By Virginia Lascara
virginia.lascara@insidebiz.com
At a meeting hosted by the Peninsula Council for Workforce Development, Gov. Terry McAuliffe announced the launch of new online work readiness modules offered through SkillsOnline. In spring 2015, the first five of 21 career readiness courses will be ready.
The courses include Applied Mathematics, Reading for Information, Locating Information, Internet Use and Safety-Digital Citizenship, and Understanding Health, Wellness and Safety.
These soft-skill courses will be made available through SkillsOnline free of charge to all Virginia students, K-12 career and technical education programs, workforce investment boards, social service agencies, local community colleges and employers throughout Virginia in support of Virginia's career readiness certification, an assessment-based credential that measures the workplace-related skills of a potential employee.
The modules are partially funded by a $200,000 grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and a $100,000 grant from the Hampton Roads Community Foundation. Public broadcaster WHRO, based in Norfolk, is raising $1.5 million for the remaining 16 career readiness courses.
SkillsOnline is a professional development and workforce training portal created by WHRO that offers skills-based courses to help workers succeed in the 21st century.
McAuliffe said that WHRO's SkillsOnline initiative lines up with his Executive Order 23. Under that order, announced in August, McAuliffe established the New Virginia Economy Workforce Initiative, led by Secretary of Commerce and Trade Maurice Jones.
The initiative looks to improve postsecondary education and workforce credentials, secure employment for veterans, align education with business needs, and diversify the economy.
Executive Order 23 seeks to educate and prepare Virginians for 21st century careers and sets a goal of having state residents earn 50,000 licenses, credentials, apprenticeships and sub-baccalaureate degrees to meet state-workforce needs.
"On behalf of the governor, I am working with public- and private- sector entities involved in workforce development to ensure that Virginia is the leading state for attainment of credentials that matter to business, industry and economic prosperity," Jones said in a prepared statement.
The course content will also be distributed through eMediaVa, a statewide digital media distribution system created by WHRO.
Norfolk-based WHRO is the only public broadcasting station in the country owned by 19 public school systems. Founded in 1961 by the Norfolk and Hampton school divisions as Virginia's first noncommercial educational television station, WHRO stands for Home Room One.
"Education is at the core of what this station is about," said Bert Schmidt, president and CEO of WHRO. "Most people think of us as a broadcaster, but they don't know that we're owned by a collaboration of school divisions."
eMediaVA was formed out of the necessity for affordable online classes after then-Gov. Bob McDonnell signed a law requiring every Virginia public high school student to take an online class.
The state department of education created an online course, which cost $800,000, in response to the new law requiring every public school student to take one.
WHRO competed with five commercial vendors and in 2012 won a five-year contract to provide eMediaVa's digital learning tools, video, audio and interactive graphic elements that correlate to Virginia's Standards of Leaning, free to every private, public and home school across Virginia.
The system is used by over 145,000 educators with eMediaVa accounts and has an online repository of close to 100,000 learning items, Schmidt said.
WHRO also operates Virtual Virginia, on behalf of the Virginia Department of Education. The program offers advanced placement and world language courses to students who do not have access to these programs through their home school division.
Virtual Virginia courses are eligible for high school and college-level credit in dual enrollment programs.
Now, WHRO also focuses on adult education.
"Educating our adults leads to workforce development," Schmidt said.
After Las Vegas PBS, owned by Clark County in Nevada, created a workforce development portal five years ago, WHRO became interested in creating its own online portal. Soon, a partnership formed and Las Vegas PBS helped WHRO create SkillsOnline.
The portal offers skills-based courses needed to succeed in the 21st century, said Jayna Eller, marketing officer for WHRO.
"A lot of people have been telling us that we need properly trained employees that have the soft skills," Schmidt said. "The work readiness courses will help with that."
SkillsOnline can be found on the websites of four local community colleges, including Thomas Nelson, Paul D. Camp, Eastern Shore and Rappahannock. Also available through the portal are more than 3,500 courses in 19 industry sectors, available to the public for a fee.
A final phase of SkillsOnline will be completed once sufficient funding is secured. The last phase will focus on workforce development, making sure that the needs of employers are met.
"Employers spend a lot of money training people," Schmidt said. "The modules will make it less expensive."
These courses will greatly serve the unemployed and underemployed and will make it easy for employers to train and educate employees, Schmidt said. A certificate can be printed out at the completion of the course.
WHRO and McAuliffe hope that SkillsOnline will prove to be a resource for transitioning military and recent high school and postsecondary graduates who ideally would put their skills to use in Hampton Roads.
"Workforce development is a key component for creating a new Virginia economy," McAullife said. "The work readiness modules are an example of the public-private partnership that is increasing access for Virginians to workforce training, will help employers put more Virginians to work, and will provide no-cost resources for educators and local government training providers."
