New York Consortium for Worker Education

The national welfare-to-work bill removed more than a million New Yorkers from income maintenance. It was natural then that New York's Consortium for Worker Education became involved in welfare-to-work initiatives. A nonprofit organization created by the union movement and funded by public sources, the Consortium has a long history of workforce training and development. More than 36 international unions participate in the Consortium, representing most of the major unions in the New York area.

The Consortium's initial effort with welfare-to-work was designed to address two problems: welfare mothers in the New York area needed jobs, and they needed child care to get and keep jobs.

Needed: Child Care Services, Child Care Providers

The Consortium's Satellite Child Care program addresses both of these problems at the same time. With funding from the U.S. Department of Labor, it provides training, resources, supervision, support and a management framework that allows former welfare recipients to enter the child care field, opening up certified centers in their homes.

The Consortium recruits welfare recipients and provides them 420 hours of training and work experience for new day care workers. It helps them get state clearances and transforms a part of their home into an off-site childcare classroom. They are provided with the necessary furniture, equipment and child development materials, including a portable computer that is linked to a central day care facility.

New York City day care agencies visit the home-based facilities regularly to provide support to the new day care provider. The program is designed to provide real child development for infants and toddlers, and not just serve as a holding facility for the children.

The program is creating desperately needed day care facilities in communities where few facilities exist.

The new childcare provider is a union member covered by a collective bargaining agreement with AFSCME Council 1707. She receives a starting salary of $18,200 a year and receives a full benefit package that includes health insurance and tuition reimbursement.

In addition to providing work for former welfare recipients, the program is creating desperately needed day care facilities in communities where few facilities exist. This is important in a city where more than 2,000 workers, who called in for work experience assignments, were sent home because there weren't enough infant day care slots.

Education Opportunities for Working Parents

With funding from the State Education Department, the Consortium supports 10--soon to be 14--parent resource centers where parents can go to their children's school to receive job preparation assistance, training in basic skills and get other assistance to help them reenter the workforce. Each center is operated through a sub-contract with a community-based organization and in partnership with the United Federation of Teachers, the New York affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers.

The Consortium is looking to expand these centers to offer a wider array of job placement services to welfare recipients and other low-income residents interested in entering the workforce. These centers offer parents a place where they can study and improve themselves alongside their children.

Pre-Apprenticeship Training and Placement

The Consortium is also participating as a partner with the New York building trades unions and the Building Contractors Association in a pre-apprenticeship training and placement project. With a goal of placing former welfare recipients in at least 600 new construction jobs over the next three years, this program recruits candidates and provides all the up-front supports necessary to allow them to enter a regular apprenticeship program.

Ongoing Support

The need for support and assistance doesn't end when a new worker finds a job; in many respects, it just begins. To support workers once they enter the workforce, the Consortium is establishing a comprehensive post-employment assistance project. This includes educational assistance and skill upgrading, as well as counseling for any personal problems that might interfere with a worker's ability to remain employed.

Peer support networks will be established to provide new workers with people that they can talk to about getting assistance with workforce issues and problems that might arise with childcare, transportation, budgeting, and other realities of day-to-day employment.

The Consortium wants to be a one-stop provider of services to all workers--whether they're former welfare recipients, dislocated workers trying to reenter the workforce, or workers in search of new opportunities and continued career development. For the last five years, the Consortium has operated five one-stop centers in the various New York City boroughs and is hoping to expand to nine one-stop centers in the near future.