Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Good morning, everyone. This is the Vermont House Committee on Commerce and Economic Development. It is Tuesday, 01/20/2026 at nine in the morning. So we're here this morning to hear from our friends at the Office of Workforce Strategy and Development. Good morning, Subhana. Good morning, Drake. Thank you for joining us. Would you both like to join us?

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Sure. That's great. Thank you.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: You can always swap that out for Jonathan's CD, as far as I know he won't be in today.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Oh, okay. Well, I'm okay right now. Thank you, dear. Guess that's so interesting.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: She's renting it out.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Sure. I didn't know if you

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: were gonna put the Yeah, I'm getting that shared. Okay.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Yeah. Well, for the record, good morning. I am Sabina Haskell. I'm the executive director with the Office of Workforce Strategy and Development. With me is Drake Turner, our Deputy Director at the office. You asked us to come in and give you an overview of the office and what we're doing and what we hope to accomplish and how things are going, and that's what we're going to do today. First things first, Drake is going to start the presentation, and I'll come in at the end and finish it. But do you want to go first about ECCWORTH six and all of that? 146?

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Excuse me, sure. Hi folks, Drake Turner, Deputy Director of the Office of Workforce Strategy and Development. Thanks for having us in. Again, I've So been in here twice, which is we talked last time about some of the work that the office has done around different options for coalescing workforce data and informing the decisions that you all make. And I think we want to take a step back now and give you a little bit of an update on what we've been up to. Here we go. See if this works great. So I'm going to give a little bit of context as to the story behind the Office of Workforce Strategy and Development and the State Workforce Development Board, because you all have done some work over the past couple of years to really reorganize how we look at that work and how we do it. Then give some updates on what the State Workforce Development Board has accomplished in the past year. And then Savannah, as she mentioned, is going to talk about some updates at the office. And by way of background, there in recent years are two pieces of legislation that y'all passed that made some pretty significant changes to this component of the workforce development system, including Act 146 of 2024, which actually created the Office of Workforce Strategy and Development. That came out of a pretty big body of work to think about how do we best organize workforce development in the state. I know Chair Marcotte and many others were pretty deeply involved in that work. Act 146 also reorganized the state workforce development board. The office, Sabina knows this better than I do, but it's a year and Two weeks. A year and fourteen days old. And for a good amount of that year, it was a one woman office. So there's been a lot of work underway to really get things up and running. And the state workforce development board was also totally reorganized. And the majority of folks on the board now are brand new to that board as of a year ago. And then Act 65 of 2025 included a lot of other things, but there were some specific components of that Act that clarified some of the roles and responsibilities of the office, specifically around workforce education and employment and training. And some of those pieces were still figuring out how to operationalize, but we're hard at work meeting the need and fulfilling the requirements of those two pieces of legislation. One thing that's been really helpful for me as I've sort of gotten into this role is to really learn and distinguish what are the roles of the Office of Workforce Strategy and Development and the State Workforce Development Board. So wanted to give a little bit of detail about sort of who's on what and what the purpose of both of those entities are. So the state workforce development board has existed in Vermont for a number of years. It's federally required under the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act. So for Vermont to be able to accept federal funds, we need to have a state workforce development board. So that's across the country. There are some states that have a number of double digit numbers of state workforce development boards like California. We have one because we're a single area state under WIOA, which I think is probably not surprising to anyone. But we have one board and they have a number of charges under WIOA, under federal statute, as well as some state statutory responsibilities that you all have enacted. So sort of broadly stated the role of the state workforce development board is to provide strategy and oversight for our workforce development system. So they're a governing board. There's many more things that the board does, but they're tasked with setting statewide workforce priorities and goals, including advising the governor on workforce policy and strategy. They approve Vermont's WIOA state plan and a number of major system initiatives. So they're there to really hold us accountable to our WIOA goals and a number of components of the system. Have a lot of work happens at the Department of Labor to provide workforce activities and services to Vermonters. And the board has a lot of roles to play there in terms of approving things and really monitoring system performance. And the board's also responsible for engaging employers and stakeholders statewide. I could go on, but I'll leave it there for now. The Office of Workforce Strategy and Development on the other hand is really more of the execution entity. So more responsible for coordination and implementation of the goals and strategies that the board identifies. So as you can see here, the office implements board approved priorities and statewide workforce strategy. The board actually approved a list of goals back in November, which we submitted to you all with our testimony. So that's really what's gonna be driving our work moving forward when it comes to board support. The office is responsible for coordinating agencies, partners, funding, aligning programs to shared goals and reducing fragmentation of services. I know was a big catalyst for creating the office. We're also responsible for managing data reporting and system analysis, especially as it applies to WIOA and identifying gaps, overlaps and opportunities for improvement. And the office, as stated on this slide, was established by the legislature to really operationalize strategy and to be an entity to really sort of coordinate, provide a catalyst and environment for coordination and workforce across state agencies in and outside of state government and to support the work of the board and work that's happening across our workforce system. So that's the simplest way to state that. We could talk much more about it, but just want to give a little bit of context as to the different roles and responsibilities of each. And another note on the state workforce development board. So as I mentioned, the board was fully reconstituted last year with new membership. The board used to have over 60 members in the past, and you all did a good amount of work to think about what's the right size for that board to ensure broad representation of folks across the state, across sectors, but also be nimble enough to really make progress and achieve and accomplish the goals that are identified by the board. So the board now is 27 members. So definitely not small, but not as large as it once was. And it includes balanced representation from business, education, state agencies, including higher ed service providers and legislative sectors. I think one thing that we hear and have been hearing from board members and folks that have interacted with the board in the past is that this board is really focused on being proactive and getting results. So the first year of the board was, there's a lot of foundational work to do to make sure that everyone understands what's the role of the board. There was a lot of sort of WIOA education to do and then figuring out what does this board want to accomplish right now? What are the needs in our workforce and how do we move forward? So as we move into the new year, we're excited to get to work. There's a real hunger for folks that we've been hearing as we've been connecting one on one with board members. Folks want to see an impact. They want tangible results. They want to get to work. And I have this graphic here, which is my attempt at a Venn diagram and PowerPoint. But I just wanted to state that I mentioned the board is federally mandated under WIOA. And when we talk about WIOA, that specific population of folks who experiencing barriers to employment, need employment supports and services. But the real, I think, driving force behind this workforce sport is how we serve our entire workforce in Vermont. Through that, the WIOA population is served as well. So I think there's a bit of an adjustment sort of in focus. Obviously, are a great deal of WIOA requirements that the board must fulfill and they're definitely committed to those. But I think there's a bit of a broader lens to this group of folks of how we serve our workforce, our employers, and move the state in the right direction.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: I think that's the vision, I think, of the federal government as well.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: That

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: although they're providing the funding for WIOA folks, that it's not just the board doesn't just focus on WIOA, we focus, like as you said, the whole workforce strategy for the whole state, for everybody.

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Right. Yeah, I think that also increases the quality of services that are offered to the WIOA specific population. It's, I think, very encouraging that folks seem to really There's a consensus among board members that this is our charge and what folks want to accomplish. You may or may not be able to read this, but this is our roster of board members currently. And you can see there are a lot of folks from a lot of different areas of the state that represent a lot of different sectors of our business community that are serving Vermonters in K-twelve settings, CTE, higher education, adult education, etcetera. So we can send you a link to the full board list on our website. But I just want to show these are the folks that have devoted a lot of time to serving in this role, we're really appreciative of that. And then One thing I want to share with you all, and I really do encourage you to take a look at the second document that is posted on your committee page right now that includes the board goals. I have not included them fully represented in this presentation because that would be, I think, a two plus hour testimony. But one thing we're really excited about is that the board approved a list of goals in November, as I mentioned earlier, that are really driving the work of the board moving forward. So these were a result of a lot of work, both in the full board setting and also work that the executive committee of the board dove into to really think about what does this board want to accomplish? What does this board see as the real needs in our workforce system? And also what is work that's currently underway in some of our state agencies that the board can plug into and amplify? Because I think one of the things that we're really present to is not wanting to duplicate work that's already happening. The value that the board and the office add to our workforce system is in identifying linkages, areas for where something's working that can be expanded, where there's a gap that can be filled. So there was a lot of work to really align these goals with some of the priorities that already seeing across state government. So really briefly, I just want to give you all a taste of the goals. And we're sort of in a moment now where we're starting to stand up subcommittees focused on these goals. So we'll have much more to report later this year. But the first goal is around increasing the supply of workers in key sectors. So the board has identified five priority sectors that they want to dig a little bit deeper into to find out what are some recruiting targets that could be implemented, What are some specific strategies in each of those sectors that the board could look into to try to increase the labor supply for those sectors? And one thing I'll also say is that really the next step for these is identifying the metrics that we're going to be using to measure progress. So I wrote a cheat sheet for myself because I always forget one of them. But the key sectors that the board has identified, and these are subject to change, of course, are around construction trades, manufacturing, healthcare and social services, professional and business services, which kind of includes IT and tech, and leisure and hospitality. So there will be a subcommittee formed soon, we're hoping in the next month, the next few weeks, to really dig into this goal. The second goal is around supporting adults to reengage and advance in our workforce. So I think there's a lot of work that this subcommittee will likely be doing, including folks that are not board members. We want as many folks at the table to contribute to this work. But there's a real desire among the board to focus on some of our adult education programs, so adult education and literacy and adult CTE, to sort of find ways to be better coordinated across the state and across providers. I know there was work that the previous board did that was not fully completed to create a statewide definition for credentials of value. There's a lot of work around outreach and awareness to do to really ensure that the adults in Vermont have the support they need to enter, advance, re engage in the workforce. That will be a really robust workflow for the board. The third goal is around supporting businesses to expand, relocate, and stay in Vermont. I would add a third one there, which has been a topic of discussion among the board. And this goal was really informed by folks at the Agency of Commerce and Community Development to really figure out how can we better integrate workforce and economic development in the state to make sure businesses know the strategies to attract more workers, especially when a business is considering relocating to Vermont. Figuring out if they're going to be able to have the workforce they need to be here is really important. And in some of the conversations that we've been having with the board and outside, I think there's a lot of opportunity to support some better alignment of messaging resources there and sort of figuring out how to plug into work that's happening in the Department of Economic Development and at the agency and communities around that. And then the fourth goal of the board is to increase post secondary graduate retention. So this, I think, ties back a little bit to the conversation that we had with you all earlier in the session around the post secondary employment outcomes coalition work, which if that is And we're hoping it will move forward. But that will, I think, give us a lot of information about how folks are doing, how many folks are staying in Vermont post graduation, what their wages are, those types of things. But this goal is really around what are some strategies that can be identified to increase the number of, as it says here, college and university graduates who remain in Vermont after graduation. And I think the conversation around this goal thus far, think there are a lot of potential avenues that the board could go down to make progress here. I think there's a lot of potential work around identifying the real and perceived barriers to staying here. I think there could be some qualitative research. How have all of the programs that y'all have passed over the past number of years to support Vermonters to stay here? There's been so many scholarships, student loan repayment supports. Some of those have been based on specific sectors. I remember there were a lot of programs that y'all stood up with COVID funds around keeping early childhood educators in Vermont. How have those supported folks? What works? What could we lean more heavily into? There's the Green Mountain Retention Grant program and also potentially thinking about some messaging and ways to have our post secondary graduates feel like they're more part of a community and have the supports, not only the positions and wages they need, but also the community that they need to be able to stay here.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: Drake, I was at a conference in November, December where UBM presented. And the numbers of graduates that are staying is higher than I thought it Oh, that's great. So they have data now. They had been having trouble collecting it, but they have data now. It's gonna be important to use that as part of our tracking.

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Absolutely. Yeah, that's great to know. And in the board goal document that I've referenced a couple of times, there's much more detail about the potential sort of activities and strategies that the board has considered. And as the committees are stood up, it will definitely be a decision that those folks make about what they want to start with. But there's also, I'll just mention a column around potential implementation partners. So to your point, Representative Graning, we need as many folks to be engaged in this work as possible so that we make sure we're all speaking the same language and using the same numbers. But we're really committed and the board is really committed to having these committees obviously include board members, but also include a lot of non board members, especially with a smaller board. That's going to be really important. So that's great to know. And I'm going to make a note of that so I don't forget to follow-up on it.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: I think that was a program that they'd been working on to get that data together for several years at the very least. Yes.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: And it's the first opportunity that they've had to actually share it. It's new information, and it's really exciting.

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: It is. I think we're really excited to get more specific. What are the right metrics that the board can be tracking that will lead us in a direction where we can make choices and implement strategies that are going to push the needle in the way we want rather than saying, Oh, we think this is what's happening. If there's data out there, that's really important for folks to be acting on. And I think this may be my last slide, and I'll pass things over to Savina. But I just want to give you all a little bit of a picture of the board structure because we're adding more structure to the board. So our full board obviously meets quarterly. We have an executive committee, which Chair Marcotte sits on, and a number of other folks that meets monthly to really I think there's actually I don't even, I think, to go into the particulars of the work the executive committee does. Suffice to say, it's very important and we're grateful for them. I will also note that there's a healthcare workforce development strategic plan advisory group that has continued to meet even when the board was on a little bit of a pause. So Suzanne Tremblay from the Agency of Human Services has been doing really great work over there. And they're, I think, nearing the finalization of a healthcare workforce strategic plan that we're really excited about. And obviously, the Rural Health Transformation grant has a significant amount of funding in it to support workforce initiatives that we're really excited to support and dig into. And then we're getting ready to stand up for subcommittees based on the four goals I just mentioned. And one thing I'll just briefly highlight here, which Sabina will talk a little bit more about, is there's a federal program on the horizon called Workforce Pell, also referred to as short term Pell, that the board has responsibilities for implementing. So we have started to convene a working group of folks to start to think about how we can best support the board in that function because there will be We're seeing a significant amount of work to implement that program. So that is where we are and where the board is going. And I'll pass it to Savannah to talk about what we've been

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: up to at the office. Thank you. Anybody have any questions before I

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: Say more about the workforce program.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Are you gonna be kidding me? Know. I was

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: just thinking about goal three here about supporting business expansion and relocation. I think we have plenty of

[Unidentified Committee Member]: data as to why businesses leave the state. If you had any luck, I would love to hear from companies that have relocated here because whatever is bringing them here, we should do more of that.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: Yeah.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: So I don't know if you've have you had a chance to talk with any businesses that have relocated here from other places?

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: I think that's something we need to connect with economic development with. Excuse me. It's sort of more in their purview than our purview, but it's a good question.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: We're still in the process of putting these subcommittees together.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: Right.

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: So I think we'd love, as that work gets underway, to obviously stay in touch. But if folks have specific suggestions, questions, please do reach out to us because those are the types of strategies and activities that I imagine that that committee will want to undertake, for sure.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: One basic question and then another one. I kind of missed that. I'm sure you said, what is the WIOA workforce as opposed to the general workforce?

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Yeah, I can follow-up with you with more particulars, but there are a lot of different folks that are eligible for WIOA services under different titles. So there could be low income folks, folks who are receiving public assistance. It's essentially folks who experience barriers to

[Unidentified Committee Member]: And then focusing on workforce issues around healthcare. We have a bunch of programs out there and then others that are being suggested around loan loan assistance, tuition assistance, assistance in terms of getting folks to do a residency in Vermont. And I'm just wondering how your work fits into those ideas, some of which exist, but some of which are being proposed.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: There are a lot of ideas being proposed right now, and there are a lot of ideas that are in play right now. I think everybody's trying to take a bite at the apple to fix it, if you will. But there are apprenticeships, are CTE programs that help you start. It just depends on where you are and all of that. Speaking to the specific individual and what their interests are. And it's not all nursing, as you know. Right. There's lots of different roles in healthcare that need attention.

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Go ahead. Yeah, I would also say we're kind of in a moment where there's the current state of our office and then the future state. So it's a great question and I think it speaks to the reason that the office was created. There's a lot that's happening. The legislature has made really generous investments in workforce supports in a lot of different ways over the years. It's And really difficult to know, especially just as a Vermonter, what you may have access to or what may work for you. So one of the things that y'all have charged us with is creating an inventory of all the different workforce education and training programs out there. It's not done yet because that's a pretty big lift. We're really figuring out how to do that in a way that is comprehensive and robust and achievable. And ECTUs. And ECTUs and user friendly. But those are the types of things that we're really present to and really leaning into as roles that the office can be supportive of is being that sort of organizing entity to figure out how to get information out to folks more clearly, assess what might be working, where there are still gaps, where there's work happening maybe in separate parts of the state that could be better connected. Know that when I hear from legislators about their hopes for the office, these are things I hear over and over again. So hopefully in the future, we'll have, again, more to share about that. And then another thing I'll say is with the rural health transformation grant funding, there's a really significant amount of workforce funding there. So we've already had some conversations with some of the folks that are going to be managing that. I know they're really committed to having a broad base of folks to advise on implementing those funds.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Thank you. We're going go to

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: John, who is remote and then Abbey.

[Rep. Jonathan Cooper (Member)]: Thank you very much. Good morning, everyone. My question is about the executive committee. I'd like to know how large it is and how those members are selected or appointed by statute, by the group's choice, and also if you have any vacancies on the full board at the moment. Thank you.

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Yes. So the executive committee is established through statute. So I'm not gonna remember off the top of my head every single member, but I can send that information out. But there are typically the agency representatives are members of the executive committee. Chair Marcotte and Senator Clarkson are on that committee. Scott Giles from VSAC is on that committee. Tiffany Walker from the Vermont State Colleges. But it is, I think, mostly pre prescribed through statute. And in terms of board composition right now, we do have one vacancy that we are looking to fill.

[Rep. Jonathan Cooper (Member)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: I'm interested in when you think about workforce development, do you think of you sort of include sort of skills and technical assistance for entrepreneurs and for our very small businesses we have, say, fewer than four employees or self employed and solopreneurs, which we have clauses. Right.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: They're definitely part of the picture. And as you probably all know, about between 8590% of businesses in Vermont are 20 employees or fewer. So right there, where you've got people, and then the different programs and the different helps. The one thing about the office with the questions that you're asking is, and we're just standing up, but we've become a central kind of, hey, I have this question, and who should I talk to? We become sort of the person who can help guide you and navigate you, as opposed to knowing specific answers, but we can point you to the person who can, if that's helpful.

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: And I would also just add one thing that we have heard from folks is succession planning is so important for really tiny small businesses like that. So as a business retention strategy, I think there could be some really important, interesting work about how to support entrepreneurs to start a business or maybe not start a business, but take over an existing business that they So can solve for a more to come. But if folks have ideas of things they think we should lean into, please let us know. You all understand what your constituents really are needing. And I think we've probably both communicated at this point that we are new. So we are ready to do what is needed and really lean into the types of things that are going to have an impact. I think really the board wants to hear that as well. So appreciate those ideas.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Okay, thank you. And for the record, again, I'm Savannah Haskell. I was going to walk you through the office's accomplishments over the past year and start talking about our priorities for year two and beyond. And as Drake stole my line, we are one year and two weeks old today. And we spent a lot of time in the past twelve months really working on how should we structure this? How are we going to set up our cadence and everything and the operational duties that go along with running the office? I think we're in pretty good shape right now. I like to say we see ourselves as a concierge, you know, that we can be your navigator and help you help anybody in the workforce, whether you're a job seeker, an employer, state agency, community organization, etcetera. And that we will become the entity that brings everybody together, braids and knits, everything, workforce development into a central location and back to you being user friendly almost. We're all at that point in our lives, push the button and follow the cues to what you want to learn and find out. That will take some time, but we're working on it. And as Drake also mentioned, we relaunched the board. Most of the board is brand new. So we have the first year was meetings, several of which were introductory and, hey, here's WIOA, this is how it works, presentations. And it's a weedy federal requirement. And so there was a lot of work with that. And the executive committee has been meeting monthly since June, which is great. And we're kind of getting into a cadence where we're seeing everything, seeing how we're going to go about it, etcetera. And back to WIOA for a second. We all need to have a state workforce development board, as Drake mentioned. And we're in a very small subset of about seven to 10 states that have only one state workforce board. And so how we operate is way different than the rest of the states.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: And

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: that's kind of interesting too, because when we talk to our counterparts at other states, they'll start talking about something and go, we go, well, we only have one board. We don't have to go to 11 boards to figure it out. But that happens as well. So the board, as you know, just to repeat again, it is required to assure compliance with WIOA grant regulations, which can be thorny. And sometimes this board is really excited and focused on seeing the bigger vision for Vermont with the new office and the new board and everything. And so those federal requirements are sometimes competing with what the strategy is for longer term for the whole state. And so one example is in six weeks or so, we need to update the two year modifications to the state WIOA plan. And we've been meeting with our core partners on that and writing an executive summary. And each core partner is updating their section of the three ninety six page state plan. And then we have to submit it and have it be approved, etcetera. And we just finished and got sign off from our partners, our 20 required partners under WIOA for the American Job Center, our one stop center that we have here in Vermont. And so that took some time. And I don't want say negotiation, but talking about what we want to change and how it's going to work and all of that. And then to Workforce Pell. That is the new short term grant program that will focus on short term credentials, training, with the goal being that they have to be stackable. And so that they lead to higher levels of certification or degrees, whatever it is. The federal requirements were reached by consensus with a committee in mid December. And the goal still is to launch this by July 1. There are a number of new requirements. For instance, a credential would count for a grant if you fall within the It's usually socioeconomic. If it's less than ten weeks, less than six hundred hours, and then you need to be able to prove, not approve, prove that there was a 70% completion rate in these courses and a 70% job placement with also a there's an ROI component that I don't think is exactly cemented yet, but that you're bringing in money that helps prove that the grant was worth it. During this meeting that Drake alluded to, a number of our courses would not qualify for the grant because they're too long. And then if they were, I'm making it up, if they were at CCV, then you might not get your credits towards the degree because it's a different program. So we're going to have to do a little working that out in the next couple of months. There are a few that are going to pop up and we're probably going to start small and pilot, if my choice of words, pilot a few different types of programs and work out the kinks because it really launches for big time in 'twenty eight. So it helps us figure it out. And then who's going to do what? And then the administration needs to approve what is chosen as the priority sectors. So there's that type of discussion, making sure the short term Pell will qualify for the priority sectors picked by the governor. We are among 35 states that are participating in the National Governors Association Pell Readiness Academy. Everybody's obviously the 35 states, everybody's trying to figure it out. And so we have our second meeting tomorrow. And that'll be very, very helpful to talk about how they're setting, what works here, what works there, and repurposing as we go, if you will, in terms

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: of

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: the implementation dynamics of that. Does that answer your question? Okay.

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: One that we've also learned is that we, as a state, have already done a pretty good job of supporting folks with accessing short term credentials and learning through the advancement grants through VSAC. So I think there are some other states that may be taking more advantage of workforce Pell in the beginning, because that's not a need that has really been met by the state up until this point. So I think we're a little bit further down the road on supporting folks to access short term credentials than some of our neighbors. But we can share more as we learn more about that.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Do you think that these new workforce health can work alongside with the advancement grants, or will it supplant the advancement?

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: It would, I think the advancement grant would still come first and workforce Pell will come second. And that's, I appreciate you bringing that up because one of the other requirements that's tricky is that the course that's going to be offered that you're interested in for your workforce Pell grant must be accredited for at least a year. So that'll be another point that we need to verify and make sure that we're in compliance with. Otherwise, the student can't get grant. The grant maximum right now is $7.37 35, something like that. And it does contribute to your overall workforce Pell cap, which is depending on if you're an associate or a bachelor's. But there is a cap. You only can get Pell for the surgery.

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: But I don't think workforce Pell at this point, I do not think would supplant advancement grants. We're still learning more. We haven't gotten the final guidance yet, but the requirements around Workforce Pell are a lot more restrictive than advancement We grants at this

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: may be able to use the Pell grants or the educational function, and then maybe the advancement grants to help with books. Potentially. All the stuff in the background that students encounter, trying to get some type of certification or degree.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: So,

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: yeah, it'll be one of those ones that It'll be interesting to implement the first time, and then it'll start to yeah, anyway. And also, as Drake mentioned, we've been working with you all on the efforts to prioritize CTE and adult education. And that's a pretty constant conversation daily about what our next step should be and all of that. We hope to be here for you with your efforts on that. We're also investigating a new opportunity for what we're calling service to career pathways. That if you've been in public service, that there's a pathway to making that be your career and training, etcetera. And as we talked about, the Rural Health Transformation Act. And meanwhile, we're working on data, and we're working on the inventory and other credentials training that we hear about from many, many partners and providers. Sorry, I don't hit my spot in front of me. Sorry. So, yeah. Meanwhile, we've also been talking with lots of people about the first year, who we should be connecting with. Make sure that you talk to so and so about this, and so that we're aware of what's going on. And when we have these conversations with folks, these are common themes. We have a lot of really good strong workforce programs, but we're siloed and there's fragmentation and how do we bring it all together and enhance the impact.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: You talk about siloed and fragmented. Are we talking about the state government, or are we talking about workforce programs throughout the state as a whole? Yes. Both. Yeah. People

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: might be doing the same programs in different parts of the state. There's nothing wrong with that, because you want to work with Vermonters who are nearby. But are there ways to collaborate and make them? Yeah. So yes, we talk a lot about how we need data. We need data every day in our lives, both personally and professionally to make decisions. It happens all the time. So we talked to you about the PSEO coalition last week, and we're starting to move forward with more conversations on that. We'll keep you apprised of that and looks pretty exciting to us. Yeah. Collaboration, collaboration, collaboration. We're going to keep reaching out to everybody. And I think one of the strong things that'll come out of our committees is that we're going to be both board members and non board members so that we get subject matter experts in there that don't, not necessarily on the board, as well as people who have a really big interest in it. And that'll build collaboration as well. And we're going as fast as we can, but we're also taking the time to make sure it's all aligned and that we don't make unintended, we don't have unintended consequences as we move forward. So that brings us to year two and beyond. We're gonna keep working on deep the board work. We have four board meetings already planned for this year with dates. We're going to be in Bennington County on February 23. We're going to be in Lamoille on June 1, September 14, and we haven't decided Washington or Orange County, but sort of the center part of the state. Then in December 14 up in the Northeast Kingdom, so that you can participate in person or virtually, which I think will be really nice for folks to feel like there's that we're bridging out. The subcommittees will start to meet every other month, hopefully, right away. And they may decide to meet more frequently as needed or less. And they might start to try to meet together for certain areas that collaborate. I see that as fluid in a good way, that they'll be able to mix and match, if you will. And then, of course, the executive committee meets every the first Monday of every month virtually for ninety minutes to go over the business of the board and what needs to happen next, etcetera. And then the workforce, I mean, the WIOA regulations and requirements. Drake and I will take sort of the operational execution lead and bring that work to the board for them to be able to say yay or nay and ask their questions and that type of thing. And finally, we plan on just reaching out to everybody and anybody who will talk to us, right? And trying to strengthen these engagement opportunities. And if there are folks that you think we should be meeting with, please shout and tell us, and we'll get out there and see them and talk to them about different things. Somebody asked the question about entrepreneurship. I just had a great meeting with folks at Hula and their work and how they're bridging out now across the state try to make more of those statewide connections. Very exciting. And if you read their mission statement, it's all about starting companies here and staying here. Yeah, it's very cool. So that was If you want to ask me more questions or ask more questions, that's our presentation.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Yeah,

[Unidentified Committee Member]: imagine it's exciting work and you'll have to see it. You talked about updating the website or being a better resource for job seekers and that kind of stuff. I trust you're going to try and Advance Vermont, JobLink and all of those things, that resource, right? I think why this pops in my head is tomorrow we're having a meeting with the Vermont captive insurance industry. And for the last several years when they've been coming, they always say they need people to work in this field. And I have said, and every year I say, so do you have resources to tell people how to get, what they need to get in working in this field? And at first they said, no, but we need to get on that. Then eventually they put a thing on their webpage that said, yes, we need people in the field to talk to us. Now they finally got to a place where it says, well, you need some education and finance and there are some certifications, but you can start at

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: the high school level or

[Unidentified Committee Member]: you can start with a master's degree level. But again, not much information that's useful. And so I'm wondering if the board has plans to work with organizations like that somehow to help them understand how to lay out that process for those especially niche industries. On

[Drake Turner (Deputy Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: the first part of your comment around JobLink in Advance Vermont, I appreciate you mentioning that because that is something that we're paying very close attention to when we're thinking about how to move forward with the website. We're in pretty consistent communication with Tom Cheney in Advance Vermont. Their resources are so wonderful to figure out how do we, again, make sure we're not duplicating something, but it doesn't look as good or work as well, which is probably what would happen. And the Department of Labor is going be updating JobLink. I think there's an opportunity, we've been having some conversations with them about how that updated job link may be able to fill some of the functions that we're thinking about. So yes, we're thinking about all that. And around the captive insurance piece, we'll make a note of that. Those are exactly the types of things I think the board can plug into as an entity and also as a group that is made up of a lot of the folks within state government and outside of state government that could be supporting better articulation of career pathways and messaging to folks who may want to enter a career path that could be really rewarding and meet the needs of Vermonters. So those are exactly the types of things that we really want to plug into. I could see the sort of arc of that being, we hear from you and committee that you've heard from testimony from those folks that they want more employees or more folks to go into that field. We could bring it to the executive committee and then advance it to the board. So there are a lot of ways that we can act as folks to flag those types of issues for the larger board and figure out how to weave it into their work.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: That's a good example, because Vermont's home to captive insurance, right? Yeah.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Subhani, great. Thank you for coming in. Thank you. We appreciate your work, and look forward to hearing more as you continue on the path of creating the office and building it out even more.

[Sabina Haskell (Executive Director, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: It's exciting.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: It is.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: Yeah. Thank you. Yeah.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Committee, we're on the floor at ten. Looks to be a short floor. Lunch. We're back on floor again at one for the gathering address, and then we're back in here about fifteen minutes after the event.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: Walk through 06:39.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Yes. And rep that Shai will not be able to make it. We will bring her in and see if there's another time of the week for her and we can work with their assistant. Let's see if she'll and look again and see if there's time. Any questions? Okay, great. So, see you on the floor. Haven't got What's it to?

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: 639.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: I haven't I looked at race and means agenda. I don't see 06:48 on it, but I think they'll we're weave it in there somewhere today or tomorrow probably. I'll be ready.

[Rep. Edye Graning (Vice Chair)]: It's on the notice account.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: It's not notice, but they'll send it to me. I think they'll send it. So no questions. Again, we'll see you on the floor at ten and at one. And then fifteen minutes after, the governor's address back from here promptly