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Hawkins County recently achieved a first. The county became the first in Northeast Tennessee, and the Lakeway Area, to become an ACT Work Ready Community. 

Work Ready Communities helps local leaders level the playing field with a high performing workforce. Regions improve their workforce and compete on quality for location consultants, investors, and other decision-makers using data powered by the WorkKeys® National Career Readiness Certificate. Site Selection magazine uses NCRC data yearly to rank state competitiveness. Click the headline to download a two-page overview on site selection insights for Work Ready Communities.

With today’s challenges, we must best serve and encourage individuals based on his or her passions and interest and not a one size fits all model of the past. In order for us to ensure every student has an opportunity to reach his or her full potential regardless of race, wealth, disability, or circumstance, we must address the needs of each student.

Video of Town Hall meeting televised at North Louisiana Technical College. It features Angie White (NLEP) one of our biggest WRC champions. Around the 32.10 mark she talks about WorkKeys specifically.

McNary High School in the certified county of Marion, Oregon promotes WorkKeys as an alternative for students struggling to meet graduation requirements. The posting by MHS also promotes the National Career Readiness Certificate benefits of employability and college credit with the NCRC.

Hawkins and Sullivan counties are the first counties in Northeast Tennessee to achieve Work Ready Community certification through the ACT National Career Readiness Certification program. Workforce development officials with the First Tennessee Development District say other counties in the region are close to obtaining the designation.

One of the largest crowds ever attended the Dickenson County Chamber of Commerce’s 2018 annual membership banquet at the Breaks Park on Friday night, Dec. 7 with the launch of ACT Work Ready Community Initiative for the county. The WRC local team presented a video for the attendees on Work Ready Communities and what it will mean to Dickenson County once we become certified.

Adult education programs at the Emerson Family School continue to go strong, with more than 130 new enrollments this year, not including students already in the program. Emerson offers several adult education programs, including high school equivalency courses, high school diploma completion courses and WorkKeys certification. In August, Emerson added an English conversation class on Fridays, mainly catering to the families of international researchers at Mississippi State University.

New research highlights the NCRC as a signal of the skills needed for success in the labor market and in postsecondary education. Specifically, this study examined the relationships between NCRC level and unemployment claim duration, employment status, wages, and postsecondary grades. 

“The Career Placement Pilot was a goal we all agreed could benefit our community – a win-win for both businesses and jobseekers,” Pierce said. “GFDC has often heard from local businesses that they have felt the absence of a Workforce Development Office since the Nebraska Department of Labor withdrew from our community several years ago. Now, this Career Placement Pilot is making in-person connections of work-ready jobseekers to our employers.”