Columbus, Ohio is one of the six sites selected to participate in the New Skills ready network. This five-year initiative, launched by JPMorgan Chase in 2020, aims to improve student completion of high-quality career pathways. In the third year of the initiative, the Columbus, Ohio, New Skills ready network team developed career maps and increased advising efforts among education institutions. The initiative was also vital to the expansion of access to career pathways at the secondary level through transition to an open lottery system, laying the foundation for increased access to all Career Technical Education (CTE) programs citywide.Additionally, the project team focused heavily on employer engagement as a core component of work-based learning efforts, adding new project team capacity and driving conversations with new and existing employer partners. This snapshot provides a summary of the three major priorities of Columbus, Ohio’s New Skills ready network team:
- Improving access to and the quality of career pathways;
- Communicating career pathway options to learners and families; and
- Strengthening work-based learning and employer engagement capacity.
