needs and invite
representatives from all eight community colleges in the region to work with them to address the
challenge on a regional level. Together, they created a common course sequence for earning a one-year
welding certificate that is aligned with industry demand for the American Welding Society’s certification
and is fully transferable to all colleges in the region. They are also working to make those courses
available at a growing number of high schools that offer dual-credit programs in welding, which provide
college credits to students in high school. The consortium is now exploring how to expand the number
of internship opportunities available through dual credit and are creating new scholarships for dualcredit and postsecondary programs that are aligned to industry demand.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

34

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

The consortium captured all of this information and made it available through a virtual center of
excellence in welding that acts as a resource hub for students, educators and industry. They are now
taking this model and all of these activities from welding and creating a new Science, Technology,
Engineering and Math (STEM) Center of Excellence resource center, which will serve as an online
community and a one-stop resource for parents, students and educators. Businesses will also participate
in the STEM Center of Excellence by providing externship opportunities for educators and internship
or mentorship opportunities for students to fill that critical gap between education and real-world
experience. The STEM Center of Excellence is developing a mobile app targeted primarily to middle and
high school students, parents and individuals considering a career change. The app will provide basic
assessment tools and career information and assist users in developing their own career map.
The consortium is also developing a mobile app targeted primarily to middle and high school students
throughout the state of Texas that will meet new legislative and Texas Education Agency requirements
for high school degree planning. Students in the state of Texas will be able to build their degree plan
beginning in the 8th grade and select an approved endorsement with the required classes needed to
meet high school graduation requirements. This mobile app will also allow students to share their degree
plan with a high school counselor electronically.
In addition to creating new tools for the region, several other benefits have come from the consortium’s
efforts to address workforce shortages. As a result of building trust and increasing communication
across the industry, several businesses are now sharing employee hours during lean economic times
rather than laying off employees. They are also identifying opportunities to work with peer companies
locally rather than contract with service or support firms from Dallas or other parts of the country.
They have also identified safety as a common priority requiring collaboration. Nearly every company in
the consortium has safety needs and concerns, particularly in transportation where there has not been
a day on the West Texas highways without a fatality. Many of those accidents involve industry vehicles,
either transport trucks or tankers, or crews going to and from job sites. In response to this challenge,
the consortium worked with companies such as Chevron, Shell, Apache, Concho Resources and Pioneer
Natural Resources to create the Permian Road Safety Coalition, which has set a number of strategic
objectives and launched a Goal Zero campaign to have a day with zero accidents on the road.43

Dallas–Fort Worth
In the Dallas–Fort Worth region, the local workforce boards, chambers of commerce, industry leaders
and the University of North Texas are collaborating as the Regional Workforce Leadership Council
(RWLC) to support five of the region’s industry clusters: aerospace, health care, infrastructure, logistics
and technology.44 As part of that support, the council has appointed an industry liaison for each industry
cluster to help the regional workforce development system develop a strong talent pipeline into these
industries. What follows are examples from three of these liaisons on how they and their organizations
serve local industry.

Background
Schools, community colleges, universities and other educators often invite employers to join their
advisory boards. Employers report receiving numerous calls from these entities for the same
information, and workforce boards and chambers of commerce can help them save time by convening
them with their industry peers, facilitating a conversation about their common challenges and sharing
this information with educators, economic development organizations and other workforce boards and
chambers of commerce.
Industry liaisons have observed that as the labor market tightens, employers tend to show more interest
in addressing their labor challenges through a partnership. This is good news for regional workforce
development systems because they need businesses to collaborate with peers in regional sector
partnerships to help develop and sustain robust career pathways.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

35

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

“Workforce boards are excellent agents for bringing together industry in a
noncompetitive environment. DFW Regional Workforce Leadership Council
(RWLC) continues to reinforce the convening of like-minded employers to
expand the talent pipeline for all.”
Laurie Bouillion Larrea

President, Workforce Solutions Greater Dallas

Aerospace Industry Liaison (at Workforce Solutions for Tarrant County)
The DFW Regional Aerospace Consortium was formed in 2003 as a result of both a targeted analysis of
industry trends and an employer-driven collaboration to address the issues of an aging workforce and
the lack of youth migrating to careers in science and math. The consortium represents an industry that
employs over 185,000 jobs in the North Texas region and includes companies such as Lockheed Martin,
Bell Helicopter, Airbus Helicopters, Elbit Systems of America and Triumph Aerostructures.
Workforce Solutions for Tarrant County has dedicated an aerospace industry liaison to facilitate the
operations of the regional consortium along with a grant manager for aerospace training grants. This
sector partnership is charged with meeting the education and workforce needs of the aerospace
industry and advises educators on curriculum so their graduates are job-ready. Often the liaison funnels
this information through the Career and Technology Education Director’s Advisory Committee that
consists of 17 directors from the local independent school districts. Career and technology directors
regularly interact with counselors, teachers and students. They share the workforce board and sector
partnership’s training products with educators, who can change their curriculum to meet industry’s needs.
The consortium has created two aerospace worker training programs administered by Tarrant County
College and the Community Learning Center. In addition, it is currently working to develop an analysis
of workforce supply and demand in the aerospace and aviation industry to produce recommendations
on building a more robust talent pipeline that meets business needs in the region. This information
will allow for a targeted curricula review and upgrade for secondary educational STEM and Career and
Technology programs.

FLYBY DFW
Another product of the DFW Regional Aerospace Consortium is “FLYBY DFW,” a free
aerospace gaming application. Education partners suggested that the consortium explore
digital applications to more easily reach the current generation of students. FLYBY DFW allows
students of all ages to have fun playing a game while also learning about career opportunities in
the aerospace and aviation fields.
Industry leaders and their suppliers donated trivia questions that are built into the game and
paid for software development. Career and technology directors brought the workforce board
and their game designer into schools to beta test the gaming app with their students. The
partnership rolled out FLYBY DFW at the Bell Helicopter Fort Worth Alliance Air Show, and
industry leaders and their suppliers are using FLYBY’s marketing materials to increase young
adults’ attraction to the aerospace industry.

Technology Industry Liaison (at Dallas–Fort Worth Technology and Education Council)
The U.S. has had, and continues to have, a severe shortage of engineers. It is estimated that every year
approximately 70,000 engineers graduate from college programs but they fill fewer than half of the
newly created engineering and computer science jobs. Almost 15 years ago, Texas Instruments, DRS
Infrared, Micron, TriQuint Semiconductor, ST Micro, National Semiconductor and Raytheon started to
collaborate to more effectively address these talent shortages. The technology industry liaison convenes

Center for Public Policy Priorities

36

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

the partnership and its board recruits industry peers and suppliers to the partnership. Its main selling
point is that businesses can accomplish more collectively than individually, each partner gets credit for
all of the partnerships’ successes and the partnership demonstrates good corporate citizenship.
There are several ways that the industry liaison connects industry to the workforce development system.
For example, the partnership has a speakers bureau of 90 engineers (each company has five to seven
engineers on the bureau). Sector partners benefit from this bureau because they can dedicate less
time to reach more students and job seekers than if they were conducting outreach alone. In addition,
Educate Texas participates in this partnership and is designing Texas-STEM (“T-STEM”) Academies,
which are “demonstration schools and learning labs [that] develop innovative methods to improve
science and math instruction.”45 Technology industry partners advise Educate Texas on how to design
these schools and labs, which serve over 40,000 students in Texas.
The industry liaison connects industry partners to meetings, conferences and other events hosted by the
regional workforce boards and chambers of commerce so that they can network with similar companies
and discuss opportunities to collaborate to meet common challenges. The liaison also helped popularize
FIRST LEGO League Junior competitions for children in kindergarten through fourth grades.46 Three
years ago, there were only four “Junior FIRST LEGO League” teams competing in North Texas. Currently,
the region has 72 teams, and 180 teams are registered for the 2016–17 season.
The sector partnership used to have the traditional membership model of asking partners to contribute
annually. This model has evolved into having “sustaining partners” and sponsors who write extra checks
for specific programs. This structure has enabled industry to increase its exposure to educators, students
and job seekers. It also gives industry partners more choices of how to participate—such as by serving
on the planning committee or recruiting staff to volunteer at events. The technology sector partnership’s
model differs from the other RWLC sector partnerships in another way. In its first year, its budget was
$125,000. Within three years, its budget grew to $1.2 million. Two years ago, to accommodate its growing
budget and diversifying funding sources, it created its own 501c3—a nonprofit organization. Representing
this nonprofit, the industry liaison organizes college and career expos, attracts industry’s financial support
of these expos and reaches out to organizations like Girl Scouts to increase student participation.

Logistics Industry Liaison (at Workforce Solutions for North Central Texas)
The logistics industry liaison’s focus is to help industry partners address high-demand, hard-to-fill
occupations. When the partners identified the need to develop an industry certificate program, the
liaison facilitated their collective work. He convened a broad sample of the logistics industry with local
and national employers, got support from the governor’s office and local chambers of commerce, raised
funds to support this effort, gathered curriculum data and brought in industrial psychologists to help
build the curriculum. The partnership launched the certificate program in 2009 and reconvenes to review
the curriculum at least every two years to make sure that it is up to date.
The industry liaison highlights how his business model differs from other industry liaisons. Workforce
boards are required to use contractors to provide direct services and typically they contract out their
outreach efforts. Workforce Solutions for North Central Texas decided to hire its own outreach staff, who
live and work in the communities that they serve. Their role is to interact on a daily basis with business
and economic development organizations. They then work with the contractor and others who provide
direct services, such as community colleges, to ensure high-quality, responsive customer service to local
and incoming businesses.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

37

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

The board also hired two staff members who have expertise in corporate recruiting so that they
successfully recruit high-quality talent for these businesses and teach other staff members how to do
so. The industry liaison cites one major example of its success: It consistently wins the highest, or one of
the highest, percent of funds from the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC)’s Skills Development Fund.47
Through this fund, TWC allocates $24 million a year to local community and technical colleges and
requires local workforce boards to review and participate in the development of the grant projects. “This
award is a big deal,” says Kent Andersen, business development manager at Workforce Solutions for
North Central Texas, because “the more training funds brought into the region, the more local workers
can get trained. The better trained they are, the more likely local employers will stay in our region,
become more productive and hire more people. Employer growth and wage increases benefit our
economy and community.”

SECTION FIVE
The Path Forward: A State’s Role in Supporting Regional Efforts
Three state-level entities—Texas Education Agency (TEA), Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board
(THECB) and Texas Workforce Commission (TWC)—play an important role in supporting regional
efforts to move Texans into higher-paying jobs and ensure businesses have the skilled workforce needed
to grow the economy and be as competitive as possible. However, regional coordination between
businesses, schools, colleges, universities and community organizations cannot be mandated at the
state level. A set of state regulations or mandates cannot create the collaborative culture required for
local leaders to work across the education and workforce systems to identify their common challenges
and opportunities for increased alignment. So while this work must be driven at the local level, the state
has a role to play: to offer strategic guidance and provide the resources local partners need to build or
strengthen regional talent pipelines that make the most sense for their community.
Texas has taken many pioneering steps to support regional workforce alignment efforts. These efforts
date back to at least 1995 when TWC was created and began to prioritize industry sectors and key
growth occupations for training.48 This focus was reinforced in 2005 when then-Governor Rick Perry
launched the Texas Industry Cluster Initiative. The initiative sought to develop a skilled regional
workforce and competitive education system through the identification of six target industry clusters
for the state.49 To varying degrees, several workforce boards across the state can still trace their industry
cluster analysis efforts back to this statewide initiative.
Under the leadership of Governor Greg Abbott, Texas is again placing a high priority on increasing
education and workforce alignment in Texas. In March 2016, the governor established the Tri-Agency
Workforce Initiative.50 Commissioners from TEA, THECB and TWC were charged with assessing local
economic activity, examining workforce challenges and opportunities, and considering innovative
approaches to meeting the state’s workforce goals. After a series of regional stakeholder meetings across
the state, the Tri-Agency initiative held a statewide convening in Austin in September 2016, and at the
time of publication was working on a new report on education and workforce integration for the state.51
Other state agencies also play an important role in overseeing the development and alignment of the
Texas workforce system. Beyond the three agencies included in the governor’s Tri-Agency initiative,
the Texas Health and Human Services Commission, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, the Texas
Juvenile Justice Department and the Texas Veterans Commission also deliver programs and services that
serve the Texas workforce system.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

38

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Each agency has a strategic plan with goals or objectives to improve the Texas workforce system. In
addition, the Texas Workforce Investment Council (TWIC), which resides in the governor’s office and
serves as the state workforce investment board under the federal Workforce Innovation and Opportunity
Act (WIOA), is also required by Texas statute to develop a single strategic plan for the state workforce
system. Nearly all of these strategic plans single out cross-agency coordination and alignment as
goals or objectives, and each emphasizes the importance of eliminating redundancies or unnecessary
overlap in function. However, more can be done to further integrate these efforts into a single workforce
development vision for the state that is marketed to the general public and used to increase the
development of world-class regional talent pipelines in Texas.
The recommendations in Box 4 are meant to complement the Tri-Agency initiative’s recommendations
and provide additional opportunities to apply promising practices and lessons learned from other states
and local Texas examples.
While each of the following recommendations can be implemented without appropriating new state
funds, the long-term success of many of these goals and opportunities may require strategic and
targeted investments by the state over time.
Box 4
Recommendations for State-Level Entities
The Vision: A World-Class Texas Talent Pipeline
Recommendation 1:

Make the Development of Sector Partnerships and Regional Talent
Pipelines a Strategic Priority for the State of Texas

Recommendation 2: Elevate and Expand the 60x30TX Strategic Plan for Higher Education
to Become Both the Education and Workforce Development Vision for
the State
Recommendation 3: Increase State Agency Alignment and Improve Efficiencies by
Increasing Cross-Agency Staffing
The Data: The Texas Talent Pipeline Report
Recommendation 4: Formalize a Process for Identifying Key Policy Questions 			
Concerning the Texas Talent Pipeline
Recommendation 5: Produce a Biennial Texas Talent Pipeline Report
Recommendation 6: Improve the Information Currently Collected Through Unemployment
Insurance Wage Record Data
The Blueprint: State Technical Support and Resources
Recommendation 7: Identify State-Level Criteria for Designating High-Quality 			
Career Pathways and Sector Partnerships
Recommendation 8: Increase State Support of Programs that Advance Regional 			
Talent Pipelines
Recommendation 9: Provide Technical Assistance Resources to Local Partners on 			
Building or Expanding Career Pathways and Sector Partnerships

Center for Public Policy Priorities

39

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

The Vision: A World-Class Texas Talent Pipeline
Recommendation No. 1

Make the Development of Sector Partnerships and Regional Talent Pipelines			
a Strategic Priority for the State of Texas
There is an opportunity for state policymakers—whether it is the governor, the legislature or the
commissioners of several state agencies working together—to advance a statewide policy to draw
business, education and training stakeholders together to build world-class talent pipelines across
the state. The practice of identifying regional industry clusters is well established across workforce
investment boards and economic development entities. However, those clusters are not always well
connected to efforts by education and training partners to build industry-led career pathways that
provide the talent that Texas businesses need to thrive and compete in a global economy. The result
is that too many of the career pathway initiatives and programs in Texas are not sufficiently driven
by industry demand. The missing element is a statewide strategy to support the creation of sector
partnerships across the state. More than half of U.S. states already support the development of sector
strategies at the local level.52 And though creating sector partnerships is a required activity in WIOA,
Texas does not yet have an official statewide strategy.
Examples of state action:
• Develop a set of cross-agency strategies to advance sector partnerships as the primary strategy
for proactively engaging industry in education and training programs across the state.
• Create new incentives in state grant funding that prioritizes any awards for workforce training—
such as the Skills Development Fund and Jobs and Education for Texans (JET) program—to
regional initiatives that follow a sector partnership model.53
• Review potential state incentives and regulatory obstacles or opportunities that can be used
to encourage the creation of sector partnerships at the regional level, as well as to affect
businesses’ desire and ability to engage in these efforts and grow their participation, (e.g.,
addressing liability concerns on the part of some businesses for allowing high school students to
tour or work on the job site).
Recommendation No. 2

Elevate and Expand the 60x30TX Strategic Plan for Higher Education to Become 		
Both the Education and Workforce Development Vision for the State
The strategic plan for higher education provides an excellent vehicle for raising awareness of the need
to increase the educational attainment level of Texas’ workforce. The overarching goal for the 60x30TX
plan is for 60 percent of Texans ages 25–34 to earn a postsecondary certificate or degree by 2030.54
However, to ensure that these credentials have value in a labor market that is changing due to advances
in technology and increasing globalization, the plan, strategies and initiatives must be able to adapt
quickly.
With education and workforce development linked directly in the vision, it underscores that the plan
must go beyond educational attainment to ensure that Texas develops the talent needed to maintain its
economic competitiveness and increase prosperity across the state.
Examples of state action:
• Elevate and specify the role of business, and in particular of sector partnerships, in helping
institutions of higher education validate the labor market value of skills and credentials as it
pertains to the marketable skills goal in the 60x30TX strategic plan.
• Remove the restriction that limits the 60x30TX goal to 25–34 year-olds and expand it to include
all adults in their prime working years, 25–54 years old. This would not only broaden the plan’s

Center for Public Policy Priorities

40

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

emphasis to more of the Texas workforce, but it would also deepen the connection to state
agencies and institutions educating, training and placing adult populations into jobs.
• Encourage all state agencies with education or training programs to develop or expand on their
own benchmarks that are responsive to the 60x30TX vision, as well as cross-reference their
strategic plans, objectives and strategies with the 60x30TX goals. This would increase crossagency coordination and ensure that all state entities are fully invested in and accountable for
the success of the plan.
• Create a plan for implementing job placement targets in the marketable skills goal of the
60x30TX vision, which aims to ensure that all graduates complete postsecondary programs with
identified marketable skills. These targets could be proposed and set by each respective agency
and program, provided they are also reported publicly.
• Create an overarching document that summarizes all cross-agency initiatives and objectives that
advance the 60x30TX vision, and report annually on progress toward attaining that vision.
Recommendation No. 3

Increase State Agency Alignment and Improve Efficiencies by 					
Increasing Cross-Agency Staffing
Workforce alignment and collaboration must be modeled at the state level. Beyond collaborating on
strategic planning efforts, state agencies in Texas have modeled effective collaboration by partnering on
several joint initiatives, most prominently the Tri-Agency initiative. There are several options to increase
state agencies’ coordination to accomplish the goals and objectives of the Tri-Agency initiative.
Examples of state action:
• Create joint staffing positions that report to the commissioners in multiple agencies.
• Increase the number of cross-agency initiatives that produce services or products used by
partners at the regional level. Examples may include the Texas Talent Pipeline report discussed
below, or programs such as Accelerate Texas, which is a joint effort by TWC and THECB to assist
individuals receiving adult education services to enroll in community college courses that lead to
a credential and employment.
• Create one or more interagency councils or leadership committees—underneath the leadership
and authority of the Tri-Agency initiative or other cross-agency body such as TWIC—that are
responsible for a particular cross-agency initiative or set of strategies for aligning education and
workforce development efforts across state agencies. One example could be the cross-agency
creation of an annual 60x30TX report on key initiatives and progress to date. Each council or
committee should have designated staff support and a clear set of deliverables and be required
to publicly report on its activities and outcomes.

The Data: The Texas Talent Pipeline Report
Texas state agencies provide a considerable amount of information on the Texas labor market and the
education and training system. While these data systems are robust, there is need for a coordinated effort
to further prioritize and elevate the most critical and actionable data from this abundance of information,
as well as to develop protocols to look at data across isolated or segmented programs and data sets
within the system. This requires a process for identifying the most important policy questions that can
elevate major challenges or gaps in Texas’ regional labor markets and a single report or summary data
source that puts that information in front of state policymakers to address these challenges.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

41

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Recommendation No. 4

Formalize a Process for Identifying Key Policy Questions Concerning 				
the Texas Talent Pipeline
Texas currently does not have a formal process for identifying key policy questions to guide the
allocation of limited resources and investments. This is a particular challenge for the workforce system
where no one agency can be tasked with oversight of all of Texas’ education, workforce and economic
development programs and services. Without clearly articulated policy questions to focus data-driven
state efforts and legislative action, policymakers run the risk of debating and enacting policies that fail
to address the most significant challenges facing the state and local areas.
Examples of state action:
• Form an interagency council or leadership committee under the leadership of the Tri-Agency
initiative to develop a list of prioritized policy questions to help guide agency strategic planning,
budgeting and reporting regarding education and workforce systems.
• Update the list of policy questions on a biennial basis to help inform and advise legislators prior
to each legislative session.
Recommendation No. 5

Produce a Biennial Texas Talent Pipeline Report
Beyond prioritizing policy questions, the state also needs a method of providing state and local
policymakers with answers to those questions. THECB produces an excellent example and model in the
Public Higher Education Almanac. Created in 2011, the almanac is designed to provide an annual status
update on the state’s higher education plan, as well as promote greater transparency and accountability
within the system. The state of Texas should consider producing a similar report for the workforce
system—or adding a new section to the existing almanac—that provides answers to the talent pipeline
policy questions and provides critical data for the state and each economic region.
Examples of state action:
• Produce a biennial Texas Talent Pipeline Report that is available before each legislative session
with data for the state and each economic region on high-wage and high-demand jobs (“hot
jobs”), the largest or most significant skill gaps threatening regional talent pipelines, economic
growth projections for industry clusters in each region and a list of priority industry certifications
that might be integrated into college courses, career and technical education courses, and dualcredit programs that offer college credit for courses taken by high school students.
• Provide a summary of the regional skill gap analyses conducted by the state’s 28 local workforce
boards, and identify for state policymakers where significant skills gaps exist across the state.
• Highlight leading examples and promising practices from across the state in the report to serve
as models for how Texas is addressing challenges and leading the development of new talent
pipelines.
• Ensure that a cross-agency team under the leadership of the Tri-Agency initiative comes
together to produce the biennial Texas Talent Pipeline Report, leverages local analysis wherever
possible, is responsive to the state’s talent pipeline vision and integrates efforts that each
agency is taking to advance that vision.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

42

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Recommendation No. 6

Improve the Information Currently Collected Through Unemployment 			
Insurance Wage Record Data
There are a few technical changes or adjustments that could significantly improve the quality of
education and workforce data available to state agencies and local partners. For example, the
unemployment insurance (UI) system is the primary tool used by state agencies to match employment
and wage information with student record data to determine the effectiveness of education and training
programs. Currently the state’s system does not require employers to provide occupation information,
which significantly limits the usefulness of this data. For example, the state’s data systems can determine
if nursing students are employed after graduating and how much these students are making on a
quarterly basis. However, the system is not able to determine if the students got jobs as nurses using the
education that they completed. Similarly, the address information collected through the UI system can
be unreliable and cannot be used to effectively determine if graduates from a college or local training
provider were able to find employment within the regional labor market.
Examples of state action:
• Explore the costs and benefits to businesses and job seekers of reporting employee occupations
on unemployment insurance forms. This could also include determining if human resources
staffing agencies, which complete a significant amount of UI reporting on behalf of employers,
can make this change more efficiently or inexpensively than individual employers.
• Explore the costs and benefits to businesses and job seekers of improving the accuracy of the
work address reported for employees through the unemployment insurance form.

The Blueprint: State Technical Support and Resources
State agencies provide a significant amount of technical support to local education and workforce
partners. For example, TWC provides a menu of resources, including helping local partners identify
industry clusters in their region, conducting outreach and training on labor market information and
providing access to several tools and resources, including third-party data tools such as Help-Wanted
Online’s real-time labor market information. Similarly, TWIC provides a series of documents and tools
designed to assist workforce alignment efforts at the local level, including its most recent effort to
identify a priority list of industry-recognized certifications for the state that can be used by schools,
colleges and training programs.
Recommendation No. 7

Identify State-Level Criteria for Designating High-Quality Career Pathways 			
and Sector Partnerships
There are more than 60 pathway programs operating in Texas across K–12, higher education and
workforce development.55 There are also an unknown number of regional sector partnerships and other
business-driven education initiatives working to guide the development of some of those pathway
programs. To take these efforts to scale and ensure that they are working toward a coherent system, the
state should identify the quality elements of a regional talent pipeline in Texas and create a credentialing
process to acknowledge excellence for both students and for employers, similar to early college high
school credentialing. But to maximize local flexibility in designing initiatives that meet the needs of their
communities, local partners must recognize the need to customize these strategies to fit the unique
needs of their regions.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

43

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Examples of state action:
• Create a formal cross-agency review process under the leadership of the Tri-Agency initiative
to identify common career pathway elements shared across state programs, and create a
blueprint for building pathways that are successful at moving various students through a series
of education and training courses and into a related job with career advancement potential.
• Create a similar review process to identify common sector partnership elements shared across
regional partnerships, and create a blueprint for creating industry-led partnerships.
Recommendation No. 8

Increase State Support of Programs that Advance Regional Talent Pipelines
There are several ways the state can make new investments—or strengthen the impact of investments
already made—to advance regional talent pipelines. One of the greatest opportunities is to strengthen
efforts or initiatives that incentivize collaboration among education and business partners.
Examples of state action:
• Increase the impact of TWC’s Skills Development Fund by requiring an industry match to receive
a workforce training grant, extending the reach of state funds and ensuring that businesses are
committed to the need for and success of their grant.
• Set aside a portion of the Skills Development Fund, Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical
Education funds, the governor’s discretionary funds provided through the Workforce Innovation
and Opportunity Act or the newly announced Texas Industry Partnership program for sector
partnerships that engage more than one business partner in an effort to build an industry-led
career pathway.
• Add job placement criteria to the performance funding model for community colleges.
• Increase the percent of WIOA clients who receive workforce training services.
• Seek opportunities to increase federal support of career pathway programs, such as using
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families funds to support adult career pathway programs
at community colleges or otherwise incentivize using these funds to support education and
training that leads to employment.
• Increase the share of state funding for education and training programs that go to statedesignated career pathway programs. This could include increasing formula funding for the
K-12 or higher education system for programs of study at the secondary or postsecondary level.
Funds may also be shifted to efforts such as the Accelerate Texas program that integrate both
basic skills instruction and workforce training for adults.56

Center for Public Policy Priorities

44

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Recommendation No. 9

Provide Technical Assistance Resources to Local Partners on Building or Expanding 		
Career Pathways and Sector Partnerships
In addition to creating a state designation process for recognizing high-quality career pathways and
sector partnerships, the state should offer technical assistance resources and services from nationally
or state-recognized sources to local partners. And because requests for assistance can come from
local workforce boards, independent school districts, institutions of higher education and economic
development entities, the technical assistance services offered should cut across education, workforce
and economic development.
Examples of state action:
• Make available technical assistance services from one or more state-recognized sources to
provide expert guidance to local stakeholders on how to build career pathway programs,
create sector partnerships or conduct industry cluster analysis. This could be accomplished by
publishing a list of experts or organizations that are familiar with state designation criteria, as
well as by setting aside a small technical assistance fund that could be used to provide local
assistance upon request.
• Design a series of state agency guidance and planning documents—a Texas Talent Pipeline
toolkit—that draws on varied promising practices from across the state and country on
implementing industry cluster analysis, sector partnerships and career pathways.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

45

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Acknowledgments
Our appreciation goes to all 28 workforce boards of Texas that took the time to complete our survey.
Our appreciation also goes to the following reviewers and contributors for sharing their insights and
expertise:
Donald Bowers, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, Houston Branch
Roberto Coronado, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, El Paso Branch
Roy C. Lopez, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas
Lupe Mares, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, El Paso Branch
Pia Orrenius, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas
Emily Ryder Perlmeter, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Local Experts
Kent Andersen, Workforce Solutions for North Central Texas
Tamara Atkinson, Workforce Solutions Capital Area*
Peter Beard, Greater Houston Partnership
Mike Buck, Workforce Solutions of Concho Valley
Elizabeth Caudill, Dallas Regional Chamber
Linda Davis, Workforce Solutions Greater Dallas
Angela Farley, Dallas Regional Chamber
Laurie Bouillion Larrea, Workforce Solutions Greater Dallas
Loh-Sze Leung, Leung Consulting
Judy McDonald, Workforce Solutions for Tarrant County
Jann Miles, Workforce Solutions for Tarrant County
Renee Parker, Workforce Solutions for Tarrant County
Mary Ross, Workforce Solutions of West Central Texas
David Setzer, Workforce Solutions for North Central Texas
John Shellene, Dallas Fort Worth Technology and Education Council
Katherine Stokes, West Texas Energy Consortium
Willie Taylor, Workforce Solutions of Permian Basin
Mike Temple, Workforce Solutions Gulf Coast

State Experts
Wende Burton, Communities Foundation of Texas**
Kelty Garbee, Educate Texas**
David Gardner, Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board
Christopher King, University of Texas at Austin Ray Marshall Center
Heath Prince, University of Texas at Austin Ray Marshall Center
Quentin Suffren, College, Career & Military Preparation, Texas Education Agency
Greg Vaughn, Texas Association of Workforce Boards

National Experts
Taryn MacFarlane, Corporation for a Skilled Workforce
Brent Parton, Employment and Training Administration, U.S. Department of Labor
Deborah Povich, Working Poor Families Project**
Brandon Roberts, Working Poor Families Project**
Eric Seleznow, Employment and Training Administration, U.S. Department of Labor
Martin Simon, National Governors Association
Lindsey Woolsey, Woolsey Associates

*Workforce Solutions Capital Area has contracted for services with the Center for Public Policy Priorities.
**Disclaimer: These organizations have been a financial supporter of the Center for Public Policy Priorities.

Center for Public Policy Priorities

46

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

Notes
“The Vanishing Middle: Job Polarization and Workers’ Response to the Decline in Middle-Skill Jobs,” by Didem Tüzemen and Jonathan
L. Willis, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, Economic Review, First Quarter 2013, www.kansascityfed.org/publicat/econrev/
pdf/13q1tuzemen-willis.pdf.

1

For more information, see Figure 3: Index of Changing Work Tasks in the U.S. Economy 1960–2009, “Dancing with Robots: Human
Skills for Computerized Work,” by Frank Levy and Richard Murnane, Third Way, July 17, 2013, www.thirdway.org/report/dancing-withrobots-human-skills-for-computerized-work.

2

For additional information, see “Texas Leads Nation in Creation of Jobs at All Pay Levels,” by Melissa LoPalo and Pia M. Orrenius,
Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas Southwest Economy, First Quarter 2014, www.dallasfed.org/research/swe.aspx, and “Middle-Skill Jobs
Lost in U.S. Labor Market Polarization,” by Anton Cheremukhin, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas Economic Letter, Vol. 9, No. 5, May
2014, www.dallasfed.org/research/eclett.aspx#tab4.

3

4
“America’s Divided Recovery: College Haves and Have-Nots,” by Anthony P. Carnevale, Tamara Jayasundera and Artem Gulish, Center
on Education and the Workforce, McCourt School of Public Policy, Georgetown University, 2016, https://cew.georgetown.edu/cewreports/americas-divided-recovery/#full-report.

“America’s Forgotten Middle-Skill Jobs: Education and Training Requirements in the Next Decade and Beyond,” by Harry J. Holzer
and Robert I. Lerman, The Workforce Alliance, November 2007, www.urban.org/sites/default/files/alfresco/publication-pdfs/411633America-s-Forgotten-Middle-Skill-Jobs.PDF.

5

6
See note 2 and “Computing Inequality: Have Computers Changed the Labor Market?” by David H. Autor, Lawrence F. Katz and Alan B.
Krueger, Quarterly Journal of Economics vol. 113, no. 4, 1998, pp. 1169–1213.
7
“Skill Gaps, Skill Shortages and Skill Mismatches: Evidence for the U.S.,” by Peter Capelli, National Bureau of Economic Research
Working Paper 20382, August 2014, www.nber.org/papers/w20382.

See note 7.

8

9
”Workforce Intermediaries for the Twenty-First Century,” by Robert P. Giloth, The American Assembly and Columbia University, www.
temple.edu/tempress/titles/1723_reg_print.html.
10
“State Sector Strategies Coming of Age: Implications for State Workforce Policymakers,” by Lindsey Woolsey and Garrett Groves,
Corporation for a Skilled Workforce, National Skills Coalition and the National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Jan. 16,
2013, www.nga.org/cms/home/nga-center-for-best-practices/center-publications/page-ehsw-publications/col2-content/main-contentlist/state-sector-strategies-coming-o.html.

These definitions come from a workforce development vantage point, highlighting the entities’ primary function within the workforce
development system. These definitions are not comprehensive, and entities may not prioritize their stated workforce development
function or include it in their mission (e.g., community colleges and universities might define their mission as educating well-rounded
citizens).

11

For more information, go to “U.S. Cluster Mapping: Mapping a Nation of Regional Clusters,” by Michael Porter, Institute for Strategy
& Competitiveness, Harvard Business School and U.S. Department of Commerce, Economic Development Administration, www.
clustermapping.us/.

12

”At the Heart of Texas: Cities’ Industry Clusters Drive Growth,” by Laila Assanie, Kristin E. Davis, Pia M. Orrenius and Michael Weiss,
Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, February 2016, https://dallasfed.org/en/research/heart.aspx.

13

See note 13.

14

“Houston: Energy Powerhouse,” Energy Data Sheet, Greater Houston Partnership, April 2013, www.houston.org/assets/pdf/
opportunity/Energy-Data-Sheet.pdf,

15

16
“What Are Clusters?” Institute for Strategy & Competitiveness, Harvard Business School, Harvard University, www.isc.hbs.edu/
competitiveness-economic-development/frameworks-and-key-concepts/Pages/clusters.aspx.
17
“Moving Sectoral and Career Pathway Programs from Promise to Scale,” by Christopher T. King and Heath J. Price in Transforming
U.S. Workforce Development Policies for the 21st Century, Carl Van Horn, Tammy Edwards and Todd Green, eds., Kalamazoo, Mich.:
W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, 2015, pp. 195–229.

“Texas Industry Cluster Initiative,” Texas Workforce Commission, www.twc.state.tx.us/partners/texas-industry-cluster-initiative.

18

“Tuning in to Local Labor Markets: Findings from the Sectoral Employment Study,” by Shelia Maguire, Joshua Freely, Carol Clymer,
Maureen Conway and Deena Schwartz, Public/Private Ventures, July 2010, ppv.issuelab.org/resources/5101/5101.pdf.
19

See note 10.

20

Results from “Promising Practices in Workforce Development in Texas,” the 2016 survey sent to Texas’ workforce development
boards by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and the Center for Public Policy Priorities in partnership with the Texas Association of
Workforce Boards.

21

“Workforce Development—Sector Partnerships,” Assets & Opportunity Scorecard, CFED, scorecard.assetsandopportunity.org/latest/
measure/workforce-development-sector-partnerships.

22

“Sector Snapshot: A Profile of Sector Initiatives, 2010,” by Ravi Mangat, National Network of Sector Partners, ww1.insightcced.org/
uploads/publications/wd/Sector-Snapshots.pdf.

23

See note 10.

24

“Guided Pathways to Success: Boosting College Completion,” Complete College America, completecollege.org/docs/GPS_Summary_
FINAL.pdf.

25

Center for Public Policy Priorities

47

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

“Resources,” American Association of Community Colleges, www.aacc.nche.edu/Resources/aaccprograms/pathways/Pages/default.
aspx.

26

Joint Federal Agency Memo on Career Pathways, April 28, 2016, www.ncpn.info/2016-downloads/CP-JointLetterFinal-4-22-2016.pdf.

27

“Shared Vision, Strong Systems,” Alliance for Quality Career Pathways, a project of CLASP, Framework Version 1.0, June 2014, www.
clasp.org/resources-and-publications/files/aqcp-framework-version-1-0/AQCP-Framework.pdf.

28

Building Career Pathways to Help More Students Succeed, Jobs for the Future, www.jff.org/initiatives/pathways-prosperity-network.

29

For details, see “Texas Success Center Resources,” Texas Association of Community Colleges, www.tacc.org/pages/texassuccess-center/resources/texas-success-center-resources; Texas Regional Stem Degree Accelerator, Educate Texas, www.edtx.org/
postsecondary-access-and-success/postsecondary-success/texas-regional-stem-degree-accelerator/ and 60x30TX, Texas Higher
Education Coordinating Board, www.thecb.state.tx.us/index.cfm?objectid=5033056A-A8AF-0900-DE0514355F026A7F.
30

See note 10.

31

“The New Shape of Texas High School Education: Administrator, Counselor, and Parent Viewpoints on HB5 Endorsement
Implementation,” Jenny Knowles Morrison, et al, Texas Education Grantmakers Advocacy Consortium and The Bush School of
Government & Public Service, Texas A&M University, http://bush.tamu.edu/psaa/capstones/TEGAC%20HB5%20Report_Final.pdf and
“Successful Implementation of HB 5: Recommendations for Stakeholder Groups,” Texas Education Grantmakers Advocacy Consortium,
tegac.org/uploads/HB5-Successful-Implementation-FINAL.pdf

32

“Governor Abbott Announces Initiative to Establish Innovative Academies in Texas High Schools,” Office of the Governor of Greg
Abbott, Sept. 2, 2016, gov.texas.gov/news/press-release/22629.

33

For more information, see “Beyond the Campus: Connecting Community College Students to Meaningful Employment, “ by Chandra
Kring Villanueva, Center for Public Policy Priorities, March 2015, forabettertexas.org/images/EO_2015_03_WorkStudy.pdf.

34

“Identifying Opportunity Occupations in the Nation’s Largest Metropolitan Economies,” by Keith Wardrip, Kyle Fee, Lisa Nelson and
Stuart Andreason, Federal Reserve Banks of Philadelphia, Cleveland and Atlanta, Sept. 9, 2015, www.clevelandfed.org/newsroom-andevents/publications/special-reports/sr-20150909-identifying-opportunity-occupations.aspx.

35

See note 21.

36

For a more detailed explanation of what workforce development board do, see “Engaging Workforce Development: A Framework for
Meeting CRA Obligations,” by Elizabeth Sobel Blum and Steven Shepelwich, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and Federal Reserve Bank
of Kansas City, December 2016.

37

For more information about collective impact, see the Collective Impact Forum, an initiative of FSG and the Aspen Institute Forum
for Community Solutions, collectiveimpactforum.org/what-collective-impact.

38

See note 13.

39

See note 15.

40

For more information, see East Harris County Manufacturers Association, www.ehcma.com.

41

For more information, see West Texas Energy Consortium, www.wtxec.org.

42

For more information, see Permian Road Safety Coalition: Working Together for Safer Roads, www.permianroadsafety.org.

43

For more information, see “Annual Report 2015,” Regional Workforce Leadership Council, workforcesolutions.net/wp-content/
uploads/2016/01/2015-RWLC-FINAL-Hi-Res.pdf.

44

45
For more information, see the Texas Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (T-STEM), Educate Texas, www.edtx.org/
college-ready-standards-and-practices/t-stem/.

For more information, see FIRST LEGO League Jr. Challenge & Season Info, www.firstinspires.org/robotics/flljr.

46

For more information, see the Texas Workforce Commission’s Skills Development Fund, www.twc.state.tx.us/partners/skillsdevelopment-fund.

47

See note 17.

48

See note 18.

49

For more information, see “Prosperity Requires Being Bold: Integrating Education and the Workforce for a Bright Texas Future,” The
Tri-Agency Report to the Office of the Governor from the Texas Education Agency, Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board and
Texas Workforce Commission, November 2016, www.twc.state.tx.us/files/partners/tri-agency-report-office-governor-twc.pdf.
50

“Governor Abbott Establishes Tri-Agency Workforce Initiative,” Office of the Governor Greg Abbott, March 7, 2016, http://gov.texas.
gov/news/press-release/22031.

51

See note 10.

52

For more information, see note 47 and Jobs & Education for Texans (JET) Grant Program, www.twc.state.tx.us/partners/jobseducation-texans-jet-grant-program.

53

54
“60x30TX: Texas Higher Education Strategic Plan: 2015-2030,” Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, www.thecb.state.tx.us/
reports/PDF/6862.PDF?CFID=41531877&CFTOKEN=29618147.

See note 29.

55

For more information, see Accelerate TEXAS, Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board, www.thecb.state.tx.us/index.
cfm?objectid=896FFFBE-FD7B-786E-FC7B9F8F4EC245AE.

56

Center for Public Policy Priorities

48

Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas