COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Implement a Financial Counseling and Work Assistance Program
Problem:
COVID-19 is wreaking havoc on many peoples’ lives. In addition to the high levels of unemployment, financial planning has become more challenging given the uncertainty of markets and asset values. Evaluating all the available sources of capital — and how best to leverage them — is daunting. In addition to financial counseling, services can include examining resumes to identify skillsets.
A financial counseling and work assistance program is critical for cities to support an equitable recovery. Studies have identified a significant gap in financial literacy between Black and white Americans. Equally important, those who have more financial literacy are more likely “to plan and save for retirement, have non-retirement savings and better manage their debt.” To work towards a goal of equity, this wraparound service is key to helping lift low-income people and communities of color, and lowering barriers for small business owners and entrepreneurs.
Action:
Cities should develop a partnership to provide a free 1-1 financial counseling program for local residents. The counseling should be integrated into other public services (e.g., assistance when applying for a microgrant).
Case Study
Nashville, TN: Financial Empowerment Center
The Nashville Financial Empowerment Center (FEC) operates under a simple premise: that an “increase in the economic well-being of any Nashvillian improves the overall economic climate of the whole city.” Founded in 2013, the Nashville FEC is a free 1-1 counseling program for all residents in Nashville provided by the government and United Way. Counselors will help with a variety of personal finance issues — such as how to negotiate debt, what to look for in a loan, or even just general financial literacy.
The City recognized the need to establish the center because there was a relative lack of financial empowerment services in the city. After researching nonprofits that work in the space, it settled on a partnership with United Way, given the organization’s visibility and track record in this space. Nashville chose to place the FEC within the Mayor’s office to ensure prominence and attention. It has since established an office dedicated to implementing financial counseling and integrating it with other government and social services (e.g., affordable housing). Nashville set aside ~$250,000 per year to cover the shared costs with United Way.
As the FEC was growing, Nashville made a dedicated effort to attract and develop partnerships. The City hosted a summit with existing and prospective partners in the community to discuss how best to provide counseling, and identify additional opportunities for collaboration. They used these partners to better understand residents’ needs (e.g., debt reduction, increasing savings) and how the center could best reach and support residents. These same partners provide ongoing feedback to the FEC to help them continually improve their offerings. For example, they have prioritized hiring counselors who speak Spanish as a primary or secondary language after they noticed that Spanish was the main language of 12.4% of clients.
Since it was launched in 2013, the Center has helped 7,700 clients reduce their debt by $14.2 million and increase their savings by $2.9 million. It has made a concerted effort to reach out and serve low-income and people of color. 54% of FEC clients identified as African American/Black and 21.2% identified as Latino/Latina. Nearly 18% had not completed high school and 61.8% of clients had very low incomes (relative to the median income). The FEC also conducted targeted outreach to certain sectors of the population (e.g., low-wage workers, those seeking assistance with food, utility, etc.) to determine how the center could be helpful.
How To Adapt this Approach:
- Research potential partners (e.g., education institutions, non-profits, etc.) that are present in the community.
- These partners should have some experience either with financial planning (e.g., workers in a school’s financial aid office) or have already worked in the community.
- Identify non-profits that work in this space (e.g., United Way) and have relevant expertise
- Understand the needs in the local community
- Reach out to community leaders to determine who would take advantage of this service.
- Design the program
- Discuss with local banks and financial institutions (especially those serving low-income and communities of color) and ask for their assistance (e.g. offering the services to anyone reaching out about a loan, or facing foreclosures and other financial hardships)
- Reach out to potential partners and propose collaborations. Some non-profits may be willing to offer funding or expertise. Partners can provide funding, expertise, and/or community reach and engagement. All are useful and should be sought.
A successful partnership requires having these non-profits committed to this work.
Partners will be necessary to help train counselors, promote the service, etc. - Determine where program should be housed
- This will be dependent on which partners are involved. Cities may want to house the program in the mayor’s office, keep it as a standalone department, or have a non-profit take the lead and the city provide funding and support.
- Offer 1-1 appointments and have call/email options
- A group class is much less effective, as people are hesitant to discuss personal financial circumstances in this format.
- Draft general information sheets on handling financial hardships
- Have this readily available (e.g., on website, at local financial institutions) so that people can learn about the services provided
- This should include key topics that the program can help with (e.g., debt reduction, improving credit score, increasing savings)
- Launch program with active outreach and media campaigns in local communities
- Promote at community meetings (e.g., religious services)
- Ensure that banks and financial institutions provide information about the service
- Hire staff. Size depends on % of the population that is low-income, but assume at least 2 FTE for the program.
- Staff must be trained professionals with experience in financial counseling.
- Make sure to have clear training standards for counselors.
- Reach out proactively to small business owners and low-income individuals (e.g., those on SNAP) to offer the service
- Track progress/program usage and revise as necessary (See template in resources section below)
- Note: metrics need to be tied to improvement in residents’ lives, not merely visits/time spent (e.g., $$ debt reduced).
Benefits:
- Enables residents to make more informed economic decisions
- Offers additional guidance and pathways for careers
- Builds residents’ ability to gain access to credit
Risks:
- Assumes risk of providing financial guidance
- Residents do not use the service and/or are unaware of the service
Impact: Low
Implementation time: Slow
Cost: Low Non-profit partners can take the lead on offering a lot of the programming, so costs should be minimal to administer.
Learn more about the Toolkit
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Implement equitable frameworks and rubrics in the recruitment and screening processes to reach hardest hit workers
Ways to help displaced and unemployed workers re-enter the labor market
Background:
In order to respond to rapidly shifting and dynamic market adjustments, re-engaging business leaders, re-examining data, and identifying short-term and long-term action plans has become crucial to meeting both workforce supply and demand needs. Additionally, proactive efforts are being generated by industry themselves, and our efforts to help support these initiatives have required some flexibility in coordination and alignment.
The examples below represent city-led and workforce-aligned efforts to strengthen connection to education, training, and work-based learning opportunities; financial supports; and rapid reemployment that attempts to address the needs of particularly hard-hit communities with a focus on equity and the development of career pathways, as well as impacted industries.
Many local, regional and statewide efforts have sought to address the needs of businesses and workers through a variety of strategies considered promising practices that succeeded in the last economic downturn, aligned with more recent innovations. Most have leveraged existing sector strategy efforts and some have provided employment supports for virtual learning and virtual work initiatives, as well as the transition of workers to new career pathways based on transferrable skill sets.
Some local efforts have included new innovative twists to respond to the specifics of this COVIDrelated crisis, two of which we are highlighting for you.
Each example, to varying degrees, includes the following essential elements:
- Heavy reliance on real-time labor market information, partnership alignment, and employer engagement: All involve rapid assessment of data and realignment to new priorities and hit upon the key promising practice for all workforce efforts — they are industry-aligned or employer-led, and a broad swath of key trusted partners are engaged. There is a clear commitment to high-demand industries and occupations.
- Braiding traditional and more flexible funding sources: In each case there is a clear effort to align general funds, emergency grant funds and/or philanthropic funds to braid with traditional workforce development formula funding to ensure flexibility and responsiveness to immediate needs.
- Commitment to equity, as well as student and job seeker supports: These efforts have implemented new tools such as equity frameworks and rubrics in the recruitment and screening process, with a focus on transferrable skills between sectors, assistance to get back into the labor market in a temporary position and financial support to supplement temporary position income so that participants can also study part time to gain new skills. Each incorporates a heavy focus on worker and student wraparound supports such as case management, career navigation, and legal and mental health services.
Case Study #1
Baltimore Health Corps
Baltimore City Mayor’s Office of Employment Development- Baltimore, MD
Program Overview:
- Temporary employment for over 300 community members
- Focus on career pathways within health care
- Upskilling training available
- Support services for workers
In March of 2020, the Baltimore City Health Department, Baltimore City Mayor’s Office for Employment Development (MOED), Mayor’s Office of Performance and Innovation, Baltimore Corps, the Baltimore Civic Fund, HealthCare Access Maryland, Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Innovation Team (i-team), and Jhpiego, a Johns Hopkins University affiliate, partnered to address the dual need of responding to the public health crisis caused by the pandemic and rapid reskilling and reemployment of the available workforce.
The new initiative, the Baltimore Health Corps, focuses on contact tracing, a method of identifying people exposed to the novel coronavirus, with the intent of preventing and containing transmission.
Program Specifics Include:
- Training and employment of over 300 residents for immediately available contact tracing related positions, with a focus on helping residents get on long-term career paths.
- Majority of positions are contact tracers, but the project also employs a care coordination team of about 40, which connects residents to needed social services, as well as operations support staff, supervisors, directors, managers, and career navigators to support the temporary contact tracer positions.
- Positions pay from $35,000 and up to $80,000 for the highest-level positions, and each includes a stipend to cover health benefits. Most last for eight months.
The project team carefully crafted new rubrics for screening and rating candidates prior to opening the job portal in June. The purpose of the rubrics is to eliminate barriers and bias in the process, while increasing equity and access to disadvantaged populations. These include detailed directions for applicant pre-screening, resume review, group screening and breakout session rubrics, and a rubric for pre-recorded interviews.
Once resumes have been screened through the portal, those that receive middle scores in the rubric are invited to a group interview with behavioral questions, while those that are high-scoring receive a link to pre-record an introductory interview, which will later be reviewed by staff.
The emphasis of the selection criteria throughout the interview process is on customer service and the ability to display empathy, as well as any other transferrable skill sets. This process provides opportunity for those middle scores to still advance in the process, with some being referred to shortterm upskilling programs, rather than being immediately referred to other programs and services outside of the Baltimore Health Corps.
Once hired, individuals in contact tracer positions begin two weeks of in-person training, and then their work is conducted from a centralized office building location until they are comfortable and competent with the contact tracing platform, after which they may opt to work from home. New employees are provided with a laptop and cell phone.
The provision of equipment is an equity strategy to ensure that some of those most at risk in the pandemic have the tools they need to be employed. Positions also come with employee supports, provided through MOED, including career navigation, financial empowerment counseling, and free behavioral health and legal services.
For a select number of applicants (up to 100) who show potential but might not yet ready for the contact tracer positions, the initiative offers a four-week community health worker training to help strengthen their candidacy. Completers are recommended to employers for priority recruitment, which serves as yet another equity strategy for upskilling local residents.
Key Partnerships:
The Baltimore Health Corps initiative is driven by critical partnerships. Key partners and their roles include:
- Mayor’s Office of Employment Development is the primary workforce agency, providing planning and staff for the recruitment and screening structure, career navigation, and connection to behavioral health support and legal services (offered through with Catholic Charities and Maryland Volunteer Lawyers Services).
- The Baltimore Civic Fund serves as the fiscal sponsor and provides assistance with fundraising and funding consolidation that supports streamlined relationships between funders and the city.
- Baltimore Corps conducts recruitment, providing the application website and the recruitment structure.
- Mayor’s Office of Performance and Innovation provides strategic and project management support.
- Jhpiego provides operational support to the Health Department, along with acting as a training partner for contact tracers and providing structure for performance monitoring.
- The University of Maryland School of Public Health is evaluating the program and will conduct a process study and summative evaluation.
- They are working on final outcome measures and supporting the team by providing a summary of performance metrics.
- The Baltimore Innovation Team (i-team) is supported by Bloomberg Philanthropies which awards cities multi-year grants to create highly skilled in-house teams that are dedicated to solving big problems in new ways — from reducing violent crime to revitalizing neighborhoods to strengthening the growth of small businesses.
The full list of partners and funders for this project include:
- Abell Foundation
- Annie E. Casey Foundation
- Baltimore City Health Department
- Baltimore Community Foundation
- Baltimore Ravens
- Bank of America
- Jacob & Hilda Blaustein Foundation
- Bloomberg Philanthropies
- BGE
- CareFirst
- France-Merrick Foundation
- Goldseker Foundation
- BACH (Baltimore Alliance for Careers in Health)
- Baltimore City Health Department
- Baltimore Civic Fund
- Baltimore Corps
- Catholic Charities of Baltimore
- HealthCare Access Maryland
- Jhpiego
- Maryland Volunteer Lawyers Service
- Mayor’s Office of Employment Development
- Mayor’s Office of Performance and Innovation
- Univ. of Maryland School of Public Health
Funding:
The total cost of the initiative is $12.44 million. This public-private partnership was mobilized by a $3 million commitment from The Rockefeller Foundation through its Equity & Economic Opportunity and Health teams. The City of Baltimore has made a $4.5 million commitment to support this initiative, tapping into its CARES Act Funds.
Additional private funders and local institutions have contributed more than $3.6 million in support and include the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield (CareFirst), the France-Merrick Foundation, the Goldseker Foundation, OSI — Baltimore, the PepsiCo Foundation, the Rauch Foundation, the Stulman Foundation, and the T. Rowe Price Foundation. The city will continue to raise the remaining $1.3 million as the project moves forward.
Key Challenges:
Rapid partnership building
MOED and the Health Department had not previously worked this closely before on a combined effort at this scale. The entire initiative was built on leveraging virtual tools such as Zoom and Webex, from remotely coordinating partnership alignment and communication to recruitment efforts.
Prior to the pandemic, the Health Department had not previously relied on the workforce system for hiring needs, and did report having struggled at various times with recruitment and identifying applicants who meet the needs of a specific position but had not aligned themselves with the workforce system.
Through this new program, the Health Department expressed their satisfaction with the candidates that have been onboarded and working for a few weeks now. Baltimore Corps’ work to identify candidates who would be successful in this environment has been pivotal to their success.
The Health Department would recommend to other similar departments that are uneasy at taking on this challenge that it really has been an incredible experience, they are very happy and pleased with the results thus far and are looking forward to continuing the relationship.
Communicating vision to existing program staff
Developing processes for a large recruitment and placement initiative while not greatly expanding staff numbers (FTEs) could have been daunting to existing staff. Leadership developed a clear plan for weekly recruitment process flow and spoke directly with team members about the importance of the mission and value to the community. As a result of sharing the broader community vision, they were able to engender a sense of shared ownership and buy-in from staff as they launched the program.
Aligning communication strategy
Aligning a large multi-partner communication plan can be challenging in the best of times. At the outset, the Public Information Officers for each organization came together to engage their preexisting Joint Information Center (JIC) and worked to align their communication efforts. It had existed prior to the project; and, it was effectively leveraged in a virtual environment to coordinate the rapid building of this effort.
The Health Department took a lead role, along with MOED and Jhpiego, to get the word out to partners, and to the public through public virtual town halls, and at all relevant events held throughout Baltimore City. Additionally, they employed the use of multiple social media outlets, such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Partners met weekly, and shared information frequently across major program components, and continue to check in regularly as needed.
Summary of Project Impact
The team has received 4,500 applications since the program launched on June 4, 2020. As of November 6, over 200 applicants have accepted offers to join the Health Corps, and nearly 175 have already started their temporary positions with HCAM and the Health Department. To serve these staff, the Mayor’s Office of Employment Development hired five career navigators and placed approximately 100 participants into community health worker (CHW) training through the Baltimore Alliance for Careers in Healthcare.
The program team has contracted with University of Maryland School of Public Health to act as external evaluators. They will track standard workforce metrics as required by their grants but are looking to move beyond the traditional measures. They are also evaluating the public health contracting side of the project, as well as care coordination. The team will also conduct a post-intervention analysis to determine if the Health Corps program led participants to long-term employment within a health care career pathway.
Adapt This Approach:
Cost and Time Commitments:
From initial award to program launch, this program took six weeks. The rapid pace was driven by high COVID-19 case volume in the late spring and summer and a recognition of immediate need. The time and resources required to implement this model will depend on a variety of factors including:
- Availability and flexibility of funding streams
- Flexibility of existing team to work overtime and adaptability to shifting priorities
- Existing relationships and coordination with partners
- Community support and outreach strategies
Do:
- Do borrow from other models and adapt to local context.
The team leveraged the Massachusetts Partners in Health model to develop their contact tracing hiring strategy to allow for an explicit focus on rapid re-employment of the unemployed. They could have focused on quickly hiring the highest level of education possible, but their local commitment to employing dislocated workers with an equity lens required different strategies. The team believes the Baltimore Model is a promising and adaptive approach for other cities looking to expand their contact tracing capacity while addressing their jurisdiction’s economic and social needs. - Do engage employers throughout the process.
Because of the focus on upskilling participants and putting them on the road to clear career pathways in health, the team made the employer partners a part of the entire process — from weekly meetings to keeping them informed of participants’ training status. They were, of course, a key partner to the initiative, but their full engagement helped to drive the success of the recruitment process, and, in this way, demonstrated the key benefits of employer alignment. The employers’ public health expertise informed the program design and ensured that participants will come out of the program with the skills needed to go into full-time employment within an industry career pathway. - Do begin with a diverse and connected project management team.
The core team at Baltimore City included workforce experts, epidemiologists, community health work practitioners, and managers across each of the program objectives. Through these diverse viewpoints and early, open dialogue about program aims, the team was able to align its workforce and public health aims towards creating the most effective program possible. The team began by developing a solid operational framework that leveraged existing partnership organizations to support rapid implementation. The larger core project team across partners included leaders from all of the aligned organizations, totaling between 45-55 members.
Don’t:
- Don’t rely solely on traditional funding strategies.
Alignment of private funds and CARES Act funds, with a small portion of dislocated worker funds, provided the program team the flexibility to move ahead with recruitment and hiring for positions quickly to respond to urgent demand. Flexible funds also allowed Baltimore to contract for legal and mental health service supports quickly, and to support CHW training. - Don’t rely on traditional hiring strategies.
The Health Department partnered with the workforce team to craft job postings with no education requirements, which opened the process to a wide swath of the community. They also expedited their hiring process by working closely with Baltimore Corps and Jhpiego, employing the use of their existing online platform for screening candidates, and by developing a clear rubric and comprehensive plan for interviewing, training, and hiring.
Case Study #2
Train for Jobs SA, San Antonio, TX
Program Overview:
- Training stipend of $15/hr
- Up to $450 per week
- Up to 10,000 residents by September 2021
- Anticipate 80% receiving wraparound support
In May 2020, Workforce Solutions Alamo (WSA), in partnership with the City of San Antonio and Bexar County, established Train for Jobs SA, a training program designed to quickly upskill dislocated individuals for high-growth industries and occupations.
In addition to free training, participants also receive weekly stipends and significant wraparound services to support successful completion of the program and then placement into a job. The program was made possible through the commitment of the City of San Antonio and Bexar County officials who prioritized workforce development as their leading strategy to guide the city into and through recovery from the pandemic.
The overall goal of the program is to provide economic stability for those who are displaced as well as ensure the talent needed to support local industry is available as businesses begin to recover. Train for Jobs SA aims to serve up to 10,000 San Antonio and Bexar County residents by September 2021.
Eligible participants enroll via phone, and once in the program, complete a skills and career assessment. Participants may then be enrolled in high school equivalency preparation, or short-term, long-term or on-the-job training, all of which are aligned to in demand occupations in the city’s target industries and growth occupations. There are a myriad of training courses available, both on and off of their Eligible Training Provider List (ETPL).
Qualified participants are eligible to receive stipends of $15/hour (for between a minimum of 6 hours and a maximum of 30 hours per week) for actual time spent in an approved training program, up to a maximum of $450 stipend per week. The stipend is made available for the full length of the training, with a focus on participants attaining new skills or credentials and keeping them engaged after the training to advance on a career pathway.
Train for Jobs SA is also a key driver supporting the City of San Antonio’s long-term goal of decreasing economic segregation. The program developed and uses an equity matrix questionnaire to identify participants in specific areas who are more at risk and prioritize them for enrollment and additional services.
Up to 80% of program participants are anticipated to receive comprehensive wraparound support such as case management, career navigation, and connection to other Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA)-funded services.
Key Partnerships:
Key partners for this project include:
Funding:
Funding was awarded to the Train for Jobs SA program in the amount of $12 million, with $8 million provided by the City of San Antonio General Fund and $4 million in Coronavirus Relief funding. Although they have received significant disaster grants, this program is separate and fully funded by city and county dollars. Co-enrollment and alignment with WIOA-funded programs is encouraged where appropriate.
Key Challenges:
Shifting to virtual delivery
Train for Jobs SA is working to improve virtual onboarding and orientation for participants. The project team is piloting online open sessions for orientations and the development of a video tutorial on how to sign up for services, to accompany the registration site.
Partner referrals and participant awareness
WSA noted that building system and public awareness is an ongoing challenge with any new program, yet it is critical to support referrals into the program. To address this challenge, the WSA team has launched a multi-modal messaging effort, including social media outlets such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and numerous websites, to increase overall public awareness as well as reach specific populations targeted by the program.
Summary of Project Impact
With the start of the program in mid-August 2020, and active participant recruitment beginning in September, intake is active and ongoing. The team has developed a set of goals and measures for the project that include by September 2021 an anticipated: 4,000 assessed, 1,750 receiving case management services, 1,400 receiving short-term training, 100 receiving long-term training, 1,500 receiving stipends, and 1,000 placed in on-the-job training and employment. In the first five weeks of the program, 78 participants were placed in shortterm training, and 21 in long-term training.
Adapt This Approach:
Cost and Time Commitments:
With strong support from the Mayor’s office, funding was awarded during the summer and the program began in mid-August. In alignment with citywide equity goals, and more flexible funding streams, they were able to stand up a new, large program in a matter of weeks, and the program launched at the beginning of September. The time and resources needed to implement this model will depend on a variety of factors including:
- Flexibility of funding streams
- Buy-in and adaptability of partners
- Ability to borrow from existing tools and structures
- Availability of staff
Do:
- Do start — and proceed — with good data.
Prior to COVID, WSA determined high-growth occupations and identified the target industries that aligned with economic development goals for the region. Although WSA is operating under the assumption that many industries will return to previous employment levels post-COVID, they are also using real-time labor market information and job postings (such as Burning Glass and Help Wanted Online data) to monitor monthly shifts and pivot their training investments accordingly. - Do identify training providers upfront.
Provide as many options as possible by broadening the training provider pool and expanding the ETPL. By expanding the list of programs to include short-term as well as long-term, increasing the variety of training to all of the regional industries in demand, and increasing flexibility in training schedules, the program can become relevant for a broader array of participants. Training providers are a critical part of the planning process and can support workforce staff in identifying training gaps more quickly. - Do focus on program awareness.
Focus just as much on partner and staff awareness as participant awareness in your outreach campaign. Intentionally messaging the availability and value of services provided and quickly establishing an efficient process to drive program referrals will shorten the time frame between program design and participant enrollment. - Do focus on building trust between local elected officials and the local workforce board.
A key to success of this project has been the positioning of the local workforce development board (LWDB) as a natural leader in the region. The LWDB is seen by local elected officials (LEOs) as a trusted entity with the ability to analyze unemployment data as well as real-time data to help officials better assess the current situation and those most impacted by the pandemic. - Do incorporate strategies to reach equity goals.
The City of San Antonio uses an equity lens to prioritize investments and policy decisions. As previously noted, Train for Jobs SA uses an equity matrix to target key populations for recruitment and provides extensive support and wraparound services to drive successful program outcomes.
Don’t:
- Don’t rely solely on traditional funding strategies. A key to standing up the program in short order has been the ability to identify flexible funding streams that allow financial resources to be implemented quickly and in an innovative manner. The board worked directly with the Mayor’s office and other local city leadership to make general fund dollars available to support this program.
Resources:
- Train for Jobs SA informational site
- Participant site
- Workforce Solutions Alamo site
- San Antonio equity maps
- San Antonio, TX press release – $2 Million Dislocated Worker Upskilling Grant
- San Antonio, TX press release – $450 Stipend for Retraining
Learn more about the Workforce Tactical Guide
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Center employers and partners in data and program evaluation and realign efforts to ensure industry alignment with workforce efforts
Ways to Help Displaced and Unemployed Workers Re-enter the Labor Market
Background:
In order to respond to rapidly shifting and dynamic market adjustments, re-engaging business leaders, re-examining data, and identifying short-term and long-term action plans has become crucial to meeting both workforce supply and demand needs. Additionally, proactive efforts are being generated by industry themselves, and our efforts to help support these initiatives have required some flexibility in coordination and alignment.
The examples below represent city-led and workforce-aligned efforts to strengthen connection to education, training, and work-based learning opportunities; financial supports; and rapid reemployment that attempts to address the needs of particularly hard-hit communities with a focus on equity and the development of career pathways, as well as impacted industries.
Many local, regional and statewide efforts have sought to address the needs of businesses and workers through a variety of strategies considered promising practices that succeeded in the last economic downturn, aligned with more recent innovations. Most have leveraged existing sector strategy efforts and some have provided employment supports for virtual learning and virtual work initiatives, as well as the transition of workers to new career pathways based on transferrable skill sets.
Some local efforts have included new innovative twists to respond to the specifics of this COVIDrelated crisis, two of which we are highlighting for you.
Each example, to varying degrees, includes the following essential elements:
- Heavy reliance on real-time labor market information, partnership alignment, and employer engagement: All involve rapid assessment of data and realignment to new priorities and hit upon the key promising practice for all workforce efforts — they are industry-aligned or employer-led, and a broad swath of key trusted partners are engaged. There is a clear commitment to high-demand industries and occupations.
- Braiding traditional and more flexible funding sources: In each case there is a clear effort to align general funds, emergency grant funds and/or philanthropic funds to braid with traditional workforce development formula funding to ensure flexibility and responsiveness to immediate needs.
- Commitment to equity, as well as student and job seeker supports: These efforts have implemented new tools such as equity frameworks and rubrics in the recruitment and screening process, with a focus on transferrable skills between sectors, assistance to get back into the labor market in a temporary position and financial support to supplement temporary position income so that participants can also study part time to gain new skills. Each incorporates a heavy focus on worker and student wraparound supports such as case management, career navigation, and legal and mental health services.
Case Study
Baltimore Health Corps
Baltimore City Mayor’s Office of Employment Development- Baltimore, MD
Program Overview:
- Temporary employment for over 300 community members
- Focus on career pathways within health care
- Upskilling training available
- Support services for workers
In March of 2020, the Baltimore City Health Department, Baltimore City Mayor’s Office for Employment Development (MOED), Mayor’s Office of Performance and Innovation, Baltimore Corps, the Baltimore Civic Fund, HealthCare Access Maryland, Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Innovation Team (i-team), and Jhpiego, a Johns Hopkins University affiliate, partnered to address the dual need of responding to the public health crisis caused by the pandemic and rapid reskilling and reemployment of the available workforce.
The new initiative, the Baltimore Health Corps, focuses on contact tracing, a method of identifying people exposed to the novel coronavirus, with the intent of preventing and containing transmission.
Program Specifics Include:
- Training and employment of over 300 residents for immediately available contact tracing related positions, with a focus on helping residents get on long-term career paths.
- Majority of positions are contact tracers, but the project also employs a care coordination team of about 40, which connects residents to needed social services, as well as operations support staff, supervisors, directors, managers, and career navigators to support the temporary contact tracer positions.
- Positions pay from $35,000 and up to $80,000 for the highest-level positions, and each includes a stipend to cover health benefits. Most last for eight months.
The project team carefully crafted new rubrics for screening and rating candidates prior to opening the job portal in June. The purpose of the rubrics is to eliminate barriers and bias in the process, while increasing equity and access to disadvantaged populations. These include detailed directions for applicant pre-screening, resume review, group screening and breakout session rubrics, and a rubric for pre-recorded interviews.
Once resumes have been screened through the portal, those that receive middle scores in the rubric are invited to a group interview with behavioral questions, while those that are high-scoring receive a link to pre-record an introductory interview, which will later be reviewed by staff.
The emphasis of the selection criteria throughout the interview process is on customer service and the ability to display empathy, as well as any other transferrable skill sets. This process provides opportunity for those middle scores to still advance in the process, with some being referred to shortterm upskilling programs, rather than being immediately referred to other programs and services outside of the Baltimore Health Corps.
Once hired, individuals in contact tracer positions begin two weeks of in-person training, and then their work is conducted from a centralized office building location until they are comfortable and competent with the contact tracing platform, after which they may opt to work from home. New employees are provided with a laptop and cell phone.
The provision of equipment is an equity strategy to ensure that some of those most at risk in the pandemic have the tools they need to be employed. Positions also come with employee supports, provided through MOED, including career navigation, financial empowerment counseling, and free behavioral health and legal services.
For a select number of applicants (up to 100) who show potential but might not yet ready for the contact tracer positions, the initiative offers a four-week community health worker training to help strengthen their candidacy. Completers are recommended to employers for priority recruitment, which serves as yet another equity strategy for upskilling local residents.
Key Partnerships:
The Baltimore Health Corps initiative is driven by critical partnerships. Key partners and their roles include:
- Mayor’s Office of Employment Development is the primary workforce agency, providing planning and staff for the recruitment and screening structure, career navigation, and connection to behavioral health support and legal services (offered through with Catholic Charities and Maryland Volunteer Lawyers Services).
- The Baltimore Civic Fund serves as the fiscal sponsor and provides assistance with fundraising and funding consolidation that supports streamlined relationships between funders and the city.
- Baltimore Corps conducts recruitment, providing the application website and the recruitment structure.
- Mayor’s Office of Performance and Innovation provides strategic and project management support.
- Jhpiego provides operational support to the Health Department, along with acting as a training partner for contact tracers and providing structure for performance monitoring.
- The University of Maryland School of Public Health is evaluating the program and will conduct a process study and summative evaluation.
- They are working on final outcome measures and supporting the team by providing a summary of performance metrics.
- The Baltimore Innovation Team (i-team) is supported by Bloomberg Philanthropies which awards cities multi-year grants to create highly skilled in-house teams that are dedicated to solving big problems in new ways — from reducing violent crime to revitalizing neighborhoods to strengthening the growth of small businesses.
The full list of partners and funders for this project include:
- Abell Foundation
- Annie E. Casey Foundation
- Baltimore City Health Department
- Baltimore Community Foundation
- Baltimore Ravens
- Bank of America
- Jacob & Hilda Blaustein Foundation
- Bloomberg Philanthropies
- BGE
- CareFirst
- France-Merrick Foundation
- Goldseker Foundation
- BACH (Baltimore Alliance for Careers in Health)
- Baltimore City Health Department
- Baltimore Civic Fund
- Baltimore Corps
- Catholic Charities of Baltimore
- HealthCare Access Maryland
- Jhpiego
- Maryland Volunteer Lawyers Service
- Mayor’s Office of Employment Development
- Mayor’s Office of Performance and Innovation
- Univ. of Maryland School of Public Health
Funding:
The total cost of the initiative is $12.44 million. This public-private partnership was mobilized by a $3 million commitment from The Rockefeller Foundation through its Equity & Economic Opportunity and Health teams. The City of Baltimore has made a $4.5 million commitment to support this initiative, tapping into its CARES Act Funds.
Additional private funders and local institutions have contributed more than $3.6 million in support and include the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield (CareFirst), the France-Merrick Foundation, the Goldseker Foundation, OSI — Baltimore, the PepsiCo Foundation, the Rauch Foundation, the Stulman Foundation, and the T. Rowe Price Foundation. The city will continue to raise the remaining $1.3 million as the project moves forward.
Key Challenges:
Rapid partnership building
MOED and the Health Department had not previously worked this closely before on a combined effort at this scale. The entire initiative was built on leveraging virtual tools such as Zoom and Webex, from remotely coordinating partnership alignment and communication to recruitment efforts.
Prior to the pandemic, the Health Department had not previously relied on the workforce system for hiring needs, and did report having struggled at various times with recruitment and identifying applicants who meet the needs of a specific position but had not aligned themselves with the workforce system.
Through this new program, the Health Department expressed their satisfaction with the candidates that have been onboarded and working for a few weeks now. Baltimore Corps’ work to identify candidates who would be successful in this environment has been pivotal to their success.
The Health Department would recommend to other similar departments that are uneasy at taking on this challenge that it really has been an incredible experience, they are very happy and pleased with the results thus far and are looking forward to continuing the relationship.
Communicating vision to existing program staff
Developing processes for a large recruitment and placement initiative while not greatly expanding staff numbers (FTEs) could have been daunting to existing staff. Leadership developed a clear plan for weekly recruitment process flow and spoke directly with team members about the importance of the mission and value to the community. As a result of sharing the broader community vision, they were able to engender a sense of shared ownership and buy-in from staff as they launched the program.
Aligning communication strategy
Aligning a large multi-partner communication plan can be challenging in the best of times. At the outset, the Public Information Officers for each organization came together to engage their preexisting Joint Information Center (JIC) and worked to align their communication efforts. It had existed prior to the project; and, it was effectively leveraged in a virtual environment to coordinate the rapid building of this effort.
The Health Department took a lead role, along with MOED and Jhpiego, to get the word out to partners, and to the public through public virtual town halls, and at all relevant events held throughout Baltimore City. Additionally, they employed the use of multiple social media outlets, such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Partners met weekly, and shared information frequently across major program components, and continue to check in regularly as needed.
Summary of Project Impact
The team has received 4,500 applications since the program launched on June 4, 2020. As of November 6, over 200 applicants have accepted offers to join the Health Corps, and nearly 175 have already started their temporary positions with HCAM and the Health Department. To serve these staff, the Mayor’s Office of Employment Development hired five career navigators and placed approximately 100 participants into community health worker (CHW) training through the Baltimore Alliance for Careers in Healthcare.
The program team has contracted with University of Maryland School of Public Health to act as external evaluators. They will track standard workforce metrics as required by their grants but are looking to move beyond the traditional measures. They are also evaluating the public health contracting side of the project, as well as care coordination. The team will also conduct a post-intervention analysis to determine if the Health Corps program led participants to long-term employment within a health care career pathway.
Adapt This Approach:
Cost and Time Commitments:
From initial award to program launch, this program took six weeks. The rapid pace was driven by high COVID-19 case volume in the late spring and summer and a recognition of immediate need. The time and resources required to implement this model will depend on a variety of factors including:
- Availability and flexibility of funding streams
- Flexibility of existing team to work overtime and adaptability to shifting priorities
- Existing relationships and coordination with partners
- Community support and outreach strategies
Do:
- Do borrow from other models and adapt to local context.
The team leveraged the Massachusetts Partners in Health model to develop their contact tracing hiring strategy to allow for an explicit focus on rapid re-employment of the unemployed. They could have focused on quickly hiring the highest level of education possible, but their local commitment to employing dislocated workers with an equity lens required different strategies. The team believes the Baltimore Model is a promising and adaptive approach for other cities looking to expand their contact tracing capacity while addressing their jurisdiction’s economic and social needs. - Do engage employers throughout the process.
Because of the focus on upskilling participants and putting them on the road to clear career pathways in health, the team made the employer partners a part of the entire process — from weekly meetings to keeping them informed of participants’ training status. They were, of course, a key partner to the initiative, but their full engagement helped to drive the success of the recruitment process, and, in this way, demonstrated the key benefits of employer alignment. The employers’ public health expertise informed the program design and ensured that participants will come out of the program with the skills needed to go into full-time employment within an industry career pathway. - Do begin with a diverse and connected project management team.
The core team at Baltimore City included workforce experts, epidemiologists, community health work practitioners, and managers across each of the program objectives. Through these diverse viewpoints and early, open dialogue about program aims, the team was able to align its workforce and public health aims towards creating the most effective program possible. The team began by developing a solid operational framework that leveraged existing partnership organizations to support rapid implementation. The larger core project team across partners included leaders from all of the aligned organizations, totaling between 45-55 members.
Don’t:
- Don’t rely solely on traditional funding strategies.
Alignment of private funds and CARES Act funds, with a small portion of dislocated worker funds, provided the program team the flexibility to move ahead with recruitment and hiring for positions quickly to respond to urgent demand. Flexible funds also allowed Baltimore to contract for legal and mental health service supports quickly, and to support CHW training. - Don’t rely on traditional hiring strategies.
The Health Department partnered with the workforce team to craft job postings with no education requirements, which opened the process to a wide swath of the community. They also expedited their hiring process by working closely with Baltimore Corps and Jhpiego, employing the use of their existing online platform for screening candidates, and by developing a clear rubric and comprehensive plan for interviewing, training, and hiring.
Case Study #2
Train for Jobs SA, San Antonio, TX
Program Overview:
- Training stipend of $15/hr
- Up to $450 per week
- Up to 10,000 residents by September 2021
- Anticipate 80% receiving wraparound support
In May 2020, Workforce Solutions Alamo (WSA), in partnership with the City of San Antonio and Bexar County, established Train for Jobs SA, a training program designed to quickly upskill dislocated individuals for high-growth industries and occupations.
In addition to free training, participants also receive weekly stipends and significant wraparound services to support successful completion of the program and then placement into a job. The program was made possible through the commitment of the City of San Antonio and Bexar County officials who prioritized workforce development as their leading strategy to guide the city into and through recovery from the pandemic.
The overall goal of the program is to provide economic stability for those who are displaced as well as ensure the talent needed to support local industry is available as businesses begin to recover. Train for Jobs SA aims to serve up to 10,000 San Antonio and Bexar County residents by September 2021.
Eligible participants enroll via phone, and once in the program, complete a skills and career assessment. Participants may then be enrolled in high school equivalency preparation, or short-term, long-term or on-the-job training, all of which are aligned to in demand occupations in the city’s target industries and growth occupations. There are a myriad of training courses available, both on and off of their Eligible Training Provider List (ETPL).
Qualified participants are eligible to receive stipends of $15/hour (for between a minimum of 6 hours and a maximum of 30 hours per week) for actual time spent in an approved training program, up to a maximum of $450 stipend per week. The stipend is made available for the full length of the training, with a focus on participants attaining new skills or credentials and keeping them engaged after the training to advance on a career pathway.
Train for Jobs SA is also a key driver supporting the City of San Antonio’s long-term goal of decreasing economic segregation. The program developed and uses an equity matrix questionnaire to identify participants in specific areas who are more at risk and prioritize them for enrollment and additional services.
Up to 80% of program participants are anticipated to receive comprehensive wraparound support such as case management, career navigation, and connection to other Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA)-funded services.
Key Partnerships:
Key partners for this project include:
Funding:
Funding was awarded to the Train for Jobs SA program in the amount of $12 million, with $8 million provided by the City of San Antonio General Fund and $4 million in Coronavirus Relief funding. Although they have received significant disaster grants, this program is separate and fully funded by city and county dollars. Co-enrollment and alignment with WIOA-funded programs is encouraged where appropriate.
Key Challenges:
Shifting to virtual delivery
Train for Jobs SA is working to improve virtual onboarding and orientation for participants. The project team is piloting online open sessions for orientations and the development of a video tutorial on how to sign up for services, to accompany the registration site.
Partner referrals and participant awareness
WSA noted that building system and public awareness is an ongoing challenge with any new program, yet it is critical to support referrals into the program. To address this challenge, the WSA team has launched a multi-modal messaging effort, including social media outlets such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and numerous websites, to increase overall public awareness as well as reach specific populations targeted by the program.
Summary of Project Impact
With the start of the program in mid-August 2020, and active participant recruitment beginning in September, intake is active and ongoing. The team has developed a set of goals and measures for the project that include by September 2021 an anticipated: 4,000 assessed, 1,750 receiving case management services, 1,400 receiving short-term training, 100 receiving long-term training, 1,500 receiving stipends, and 1,000 placed in on-the-job training and employment. In the first five weeks of the program, 78 participants were placed in shortterm training, and 21 in long-term training.
Adapt This Approach:
Cost and Time Commitments:
With strong support from the Mayor’s office, funding was awarded during the summer and the program began in mid-August. In alignment with citywide equity goals, and more flexible funding streams, they were able to stand up a new, large program in a matter of weeks, and the program launched at the beginning of September. The time and resources needed to implement this model will depend on a variety of factors including:
- Flexibility of funding streams
- Buy-in and adaptability of partners
- Ability to borrow from existing tools and structures
- Availability of staff
DO:
- Do start — and proceed — with good data.
Prior to COVID, WSA determined high-growth occupations and identified the target industries that aligned with economic development goals for the region. Although WSA is operating under the assumption that many industries will return to previous employment levels post-COVID, they are also using real-time labor market information and job postings (such as Burning Glass and Help Wanted Online data) to monitor monthly shifts and pivot their training investments accordingly. - Do identify training providers upfront.
Provide as many options as possible by broadening the training provider pool and expanding the ETPL. By expanding the list of programs to include short-term as well as long-term, increasing the variety of training to all of the regional industries in demand, and increasing flexibility in training schedules, the program can become relevant for a broader array of participants. Training providers are a critical part of the planning process and can support workforce staff in identifying training gaps more quickly. - Do focus on program awareness.
Focus just as much on partner and staff awareness as participant awareness in your outreach campaign. Intentionally messaging the availability and value of services provided and quickly establishing an efficient process to drive program referrals will shorten the time frame between program design and participant enrollment. - Do focus on building trust between local elected officials and the local workforce board.
A key to success of this project has been the positioning of the local workforce development board (LWDB) as a natural leader in the region. The LWDB is seen by local elected officials (LEOs) as a trusted entity with the ability to analyze unemployment data as well as real-time data to help officials better assess the current situation and those most impacted by the pandemic. - Do incorporate strategies to reach equity goals.
The City of San Antonio uses an equity lens to prioritize investments and policy decisions. As previously noted, Train for Jobs SA uses an equity matrix to target key populations for recruitment and provides extensive support and wraparound services to drive successful program outcomes.
DON’T:
- Don’t rely solely on traditional funding strategies. A key to standing up the program in short order has been the ability to identify flexible funding streams that allow financial resources to be implemented quickly and in an innovative manner. The board worked directly with the Mayor’s office and other local city leadership to make general fund dollars available to support this program.
Resources:
- Train for Jobs SA informational site
- Participant site
- Workforce Solutions Alamo site
- San Antonio equity maps
- San Antonio, TX press release – $2 Million Dislocated Worker Upskilling Grant
- San Antonio, TX press release – $450 Stipend for Retraining
Learn more about the Workforce Tactical Guide
COVID-19 Economic Response and Recovery
Braid traditional funding with flexible funding to address immediate needs
Ways to Help Displaced and Unemployed Workers Re-enter the Labor Market
Background:
In order to respond to rapidly shifting and dynamic market adjustments, re-engaging business leaders, re-examining data, and identifying short-term and long-term action plans has become crucial to meeting both workforce supply and demand needs. Additionally, proactive efforts are being generated by industry themselves, and our efforts to help support these initiatives have required some flexibility in coordination and alignment.
The examples below represent city-led and workforce-aligned efforts to strengthen connection to education, training, and work-based learning opportunities; financial supports; and rapid reemployment that attempts to address the needs of particularly hard-hit communities with a focus on equity and the development of career pathways, as well as impacted industries.
Many local, regional and statewide efforts have sought to address the needs of businesses and workers through a variety of strategies considered promising practices that succeeded in the last economic downturn, aligned with more recent innovations. Most have leveraged existing sector strategy efforts and some have provided employment supports for virtual learning and virtual work initiatives, as well as the transition of workers to new career pathways based on transferrable skill sets.
Some local efforts have included new innovative twists to respond to the specifics of this COVIDrelated crisis, two of which we are highlighting for you.
Each example, to varying degrees, includes the following essential elements:
- Heavy reliance on real-time labor market information, partnership alignment, and employer engagement: All involve rapid assessment of data and realignment to new priorities and hit upon the key promising practice for all workforce efforts — they are industry-aligned or employer-led, and a broad swath of key trusted partners are engaged. There is a clear commitment to high-demand industries and occupations.
- Braiding traditional and more flexible funding sources: In each case there is a clear effort to align general funds, emergency grant funds and/or philanthropic funds to braid with traditional workforce development formula funding to ensure flexibility and responsiveness to immediate needs.
- Commitment to equity, as well as student and job seeker supports: These efforts have implemented new tools such as equity frameworks and rubrics in the recruitment and screening process, with a focus on transferrable skills between sectors, assistance to get back into the labor market in a temporary position and financial support to supplement temporary position income so that participants can also study part time to gain new skills. Each incorporates a heavy focus on worker and student wraparound supports such as case management, career navigation, and legal and mental health services.
Case Study #1
Baltimore Health Corps, Baltimore, MD
Program Overview:
- Temporary employment for over 300 community members
- Focus on career pathways within health care
- Upskilling training available
- Support services for workers
In March of 2020, the Baltimore City Health Department, Baltimore City Mayor’s Office for Employment Development (MOED), Mayor’s Office of Performance and Innovation, Baltimore Corps, the Baltimore Civic Fund, HealthCare Access Maryland, Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Innovation Team (i-team), and Jhpiego, a Johns Hopkins University affiliate, partnered to address the dual need of responding to the public health crisis caused by the pandemic and rapid reskilling and reemployment of the available workforce.
The new initiative, the Baltimore Health Corps, focuses on contact tracing, a method of identifying people exposed to the novel coronavirus, with the intent of preventing and containing transmission.
Program Specifics Include:
- Training and employment of over 300 residents for immediately available contact tracing related positions, with a focus on helping residents get on long-term career paths.
- Majority of positions are contact tracers, but the project also employs a care coordination team of about 40, which connects residents to needed social services, as well as operations support staff, supervisors, directors, managers, and career navigators to support the temporary contact tracer positions.
- Positions pay from $35,000 and up to $80,000 for the highest-level positions, and each includes a stipend to cover health benefits. Most last for eight months.
The project team carefully crafted new rubrics for screening and rating candidates prior to opening the job portal in June. The purpose of the rubrics is to eliminate barriers and bias in the process, while increasing equity and access to disadvantaged populations. These include detailed directions for applicant pre-screening, resume review, group screening and breakout session rubrics, and a rubric for pre-recorded interviews.
Once resumes have been screened through the portal, those that receive middle scores in the rubric are invited to a group interview with behavioral questions, while those that are high-scoring receive a link to pre-record an introductory interview, which will later be reviewed by staff.
The emphasis of the selection criteria throughout the interview process is on customer service and the ability to display empathy, as well as any other transferrable skill sets. This process provides opportunity for those middle scores to still advance in the process, with some being referred to shortterm upskilling programs, rather than being immediately referred to other programs and services outside of the Baltimore Health Corps.
Once hired, individuals in contact tracer positions begin two weeks of in-person training, and then their work is conducted from a centralized office building location until they are comfortable and competent with the contact tracing platform, after which they may opt to work from home. New employees are provided with a laptop and cell phone.
The provision of equipment is an equity strategy to ensure that some of those most at risk in the pandemic have the tools they need to be employed. Positions also come with employee supports, provided through MOED, including career navigation, financial empowerment counseling, and free behavioral health and legal services.
For a select number of applicants (up to 100) who show potential but might not yet ready for the contact tracer positions, the initiative offers a four-week community health worker training to help strengthen their candidacy. Completers are recommended to employers for priority recruitment, which serves as yet another equity strategy for upskilling local residents.
Key Partnerships:
The Baltimore Health Corps initiative is driven by critical partnerships. Key partners and their roles include:
- Mayor’s Office of Employment Development is the primary workforce agency, providing planning and staff for the recruitment and screening structure, career navigation, and connection to behavioral health support and legal services (offered through with Catholic Charities and Maryland Volunteer Lawyers Services).
- The Baltimore Civic Fund serves as the fiscal sponsor and provides assistance with fundraising and funding consolidation that supports streamlined relationships between funders and the city.
- Baltimore Corps conducts recruitment, providing the application website and the recruitment structure.
- Mayor’s Office of Performance and Innovation provides strategic and project management support.
- Jhpiego provides operational support to the Health Department, along with acting as a training partner for contact tracers and providing structure for performance monitoring.
- The University of Maryland School of Public Health is evaluating the program and will conduct a process study and summative evaluation.
- They are working on final outcome measures and supporting the team by providing a summary of performance metrics.
- The Baltimore Innovation Team (i-team) is supported by Bloomberg Philanthropies which awards cities multi-year grants to create highly skilled in-house teams that are dedicated to solving big problems in new ways — from reducing violent crime to revitalizing neighborhoods to strengthening the growth of small businesses.
The full list of partners and funders for this project include:
- Abell Foundation
- Annie E. Casey Foundation
- Baltimore City Health Department
- Baltimore Community Foundation
- Baltimore Ravens
- Bank of America
- Jacob & Hilda Blaustein Foundation
- Bloomberg Philanthropies
- BGE
- CareFirst
- France-Merrick Foundation
- Goldseker Foundation
- BACH (Baltimore Alliance for Careers in Health)
- Baltimore City Health Department
- Baltimore Civic Fund
- Baltimore Corps
- Catholic Charities of Baltimore
- HealthCare Access Maryland
- Jhpiego
- Maryland Volunteer Lawyers Service
- Mayor’s Office of Employment Development
- Mayor’s Office of Performance and Innovation
- Univ. of Maryland School of Public Health
Funding:
The total cost of the initiative is $12.44 million. This public-private partnership was mobilized by a $3 million commitment from The Rockefeller Foundation through its Equity & Economic Opportunity and Health teams. The City of Baltimore has made a $4.5 million commitment to support this initiative, tapping into its CARES Act Funds.
Additional private funders and local institutions have contributed more than $3.6 million in support and include the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield (CareFirst), the France-Merrick Foundation, the Goldseker Foundation, OSI — Baltimore, the PepsiCo Foundation, the Rauch Foundation, the Stulman Foundation, and the T. Rowe Price Foundation. The city will continue to raise the remaining $1.3 million as the project moves forward.
Key Challenges:
Rapid partnership building
MOED and the Health Department had not previously worked this closely before on a combined effort at this scale. The entire initiative was built on leveraging virtual tools such as Zoom and Webex, from remotely coordinating partnership alignment and communication to recruitment efforts.
Prior to the pandemic, the Health Department had not previously relied on the workforce system for hiring needs, and did report having struggled at various times with recruitment and identifying applicants who meet the needs of a specific position but had not aligned themselves with the workforce system.
Through this new program, the Health Department expressed their satisfaction with the candidates that have been onboarded and working for a few weeks now. Baltimore Corps’ work to identify candidates who would be successful in this environment has been pivotal to their success.
The Health Department would recommend to other similar departments that are uneasy at taking on this challenge that it really has been an incredible experience, they are very happy and pleased with the results thus far and are looking forward to continuing the relationship.
Communicating vision to existing program staff
Developing processes for a large recruitment and placement initiative while not greatly expanding staff numbers (FTEs) could have been daunting to existing staff. Leadership developed a clear plan for weekly recruitment process flow and spoke directly with team members about the importance of the mission and value to the community. As a result of sharing the broader community vision, they were able to engender a sense of shared ownership and buy-in from staff as they launched the program.
Aligning communication strategy
Aligning a large multi-partner communication plan can be challenging in the best of times. At the outset, the Public Information Officers for each organization came together to engage their preexisting Joint Information Center (JIC) and worked to align their communication efforts. It had existed prior to the project; and, it was effectively leveraged in a virtual environment to coordinate the rapid building of this effort.
The Health Department took a lead role, along with MOED and Jhpiego, to get the word out to partners, and to the public through public virtual town halls, and at all relevant events held throughout Baltimore City. Additionally, they employed the use of multiple social media outlets, such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Partners met weekly, and shared information frequently across major program components, and continue to check in regularly as needed.
Summary of Project Impact
The team has received 4,500 applications since the program launched on June 4, 2020. As of November 6, over 200 applicants have accepted offers to join the Health Corps, and nearly 175 have already started their temporary positions with HCAM and the Health Department. To serve these staff, the Mayor’s Office of Employment Development hired five career navigators and placed approximately 100 participants into community health worker (CHW) training through the Baltimore Alliance for Careers in Healthcare.
The program team has contracted with University of Maryland School of Public Health to act as external evaluators. They will track standard workforce metrics as required by their grants but are looking to move beyond the traditional measures. They are also evaluating the public health contracting side of the project, as well as care coordination. The team will also conduct a post-intervention analysis to determine if the Health Corps program led participants to long-term employment within a health care career pathway.
How To Adapt this Approach:
Cost and Time Commitments:
From initial award to program launch, this program took six weeks. The rapid pace was driven by high COVID-19 case volume in the late spring and summer and a recognition of immediate need. The time and resources required to implement this model will depend on a variety of factors including:
- Availability and flexibility of funding streams
- Flexibility of existing team to work overtime and adaptability to shifting priorities
- Existing relationships and coordination with partners
- Community support and outreach strategies
Do:
- Do borrow from other models and adapt to local context.
The team leveraged the Massachusetts Partners in Health model to develop their contact tracing hiring strategy to allow for an explicit focus on rapid re-employment of the unemployed. They could have focused on quickly hiring the highest level of education possible, but their local commitment to employing dislocated workers with an equity lens required different strategies. The team believes the Baltimore Model is a promising and adaptive approach for other cities looking to expand their contact tracing capacity while addressing their jurisdiction’s economic and social needs. - Do engage employers throughout the process.
Because of the focus on upskilling participants and putting them on the road to clear career pathways in health, the team made the employer partners a part of the entire process — from weekly meetings to keeping them informed of participants’ training status. They were, of course, a key partner to the initiative, but their full engagement helped to drive the success of the recruitment process, and, in this way, demonstrated the key benefits of employer alignment. The employers’ public health expertise informed the program design and ensured that participants will come out of the program with the skills needed to go into full-time employment within an industry career pathway. - Do begin with a diverse and connected project management team.
The core team at Baltimore City included workforce experts, epidemiologists, community health work practitioners, and managers across each of the program objectives. Through these diverse viewpoints and early, open dialogue about program aims, the team was able to align its workforce and public health aims towards creating the most effective program possible. The team began by developing a solid operational framework that leveraged existing partnership organizations to support rapid implementation. The larger core project team across partners included leaders from all of the aligned organizations, totaling between 45-55 members.
Don’t:
- Don’t rely solely on traditional funding strategies.
Alignment of private funds and CARES Act funds, with a small portion of dislocated worker funds, provided the program team the flexibility to move ahead with recruitment and hiring for positions quickly to respond to urgent demand. Flexible funds also allowed Baltimore to contract for legal and mental health service supports quickly, and to support CHW training. - Don’t rely on traditional hiring strategies.
The Health Department partnered with the workforce team to craft job postings with no education requirements, which opened the process to a wide swath of the community. They also expedited their hiring process by working closely with Baltimore Corps and Jhpiego, employing the use of their existing online platform for screening candidates, and by developing a clear rubric and comprehensive plan for interviewing, training, and hiring.
Case Study #2
Train for Jobs SA, San Antonio, TX
- Training stipend of $15/hr
- Up to $450 per week
- Up to 10,000 residents by September 2021
- Anticipate 80% receiving wraparound support
In May 2020, Workforce Solutions Alamo (WSA), in partnership with the City of San Antonio and Bexar County, established Train for Jobs SA, a training program designed to quickly upskill dislocated individuals for high-growth industries and occupations.
In addition to free training, participants also receive weekly stipends and significant wraparound services to support successful completion of the program and then placement into a job. The program was made possible through the commitment of the City of San Antonio and Bexar County officials who prioritized workforce development as their leading strategy to guide the city into and through recovery from the pandemic.
The overall goal of the program is to provide economic stability for those who are displaced as well as ensure the talent needed to support local industry is available as businesses begin to recover. Train for Jobs SA aims to serve up to 10,000 San Antonio and Bexar County residents by September 2021.
Eligible participants enroll via phone, and once in the program, complete a skills and career assessment. Participants may then be enrolled in high school equivalency preparation, or short-term, long-term or on-the-job training, all of which are aligned to in demand occupations in the city’s target industries and growth occupations. There are a myriad of training courses available, both on and off of their Eligible Training Provider List (ETPL).
Qualified participants are eligible to receive stipends of $15/hour (for between a minimum of 6 hours and a maximum of 30 hours per week) for actual time spent in an approved training program, up to a maximum of $450 stipend per week. The stipend is made available for the full length of the training, with a focus on participants attaining new skills or credentials and keeping them engaged after the training to advance on a career pathway.
Train for Jobs SA is also a key driver supporting the City of San Antonio’s long-term goal of decreasing economic segregation. The program developed and uses an equity matrix questionnaire to identify participants in specific areas who are more at risk and prioritize them for enrollment and additional services.
Up to 80% of program participants are anticipated to receive comprehensive wraparound support such as case management, career navigation, and connection to other Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA)-funded services.
Key Partnerships:
Key partners for this project include:
Funding:
Funding was awarded to the Train for Jobs SA program in the amount of $12 million, with $8 million provided by the City of San Antonio General Fund and $4 million in Coronavirus Relief funding. Although they have received significant disaster grants, this program is separate and fully funded by city and county dollars. Co-enrollment and alignment with WIOA-funded programs is encouraged where appropriate.
Key Challenges:
Shifting to virtual delivery
Train for Jobs SA is working to improve virtual onboarding and orientation for participants. The project team is piloting online open sessions for orientations and the development of a video tutorial on how to sign up for services, to accompany the registration site.
Partner referrals and participant awareness
WSA noted that building system and public awareness is an ongoing challenge with any new program, yet it is critical to support referrals into the program. To address this challenge, the WSA team has launched a multi-modal messaging effort, including social media outlets such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and numerous websites, to increase overall public awareness as well as reach specific populations targeted by the program.
Summary of Project Impact
With the start of the program in mid-August 2020, and active participant recruitment beginning in September, intake is active and ongoing. The team has developed a set of goals and measures for the project that include by September 2021 an anticipated: 4,000 assessed, 1,750 receiving case management services, 1,400 receiving short-term training, 100 receiving long-term training, 1,500 receiving stipends, and 1,000 placed in on-the-job training and employment. In the first five weeks of the program, 78 participants were placed in shortterm training, and 21 in long-term training.
Adapt This Approach:
Cost and Time Commitments:
With strong support from the Mayor’s office, funding was awarded during the summer and the program began in mid-August. In alignment with citywide equity goals, and more flexible funding streams, they were able to stand up a new, large program in a matter of weeks, and the program launched at the beginning of September. The time and resources needed to implement this model will depend on a variety of factors including:
- Flexibility of funding streams
- Buy-in and adaptability of partners
- Ability to borrow from existing tools and structures
- Availability of staff
Do:
- Do start — and proceed — with good data.
Prior to COVID, WSA determined high-growth occupations and identified the target industries that aligned with economic development goals for the region. Although WSA is operating under the assumption that many industries will return to previous employment levels post-COVID, they are also using real-time labor market information and job postings (such as Burning Glass and Help Wanted Online data) to monitor monthly shifts and pivot their training investments accordingly. - Do identify training providers upfront.
Provide as many options as possible by broadening the training provider pool and expanding the ETPL. By expanding the list of programs to include short-term as well as long-term, increasing the variety of training to all of the regional industries in demand, and increasing flexibility in training schedules, the program can become relevant for a broader array of participants. Training providers are a critical part of the planning process and can support workforce staff in identifying training gaps more quickly. - Do focus on program awareness.
Focus just as much on partner and staff awareness as participant awareness in your outreach campaign. Intentionally messaging the availability and value of services provided and quickly establishing an efficient process to drive program referrals will shorten the time frame between program design and participant enrollment. - Do focus on building trust between local elected officials and the local workforce board.
A key to success of this project has been the positioning of the local workforce development board (LWDB) as a natural leader in the region. The LWDB is seen by local elected officials (LEOs) as a trusted entity with the ability to analyze unemployment data as well as real-time data to help officials better assess the current situation and those most impacted by the pandemic. - Do incorporate strategies to reach equity goals.
The City of San Antonio uses an equity lens to prioritize investments and policy decisions. As previously noted, Train for Jobs SA uses an equity matrix to target key populations for recruitment and provides extensive support and wraparound services to drive successful program outcomes.
Don’t:
- Don’t rely solely on traditional funding strategies. A key to standing up the program in short order has been the ability to identify flexible funding streams that allow financial resources to be implemented quickly and in an innovative manner. The board worked directly with the Mayor’s office and other local city leadership to make general fund dollars available to support this program.
Resources:
- Train for Jobs SA informational site
- Participant site
- Workforce Solutions Alamo site
- San Antonio equity maps
- San Antonio, TX press release – $2 Million Dislocated Worker Upskilling Grant
- San Antonio, TX press release – $450 Stipend for Retraining
Learn more about the Workforce Tactical Guide