Workforce Development

Talent Development

Virginia Hamilton
Project Lead/Executive Director, California Workforce Association (CWA)
Sacramento, CA 95814
County: Sacramento
vhamilton@calworkforce.org
http://www.calworkforce.org/

Objective:
The Learning Collaboratory project is a learning community among California's Workforce Investment Boards (WIBs), in which WIBs are exposed to and learn about the innovations developed by and among California Innovation Corridor partners and from WIB best practices statewide. As one of the Sustainability Projects of the Corridor's Workforce Innovation in Regional Economic Development (WIRED) initiative, its goal is to help WIBs become catalysts, brokers, conveners and purveyors of workforce intelligence in response to the new requirements of high tech and innovative businesses. The project's design is based on the "learning community" and "communities of practice" research models, which have demonstrated that people in the workforce learn better and are more disposed to change when working collaboratively with their peers on issues of mutual interest.

Desired Outcomes:
- Development of web-based training for new and innovative workforce and economic development strategies and on innovative approaches for building partnership investment in demand-driven training.
- Development of a self-assessment tool for local WIBs, informed by the Council on Competitiveness's monograph on "Measuring Regional Innovation."
- Development and execution of mid-project and final surveys to assess success.

Contact Scarlett Carmona at scarmona@amtech-usa.org