The Workforce Investment Act and the One-Stop Delivery System

[Excerpt] The Workforce Investment Act of 1998 (WIA; P.L. 105-220) is the primary federal program that supports workforce development. WIA includes five titles: • Title I—Workforce Investment Systems—provides job training and related services to unemployed or underemployed individuals; • Title II—Adult Education and Literacy—provides education services to assist adults in improving their literacy and completing secondary education; • Title III—Workforce Investment-Related Activities—amends the Wagner-Peyser Act of 1933 to integrate the U.S. Employment Service (ES) into the One-Stop system established by WIA; • Title IV—Rehabilitation Act Amendments of 1998—amends the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, which provides vocational rehabilitation services to individuals with disabilities, to integrate vocational rehabilitation into the One-Stop system; and • Title V—General Provisions—specifies components of State Unified Plans and provisions for state incentive grants. Workforce development programs provide a combination of education and training services to prepare individuals for work and to help them improve their prospects in the labor market. In the broadest sense, workforce development includes secondary and postsecondary education, on-the- job and employer-provided training, and the publicly funded system of job training and employment services. Most workforce development occurs in the workplace during the course of doing business. The federal government provides workforce development activities through WIA’s programs and other programs designed to increase the employment and earnings of workers. Workforce development may include activities such as job search assistance, career counseling, occupational skill training, classroom training, or on-the-job training

The Arts Advantage: Expanding Arts Education in the Boston Public Schools

Presents findings from a survey on the availability of arts education in the city's public schools, relevant school traits, funding needs, and partners. Offers recommendations and strategies for a three-year expansion plan. Highlights best practices

Is Offshore Commercial Fishing a Prospect in the Pitcairn Islands?

Past studies in the Pitcairn Islands exclusive economic zone concur that fish stocks are low and that large-scale commercial fishing is not economically viable. Pitcairn lies in an area of the Pacific that is low in nutrients and therefore lacks the conditions necessary to support commercially significant fish biomass. Although it is possible that the available biomass for tuna may change in the future due to climate change, there is little evidence upon which to make a solid prediction and other climate change related factors may in any case preclude this from happening. Furthermore, evidence from fisheries elsewhere shows that the sustainability of stocks can only be ensured through the use of on-board observers to monitor all activities and catches. This is economically viable only in non-marginal fishing areas, which therefore precludes Pitcairn waters

Operations Research - Contemporary Role in Managerial Decision Making

As the global environment turns out to be furiously focused, Operations Research has picked up criticalness in applications like world-class Manufacturing systems (WCM), Lean generation, and Six-sigma quality administration, Bench marking, Just-in-time (JIT) inventory techniques. The development of worldwide markets and the subsequent increment in rivalry have highlighted the requirement for Operation Research. To survive and lead the todays very focused and request driven market, weight is on administration to settle on conservative choices. One of the key administrative aptitudes is capacity to distribute and use assets fittingly in the endeavors of accomplishing the ideal execution productively. Now and again, for example, little scale low many-sided quality environment; choice in light of instinct with insignificant quantitative premise might be sensibly satisfactory and viable in accomplishing the objective of the association. Be that as it may, for a substantial scale framework, both quantitative and subjective (i.e. instinct, experience, sound judgment) investigations are required to settle on the most practical choices. Utilizing Operations Research techniques including Linear Programming, Discrete Event Simulation and Queuing Theory, association pioneers can settle on top notch choices. Present paper is an endeavor to study the importance of Operation research and different techniques used to improve the operational efficiency of the association

Role of Stand-Alone Business Entities in Sustaining Newly Established Nonprofit Organizations

Thousands of newly established nonprofit organizations (NPOs) with long-lasting and needed missions disappear annually, which negatively impacts the nonprofit sector in general and the potential recipients of the discontinued NPOs\u27 services. The purpose of this quantitative study was to examine the possible influence that the presence of a strategic resource development plan and the establishment of a stand-alone business entity have on the persistence of newly established NPOs that have long-lasting and needed missions in the United States within the context of the theoretical framework resource dependence theory. Research questions focused on the role of commercial activities, particularly the stand-alone business entity model, and the importance of strategic resource development on NPOs\u27 sustainability within the first 5 years of existence. The study population consisted of NPOs that had disappeared within 5 years of existence and those that had remained active for more than 5 years. Data from a researcher-developed survey instrument were collected from 33 representatives of active organizations and 29 representatives of nonactive organizations. Chi-square tests of independence revealed that the strategic resource development plan and the commercial activities/stand-alone business entities were significantly associated with the sustainability of the NPOs. Findings may be used to promote the creation of a strategic resource development plan and/or a stand-alone business entity at the initial stages of NPOs\u27 establishment to sustain their role and contributions in their communities

Cost Functions of Crabs: Applications of Hermit Crab Shell Exchange Behavior to Vacancy Chain Modelling

Vacancy chain systems function as a method of resource distribution in domains such as housing and labor markets. Hermit crabs also employ vacancy chains as a method of shell exchange. Application of vacancy chain modelling in engineering has been attempted, but numerous flaws exist in the developed vacancy chain scheduling algorithm. This work addresses the lack of an appropriate vacancy chain cost function by developing a generalizable cost function based on hermit crab shell exchange behavior. The cost function’s purpose is enabling development of realistic engineering experiments and models based on real-world vacancy chain systems

Strategies for Identifying and Selecting Performance Measures of Effectiveness for Nonprofit Organizations

There is a growing demand for accountability of nonprofit organizations, and nonprofit business leaders are increasingly under pressure to demonstrate operational effectiveness. The problem is that some business leaders of nonprofit organizations lack strategies for identifying and selecting actionable performance measures of operational effectiveness. Using the plan-do-study-act conceptual framework, this single case study of a nonprofit organization located in the mid-Atlantic region of United States was conducted to explore strategies that 3 of its business leaders used to identify and select actionable performance measures of operational effectiveness. Using thematic analysis of data collected from semistructured interviews, documents, and public sources, emergent themes included: (a) usefulness of measures, (b) customer experience, and (c) workforce education. The findings of this study may have implications for social change by helping nonprofit business leaders achieve consensus on measures of effectiveness beyond financial measures. Additionally, the findings could support the usefulness of transparency in reporting performance outcomes, encourage a shift in focus from program spending and ratios to effectiveness, and prompt external stakeholders to expect performance measures that demonstrate effectiveness in nonprofit program operations