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At the post-secondary level, the First Tennessee Development District is working to see all eight counties in Northeast Tennessee certified as ACT Work Ready Communities, a credential job seekers can use to prove their skills and companies can leverage to know they’re hiring qualified employees, while Northeast State Community College and the regional Tennessee Colleges of Applied Technology continue to provide opportunities for education and certification.

We offer #ActJobProfiling to companies in #WashCoMS at no cost. Profiling allows HR to use the #ActWorkKeys at a hiring tool.

Workforce, workforce, workforce. Society’s migraine? Workforce. Where can we find people, good people, qualified people, reliable people for our jobs? Unfortunately, as a country, our workforce issues have been nearly forty years in the making. From a community perspective, to think that this matter can be resolved within ninety days is simply not rational. But, I do believe it can be addressed and show substantial progress within the next three years. To do this, we have to think differently. As I am quick to tell people, “Our processes are not organic. Getting the right people, with the right skills and education, in the right jobs, is strategic, not organic.”

Video tells about WRC success in Washington County MS.

In the past year, since the free test was first offered in the Omaha metro area, more than 500 people have taken it and received the certificate, which is issued by ACT. The organization also produces the ACT test, which measures college readiness.

Company to purchase six-story building and space at Haymarket Landing to grow footprint of its Wisconn Valley technology and talent hub across west-central Wisconsin

Lamar County District 1 Supervisor Steve Lampton will join a team of leaders representing government, K-12 education, workforce, economic development and the business community as part of an initiative to provide certification for county workforce.

Lamar County officials are hoping to attract employers to the area, assist employers already in the county and help residents looking for work by becoming an ACT Work Ready Community. ACT is the same entity involved with college testing.

Goldie Blumenstyk from "The Chronicle of Higher Education" interviewed Pace President Marvin Krislov at their offices in Washington, D.C. She quotes him in her article about whether hiring practices should include tests and whether those tests can be more of a determining factor of employment readiness than a college degree.  Suzana Delanghe, chief commercial officer at ACT, says that the number of people passing the three 40-to-60-minute tests required for the NCRC credential has grown steadily over the past five years. (More than 488,000 people earned the certificate in 2016.) "There is a huge demand to find a standardized test" that communicates applicants’ skills to employers, especially overseas, she contends.

Chippewa Valley Technical College is working with colleagues in education, business groups and companies to spread the word about the test that gauges soft skills.

Their intent is to get Eau Claire County named the first Work Ready Community in Wisconsin — an honor that testing company ACT bestows on areas that meet certain goals.