Rep. Courtney Votes to Pass Bipartisan Bill to Expand Americans’ Access to Workforce Training

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Last night, Rep. Joe Courtney (CT-02), a senior member of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, voted to pass the A Stronger Workforce for America Act which makes critical improvements to the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA). The bill passed the House by 376-26.

WIOA is the federal program that funds the Eastern Workforce Investment Board (EWIB) and its successful Manufacturing Pipeline Initiative (MPI). Once signed into law, this bill will deliver increased funding to help EWIB meet the strong demand for the MPI program which is central to the expanding a qualified workforce for Electric Boat and the entire manufacturing sector.

Just las year, nearly 1,000 MPI graduates found a rewarding career at Electric Boat.

Enthusiastically supporting passage of the bill on the House floor, Congressman Courtney said:

“My district in eastern Connecticut is the fastest growing labor market in our state and the second fastest in New England. The federal job training program that we're discussing here today has been a huge contributor to that growth. Back in 2015, I hosted then-labor Secretary Tom Perez to meet with our local WIOA workforce board to discuss the looming need for shipbuilding skills to meet the sharply increased demand by the U.S. Navy for submarine construction. Five months later, in September of 2015, the Manufacturing Pipeline Initiative program was launched using a $6 million WIOA grant by the U.S. Department of Labor. Since its establishment in 2016, nearly 3,500 workers in eastern Connecticut have been hired from the WIOA-funded pipeline to high quality careers at the Electric Boat shipyard. Because of this highly successful training pipeline, they've had the workforce to meet the growing build rate that continues to this day. … We need pre-apprenticeship programs like the Manufacturing Pipeline to fill the nine million job openings in the U.S. economy. This bill will do just that.”

 Watch Rep. Joe Courtney’s floor remarks here. 

“The A Stronger Workforce for America Act prioritizes successful employer-led programs like the Eastern CT Workforce Investment Board’s (EWIB) Manufacturing Pipeline Initiative (MPI). EWIB developed the MPI with strong support from Electric Boat and other Eastern Advanced Manufacturing Alliance (EAMA) employers to grow manufacturing in Eastern CT by connecting companies directly to the large talent pool available through the American Job Center system. Thanks to EWIB’s coordination of employer engagement in testing, curriculum development, and hiring, the MPI’s placement rate is an astonishing >90%. EWIB has extended efforts to align workforce development programming with employer needs to the K-12 system through the Youth MPI. Electric Boat thinks of the MPI as our “secret weapon” for growth—anything that strengthens it has our full support,” said Courtney Murphy, Director of Talent Acquisition and Workforce Development at General Dynamics Electric Boat.  

"Bipartisan House passage of this bill is an important step toward updating our nation’s primary federal workforce development legislation. The bill contains several elements that address shortcomings in the current law while adding innovative approaches, including concepts that have been critical to the success of our award-winning Eastern CT Manufacturing Pipeline Initiative. As this bill advances to the Senate, I look forward to continuing to coordinate with my colleagues on the CT Workforce Development Council and our federal partners to achieve a law that optimizes our system’s capacity to promote economic growth and equitable opportunity,” said Michael Nogelo, President and CEO of the Eastern Workforce Investment Board.

Since coming to Congress, Congressman Courtney has been a champion for WIOA programs, like Connecticut’s Eastern Workforce Investment Board’s (EWIB) Manufacturing Pipeline Initiative, and has worked to increase federal funding to expand the programs’ reach, which has paid dividends in eastern Connecticut. In October 2023, Bloomberg News featured how Groton, CT has successfully leveraged WIOA to help workers across the region gain in-demand skills and help employers, like Electric Boat, recruit qualified candidates into rewarding careers 

A Stronger Workforce for America Act:

• Upgrades the skills of American workers.
  • Dedicates 50 percent of the adult and dislocated worker funding toward upskilling workers through “individual training accounts” (ITAs) and on-the-job learning while redirecting an existing funding stream toward ITAs for displaced workers. 
  • Prioritizes employer-led initiatives that equip workers with the skill sets to fill jobs in critical industries and help the currently employed workforce upskill to avoid displacement and advance their careers.
• Delivers greater efficiency and accountability to WIOA programs.
  • Streamlines the “eligible training provider list” to focus on outcomes and ensure eligible programs are aligned with the skill and hiring demands of employers. 
  • Strengthens and fully implements the performance accountability system in the law to hold states and local workforce boards accountable for achieving positive labor market outcomes for program participants.
• Strengthens pathways to economic opportunity. 
  • Places a greater emphasis on work-based learning for youth, codifies and strengthens a program to help individuals released from incarceration transition back to employment and access career pathways, and strengthens workforce education programs at community colleges that align with in-demand jobs. 
• Fuels innovation for a skills-based economy. 
  • Establishes a demonstration authority to provide several states and local workforce boards the flexibility to reimagine their workforce system and innovate in pursuit of better outcomes. 
  • Facilitates skills-based hiring by validating workers’ competencies gained through prior experience and authorizing state and local boards to provide technical assistance to employers on implementing skills-based hiring practices.

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