Realizing Dreams and Filling Jobs

Gov. Northam’s Get Skilled, Get a Job, Give Back initiative will create educational and career opportunities for low- and middle-income families.  This piece appears in the Virginia Business publication.

Northern Virginia Community College President Anne M. Kress: 
This session, General Assembly members are considering a proposal that would help close the commonwealth’s skills gap by providing workforce scholarships to individuals without access to the community college education required to gain these skills. This proposal is a win-win-win: assisting students, growing businesses and developing our communities.

We are describing Governor Ralph Northam’s “Get Skilled, Get a Job, Give Back” (G3) budget initiative, which is being considered in the 2020 General Assembly session.

G3 is a last-dollar workforce scholarship program designed to create opportunities for low- and middle-income families. The support it provides would make up the difference between what financial aid covers and the actual cost of tuition, fees, and books for targeted programs in high-demand fields.

Qualifying students must select a career field in which employers cannot find enough qualified candidates. In Northern Virginia, these include IT, cybersecurity and health care. In other words, G3 is an investment in continued and accelerated regional economic growth.

Todd Rowley, Board Member of Northern Virginia Community College 
Because of Northern Virginia’s historically low unemployment rate, it has become clear that we need to “grow our own” workforce through educating more people to fill high-demand and high-value positions. In fact, finding and developing talent has emerged as the top concern of members of the Northern Virginia Chamber of Commerce. For that reason, the G3 plan has already earned the official endorsement of the chamber.

Read the rest of the article at Virginia Business.