[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 96 (Monday, July 8, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Page S5528]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




          STATEMENTS ON INTRODUCED BILLS AND JOINT RESOLUTIONS

      By Mr. FRANKEN (for himself, Mr. Schatz, and Mr. Durbin):
  S. 1269. A bill to amend the Workforce Investment Act of 1998 to 
support community college and industry partnerships, and for other 
purposes; to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
  Mr. FRANKEN. Mr. President, I rise to speak about legislation that I 
am introducing called the Community College to Career Fund Act. This 
legislation is aimed at closing what is called the skills gap--the gap 
between the skills that businesses need to fill open positions, and the 
skills that workers have. Closing the skills gap will mean more 
Americans get jobs and businesses get the workforce they need. It is 
key to the future prosperity and economic competitiveness of our 
Nation.
  When I travel around Minnesota and talk to employers, the single 
biggest thing they tell me they need is a workforce capable of handling 
the jobs of the 21st century. Finding qualified employees is 
particularly a problem for our manufacturers. Recent surveys in 
Minnesota show that \1/3\ to \1/2\ of manufacturers have job openings 
that they can't fill. They want to hire people, but they can't, because 
they can't find employees with the skills they need.
  Meanwhile, unemployment continues to be far too high. With so many 
Americans still looking for jobs, and employers seeking to fill open 
positions, this is a problem that we have to solve.
  Minnesota and many other States are working to address this problem 
by bringing businesses and community colleges together. There is a lot 
we can learn from these efforts, and my legislation supports and builds 
on what has been working in Minnesota.
  Take, for example, Hennepin Technical College in Minnesota. Local 
manufacturers have joined with Hennepin Tech to form the M-Powered 
Program, which trains students in manufacturing skills so they can fill 
open jobs. When I met with them recently, they told me that 93 percent 
of the program's nearly 300 graduates have permanent jobs. That is a 
program that's working.
  In Alexandria, MN, businesses and community colleges have been 
working together for years and offer another powerful example of 
success. Douglas County is like the Silicon Valley of packaging 
machines, and businesses there work with Alexandria Technical and 
Community College, which is ranked one of the best in the country. The 
manufacturers have donated machinery to train the students so that they 
can gain the skills needed for jobs at those businesses. When they 
graduate, students get snapped up by one of the companies. In fact, at 
the height of the recession in 2009-2010, Douglas County's unemployment 
rate was a good 3 points lower than the rest of the State.
  There is the Right Skills Now program, which is a partnership between 
the Manufacturing Institute, ACT, the National Institute of 
Metalworking Skills and the President's Job council. This program 
started as a pilot program in Minnesota, and has since expanded to 
Nevada and Michigan. I visited the program at South Central College in 
Faribault, MN, and held a roundtable with participating businesses. I 
asked each of them how many jobs they were ready to hire for, and 
between them, there were 40 or 50 jobs that needed to be filled. There 
were only 17 students in the first term that this program was offered, 
and the numbers are obviously in those students' favor to find a job.
  There are many other examples of this approach working in Minnesota, 
as well as across the country. It is happening in Rochester, Brainerd, 
and Duluth, Minnesota. The Employment and Workplace Safety Subcommittee 
of the HELP Committee held a hearing last year where we heard about 
four great examples of these partnerships from all over the country. 
This approach is putting Americans back to work and helping businesses 
grow nationwide, and we need to support those efforts.
  That is exactly what my bill would do. It would create a Community 
College to Career Fund, which would offer competitive grants for 
partnerships between businesses and community colleges aimed at closing 
the skills gap. The partnerships would compete by demonstrating how 
they would fill in-demand jobs.
  This bill rewards what works, giving flexibility for the partnerships 
to determine the strategy that best fits their needs, including 
apprenticeships, paid internships, partnerships with high schools, or 
updating training equipment. My bill also leverages private 
investments, rewarding those partnerships that bring outside resources 
to the table.
  I hear all the time from businesses that are desperate to hire 
people, if only they could find the right talent. This is a tremendous 
opportunity to get Americans back to work by helping them get the 
skills that they need. The Community College to Career Fund Act would 
seize that opportunity, allow our businesses to grow and expand, and 
position our workforce, and our country, for prosperity into the 
future. I urge my colleagues to support this bill.

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