print this pageWorkforce Investment Act of 1998
U.S. Department of LaborEmployment and Training Administration
The Workforce Investment Act (Public Law 105-220), was signed into law August 7, 1998.
The Workforce Investment Act of 1998 provides the framework for a unique national workforce preparation and employment system designed to meet both the needs of the nation’s businesses and the needs of job seekers and those who want to further their careers. Title I of the legislation is based on the following elements:
- Training and employment programs must be designed and managed at the local level where the needs of businesses and individuals are best understood.
- Customers must be able to conveniently access the employment, education, training, and information services they need at a single location in their neighborhoods.
- Customers should have choices in deciding the training program that best fits their needs and the organizations that will provide that service. They should have control over their own career development.
- Customers have a right to information about how well training providers succeed in preparing people for jobs. Training providers will provide information on their success rates.
- Businesses will provide information, leadership, and play an active role in ensuring that the system prepares people for current and future jobs.
The Act builds on the most successful elements of previous Federal legislation. Just as important, its key components are based on local and State input and extensive research and evaluation studies of successful training and employment innovations over the past decade.
The new law makes changes to the current funding streams, target populations, system of delivery, accountability, long-term planning, labor market information system, and governance structure.
Title I authorizes the new Workforce Investment System. State workforce investment boards will be established and States will develop five-year strategic plans. Governors will designate local "workforce investment areas" and oversee local workforce investment boards. New youth councils will be set up as a subgroup of the local board to guide the development and operation of programs for youth. Customers will benefit from a "One-Stop" delivery system, with career centers in their neighborhoods where they can access core employment services and be referred directly to job training, education, or other services.
Title I requires that standards for success be established for organizations that provide training services and outlines a system for determining their initial eligibility to receive funds. It establishes the funding mechanism for States and local areas, specifies participant eligibility criteria, and authorizes a broad array of services for youth, adults, and dislocated workers. It also authorizes certain statewide activities and a system of accountability to ensure that customer needs are met.
Also authorized are a number of national programs the Job Corps; Native American programs; Migrant and Seasonal Farmworker programs; Veterans’ Workforce Investment programs; Youth Opportunity grants for high-poverty areas; technical assistance efforts to States and local areas; demonstration, pilot, and other special national projects; program evaluations; and National Emergency grants.
Title II reauthorizes Adult Education and Literacy programs for Fiscal Years 1999-2003.
Title III amends the Wagner-Peyser Act to require that Employment Service/Job Service activities become part of the "One-Stop" system and establishes a national employment statistics initiative. It requires linkages between the Act’s programs and Trade Adjustment Assistance and North American Free Trade Agreement Transitional Adjustment Assistance programs. It establishes a temporary "Twenty-First Century Workforce Commission" to study issues relating to the information technology workforce in the United States.
Title IV reauthorizes Rehabilitation Act programs through Fiscal Year 2003 and links these programs to State and local workforce development systems.
Title V contains general provisions that include authority for State unified plans relating to several workforce development programs, incentive grants for States exceeding negotiated performance levels under the Workforce Investment Act, Adult Education Act, and Perkins Vocational Education Act, and transition provisions.
The Act specifies three funding streams to the States and local areas: adults, dislocated workers, and youth.
Adults and Dislocated Workers
Most services for adults and dislocated workers will be provided through the "One-Stop" system and most customers will use their individual training accounts to determine which training program and training providers fit their needs.
The Act authorizes "core" services (which will be available to all adults with no eligibility requirements), and "intensive" services for unemployed individuals who are not able to find jobs through core services alone. In some cases the intensive services will also be available to employed workers who need more help to find or keep a job.
While the services for adults and dislocated workers may be the same, there is a separate funding stream for dislocated workers.
Core services will include job search and placement assistance (including career counseling); labor market information (which identifies job vacancies; skills needed for in-demand jobs; and local, regional and national employment trends); initial assessment of skills and needs; information about available services; and some follow-up services to help customers keep their jobs once they are placed.
Intensive services will include more comprehensive assessments, development of individual employment plans, group and individual counseling, case management, and short-term pre-vocational services.
In cases where qualified customers receive intensive services, and are still not able to find jobs, they may receive training services which are directly linked to job opportunities in their local area. These services may include occupational skills training, on-the-job training, entrepreneurial training, skill upgrading, job readiness training, and adult education and literacy activities in conjunction with other training.
If adult funds are limited in an area, recipients of public assistance and low-income clients will be given priority for services. The Act also authorizes the provision of supportive services (e.g., transportation) to assist participants receiving the other services and the provision of temporary income support to enable participants to remain in training.
Youth
Eligible youth will be low-income, ages 14 through 21 (although up to five percent who are not low-income may receive services if they face certain barriers to school completion or employment). Young customers also must face one or more of the following challenges to successful workforce entry: (1) school dropout; (2) basic literacy skills deficiency; (3) homeless, runaway, or foster child; (4) pregnant or a parent; (5) an offender; or (6) need help completing an educational program or securing and holding a job. At least 30 percent of local youth funds must help those who are not in school.
Youth will be prepared for postsecondary educational opportunities or employment. Programs will link academic and occupational learning. Service providers will have strong ties to employers. Programs must also include tutoring, study skills training and instruction leading to completion of secondary school (including dropout prevention); alternative school services; mentoring by appropriate adults; paid and unpaid work experience (such as internships and job shadowing); occupational skills training; leadership development; and appropriate supportive services. Youth participants will also receive guidance and counseling, and follow-up services for at least one year, as appropriate.
Programs must provide summer employment opportunities linked to academic and occupational learning. (In contrast to the current legislation, a separate appropriation is not authorized for a "summer" program.) The mix of year-round and summer activities is left to local discretion.