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Title

10

:
Conservation and Development






Chapter

022A

:
WORKFORCE EDUCATION AND TRAINING











 

§

543. Workforce Education and Training Fund; grant programs

(a) Creation.

There is created a Workforce Education and Training Fund in the Department of

Labor to be managed in accordance with 32 V.S.A. chapter 7, subchapter 5.

(b) Purposes.

The Department shall use the Fund for the following purposes:

(1) training for

Vermont workers, including those who are unemployed, underemployed, or in

transition from one job or career to another;

(2) internships

to provide students with work-based learning opportunities with Vermont

employers;

(3)

apprenticeship, preapprenticeship, and industry-recognized credential training;

and

(4) other

workforce development initiatives related to current and future job

opportunities in Vermont as determined by the Commissioner of Labor.

(c)

Administrative and other support. The Department of Labor shall provide

administrative support for the grant award process. When appropriate and

reasonable the State Workforce Investment Board and all other public entities

involved in economic development and workforce education and training shall

provide other support in the process.

(d) Eligible

activities.

(1) The

Department shall grant awards from the Fund to employers and entities,

including private, public, and nonprofit entities, institutions of higher

education, high schools, technical centers, and workforce education and

training programs that:

(A) create jobs,

offer education, training, apprenticeship, preapprenticeship and

industry-recognized credentials, mentoring, or work-based learning activities,

or any combination;

(B) employ

student-oriented approaches to workforce education and training; and

(C) link

workforce education and economic development strategies.

(2) The

Department may fund programs or projects that demonstrate actual increased

income and economic opportunity for employees and employers for more than one

year.

(3) The

Department may fund student internships and training programs that involve the

same employer in multiple years with approval of the Commissioner.

(e) Repealed].

(f) Awards. The

Commissioner of Labor, in consultation with the Chair of the State Workforce

Investment Board, shall develop award criteria and may grant awards to the

following:

(1) Training

Programs.

(A) Public,

private, and nonprofit entities, including employers and education and training

providers, for existing or new training programs that enhance the skills of

Vermont workers and:

(i) train

workers for trades or occupations that are expected to lead to jobs paying at

least 200 percent of the current minimum wage or at least 150 percent if

benefits are included; this requirement may be waived when warranted based on

regional or occupational wages or economic reality;

(ii) do not

duplicate, supplant, or replace other available training funded with public

money;

(iii) provide a

project timeline, including performance goals, and identify how the

effectiveness and outcomes of the program will be measured, including for the

individual participants, the employers, and the program as a whole; and

(iv) articulate

the need for the training and the direct connection between the training and

the job.

(B) The

Department shall grant awards under this subdivision (1) to programs or

projects that:

(i) offer

innovative programs of intensive, student-centric, competency-based education,

training, apprenticeship, preapprenticeship and industry-recognized

credentials, mentoring, or any combination of these;

(ii) address the

needs of workers who are unemployed, underemployed, or are at risk of becoming

unemployed, and workers who are in transition from one job or career to

another;

(iii) address

the needs of employers to hire new employees, or retrain incumbent workers,

when the employer has demonstrated a need not within the normal course of business,

with priority to training that results in new or existing job openings for

which the employer intends to hire; or

(iv) in the

discretion of the Commissioner, otherwise serve the purposes of this chapter.

(2) Vermont

Strong Internship Program. Funding for eligible internship programs and

activities under the Vermont Strong Internship Program established in section

544 of this title.

(3)

Apprenticeship Program. The Vermont Apprenticeship Program established under 21

V.S.A. chapter 13. Awards under this subdivision may be used to fund the cost

of apprenticeship-related instruction provided by the Department of Labor.

(g) Repealed.]  (Added 2007, No. 46, § 4, eff. May 23, 2007;

amended 2007, No. 182 (Adj. Sess.), § 7, eff. June 2, 2008; 2009, No. 33, § 23;

2009, No. 54, § 9, eff. June 1, 2009; 2009, No. 1 (Sp. Sess.), § E.401.1; 2009,

No. 146 (Adj. Sess.), § G14, eff. June 1, 2010; 2011, No. 52, § 13, eff. May

27, 2011; 2013, No. 199 (Adj. Sess.), § 41; 2015, No. 51, § C.3.)