Oswego County: A Work-Ready Community with a Skilled Workforce

Designation expected to help close the large skill and work readiness gap that exists, especially among historically disadvantaged populations

by Austin Wheelock  |  ooc@oswegocounty.org

Austin M. Wheelock, certified economic developer (CEcD), is the executive director of Operation Oswego County, Inc. For more information, call 315-343-1545 or visit www.oswegocounty.org.

Workforce development and skill-building are hot topics across all industries in the current economy.

Recruiting candidates with the appropriate aptitude to be successful within an organization and offering opportunities for skill development toward internal advancement as a retention tool are fundamental to building a workforce.

More than ever, businesses are attracted to areas that can show there is a skilled and available local workforce to support economic growth.

Oswego County is focusing efforts to build and measure the skill levels and aptitudes of residents to demonstrate the potential of the local labor market through quantitative data. Workforce development and economic development agencies can then market the workforce when recruiting new businesses as well as retaining current employers.

In February, Oswego County earned the designation of a Work Ready Community through ACT WorkKeys.

This prominent workforce development designation was earned through the hundreds of National Career Readiness Credentials (NCRC) earned by area students and individuals within Oswego County. The NCRC is a portable, industry-recognized credential that clearly identifies an individual’s skills in workplace documents, applied math and graphic literacy through standardized assessments. Being designated as a Work-Ready Community allows Oswego County stakeholders to use the NCRC to help:

• Business and industry know exactly what foundational skills they need for a productive workforce and to easily communicate their needs;

• Individuals understand what skills are required by employers and how to prepare themselves for success;

• Educators close the skills gap via tools integrated into career pathways with stackable industry-recognized credentials; and

• Economic developers use an on-demand reporting tool to market the quality of their workforce.

Oswego County’s designation as a Work-Ready Community was earned by meeting benchmarks and targets of assessments, credentials and business supporters through collaborative partnerships between school districts, higher education, economic development, the local workforce development board, philanthropic organizations, community-based agencies, private businesses, and the leadership and support of the Oswego County Legislature.

“The best way I can think of to tell the world that Oswego County is ‘ready for business’ is to become the first certified ‘Work-Ready Community’ in the Northeast,” said Oswego County Legislator Roy Reehil, who led the effort toward gaining the designation for the county starting in 2016. “With so much regional business growth in the pipeline, the implementation of the NCRC for businesses in hiring and for students — college-bound or not — will become obvious almost immediately. Other counties and regions throughout the Northeast are already looking to follow Oswego County’s lead, but I’m proud to say, we will always be the first!”

Across the United States, ACT Work-Ready Communities have given over 5.9 million individuals the opportunity to explore careers, identify their skill gaps, and improve their skills and work readiness. Over 28,000 employers in these communities have a reliable measure to validate and identify skilled job candidates. Hundreds of economic development agencies have actionable data to market the quality of the local workforce, giving them a competitive advantage in recruiting new business growth and retaining current employers. Even prominent business advisement services like Site Selection Magazine uses NCRC community data within their annual State competitiveness formula for business attraction.

Being a Work-Ready Community will bring systemic change to Oswego County and the opportunity to close the large skill and work readiness gap that exists, especially among historically disadvantaged populations. The process of expanding WorkKeys and the NCRC focuses on aligning education, workforce development, and economic development strategies for Oswego County. As the first Work-Ready Community in New York state and the entire Northeastern United States, Oswego County has positioned itself to provide opportunities for the existing labor force and emerging workforce to grow with the unprecedented economic boom on the horizon for the Central New York region.

An event is being planned for this fall in Oswego County to celebrate the designation with officials from ACT as well as local leaders from business, workforce development, economic development, education, non-profits, and government.

Goals of the event will be to increase awareness of the credential program for job seekers as well as employers.

The event is being organized by CiTi BOCES, the Oswego County Department of Workforce Development, Operation Oswego County, Inc., and the Richard S. Shineman Foundation.

More information about the Work Ready Community designation through ACT WorkKeys and the National Career Readiness Certificate can be found here www.workreadycommunities.org.


This article was co-written by Rachel Pierce, executive director of the Workforce Development Board of Oswego County.