Workforce Center Touts Programs For Labor Secretary
PHOTO/MATT PILON
State Sen. Harriette Chandler, left, joins Joanne Goldstein, center, the state's secretary of labor and workforce development, for a tour of the Workforce Central Career Center in Worcester. Donald Anderson, right, the center's director, led the tour.
When Marlborough-based Evergreen Solar laid off 800 employees from its Devens plant earlier this year, many of them ended up at the Workforce Central Career Center on Front Street in Worcester, according to Donald Anderson, the center's director.
A number of those workers, who are originally from Southeast Asia, are now enrolled in the English-language courses offered at the center to help them improve their prospects of finding work.
Anderson and officials at the center gave a tour today to Joanne Goldstein, the state's secretary of labor and workforce development. The Worcester area has added 8,900 jobs over the past year, making it one of the faster growing areas of the state, with a 3.7-percent growth rate.
The workforce center assisted more than 9,200 job seekers over the past year.
Growth Fields
Amy Mosher, the center's STEM lead coach, heads a pilot program at the center that seeks to connect workers with employers in the science, technology, engineering and math fields. The program, which is one of five in the country, has helped place 153 people in STEM jobs over the past two years.
"A lot of people are still struggling, obviously, and job seekers are very frustrated," Mosher said.
But there is sometimes a disconnect between the perceptions of employers and the available workforce looking for jobs, she said.
"Employers say they can't find the people they need," Mosher said. "I tell them ‘Oh really? I will connect you with quite a few people.'"
Goldstein dropped in on a few classrooms full of area residents taking courses toward their GED.
Travis Chapman, a 27-year-old Leicester resident, told Goldstein that his goal was to attain his GED, then work as a welder to earn money before applying to colleges for a mechanical engineering program.
Chapman appreciated that the courses at the center are individually catered to each job seeker so they don't waste their time learning things they might already know.
Anderson, the center's director, said that is a unique feature of workforce centers that colleges can't always match.
"It allows them to really dig in for a few months at a time," he said.
Goldstein said that one of her goals as secretary is to form connections between employers, job seekers and educational institutions.
"There are jobs out there and people, but they don't always exactly match," Goldstein said. "We need to be a better matchmaker."
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