Wall Street West Awards Record $6.5 Million to Develop Northeastern Pennsylvania's Workforce

NORTHEASTERN PENNSYLVANIA - At the University of Scranton today, Wall Street West's fourth regional meeting brought together local, state and federal officials for the announcement of more than $6.5 million in federal funding for projects designed to strengthen the region's ability to sustain the jobs of the future.

"The Wall Street West partners are focused on short-term investments to leverage long-term dividends. Our goal has always been to invest in those projects that would strategically and effectively build the region's workforce for the better," said Chris Haran, co-chair, Human Capital Committee, Wall Street West. "Today's landmark announcements represent not only a significant infusion of funding to strengthen the pipeline for the next generation of jobs, but also a collaboration of dozens of stakeholders throughout the region that have committed to making this happen."

The meeting's keynote speaker was Congressman Paul E. Kanjorski (PA-11), who discussed the evolution of the Wall Street West project since its inception. "Restoring our capital markets after 9/11 was an enormous challenge, and from my position on the Financial Services Committee I witnessed firsthand the heroic efforts by the leadership of the New York Stock Exchange and the Securities and Exchange Commission," said Congressman Kanjorski. "During oversight hearings later, I strongly encouraged business continuity planning and was pleased with the regulatory guidance issued in April of 2003. I also saw an opportunity for Northeastern Pennsylvania to be a home for business continuity operations, and by August of that year I led a team to New York City to meet with investment banks to present our white paper. It quickly became apparent we needed to improve our fiber optic connectivity, so I was pleased that Governor Rendell took on the task of getting this done."

Congressman Kanjorski added, "I applaud the partnership between the federal and state governments that has resulted in Wall Street West. Investing in our people is the best investment we can make, and I am pleased that $6.5 million of federal money will be going to local institutions to help prepare future employees in the financial services industry."

Also making remarks was Dr. Robert Garraty, executive director, Pennsylvania Workforce Investment Boards, who addressed the continued need to integrate workforce and economic development.

"Wall Street West projects involve a unique type of regional collaboration that is proving to be successful. By connecting entities - like the Workforce Investments Boards - with regional economic development efforts, Wall Street West is creating a model for other areas of the state and nation," Garraty said.

Organizations received more than $5.4 million in federal Workforce Innovation in Regional Economic Development (WIRED) funds to create programs that will strengthen the workforce capacity to make the counties of Berks, Carbon, Lackawanna, Lehigh, Luzerne, Monroe, Northampton, Pike and Wayne a pre-eminent locale for business attraction. The recipients and projects were determined based on how they addressed certain categories that would further enhance skill sets for industries like financial services and information technology.

In addition to the new projects, Wall Street West will allocate a total of $1 million to the region's Workforce Investment Boards (WIB) for the continuation of the WIB Collaborative. The project's goal is to bolster the workforce pipeline to financial services and information technology occupations and increase educational attainment levels by providing opportunities for individuals to attain higher degrees. To date, the Collaborative has established a common individual training account allocation and outreach materials; is pursuing consistent service delivery targets; is leveraging these targets to attract additional higher education institutions to become training providers; and is identifying other partnership opportunities. The collaborative effort has successfully invested its original allocation of $500,000 and has demonstrated the need for an additional allocation of $1 million to expand this nationally recognized best-practice program.

Also announced was the final Innovation Investment grant from round two, which was awarded to Career Development and Employment, ltd., who received $101,050 for the Financial Services Fast Track Program. The initiative utilizes the "Future Connect" career planning tools to identify students interested in an information technology career. Thirty-five students will learn from this comprehensive program that includes real world experience through externship and apprenticeship opportunities. The majority of round two funding was awarded at the March 17th regional meeting.

"These announcements fulfill the final piece of the workforce development puzzle," Haran said. "With over $8 million allocated since 2007, residents of the Wall Street West region now have multiple opportunities to learn and achieve success in industries like financial services."

Wall Street West also announced the completion and release of the region's asset mapping project. Through a partnership with Thomas P. Miller & Associates, the report provides analysis of specific quantitative and qualitative data points on the region's innovation and entrepreneurship resources, as well as recommendations on what can be further enhanced.

"All regions have weaknesses in their workforce. Only those regions that identify and rectify those weaknesses will be able to compete globally today, and in the future," said Vito Gallo, co-chair, Human Capital Committee, Wall Street West. "This report now gives us a blueprint on how the region is progressing, as well as methods to make that blueprint even better,"

Wall Street West is a not-for-profit partnership in Northeastern Pennsylvania that is enhancing the financial services, information technology and related industries in the commonwealth through strategic workforce development and state-of-the-art economic development. Stemming from an interagency report by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Department of the Treasury - whose recommendations make the nine-county region an optimal geographic location for secure data back-up and back office operations - the goal of Wall Street West is to work with firms in New York City and the surrounding metropolitan threat zones to establish supplemental facilities to safeguard data, fund the education and training of a growing workforce, and expand the competitiveness and potential of these industries.

The Wall Street West partnership is made up of the top-tier economic development agencies; technology investment groups; workforce development organizations; education and research institutions; and private sector companies in the region. With the Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Northeastern Pennsylvania acting as the project manager, Wall Street West has federal support through a $15 million Workforce Innovation in Regional Economic Development (WIRED) grant from the U.S. Department of Labor for education and job training, as well as a combined $24 million commitment by the U.S. Department of Commerce, the Pennsylvania Department of Community and Economic Development, and private industry to enhance existing infrastructure.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Below are the list of new projects categorized by overall focus.

Educational Attainment and Curriculum Development

The financial services industry emphasizes the importance of learning diverse skills, as opposed to training for a specific job title. Northeast Pennsylvania has a strong base in education and training by virtue of the numerous colleges and universities, private licensed schools, and training providers throughout the nine counties. By building on that base, programs can be developed to advance students and bolster the region's name recognition to companies in the financial services, information technology and related industries. The following programs aim to increase educational attainment levels among the residents of Northeastern Pennsylvania and target demand driven curriculum development.

  • The Center for Advancing Partnership in Education (CAPE) will receive $292,315 for the Building a Regional Global Language Infrastructure Project, a program that will greatly expand the workforce's ability to understand, communicate, collaborate and compete with Chinese, Arabic, Russian and Japanese companies and cultures, as well as develop a sustainable model of critical foreign language and culture instruction integrated into the regional k-20 system.
  • Wilkes University will receive $219,727 to develop the Accelerated BBA Degree Program, which will allow adult students to attain a Bachelor of Business Administration degree with a specialization in Financial Services Operations. This program will work in collaboration with the Sidhu School of Business and is expected to create a battery of experienced workforce professionals, as well as build a sustainable educational resource.
  • Penn State Worthington Scranton will receive $187,500 for the Security and Risk Analysis and Mitigation for Area College and Secondary Education, Industry, Community and Future Area Professionals Project. The goal of this program will be to provide broad based, subsidized training in Security, Risk and Network Integrity to the area's high school educators and students, financial services and other key area industry personnel and the community at large.
  • Luzerne County Community College will receive $165,000 for GED Completers Transitioning to Postsecondary Education to Prepare for Employment in High Growth Industries. This initiative will be a pilot project for GED completers who would like to focus on pursuing postsecondary education. GED completers will pursue an associate's degree that includes the different educational components necessary to succeed in the financial services industry.
  • The University of Scranton's Kania School of Management will receive $132,000 to develop an Enterprise Resource Planning Program which will focus on education and training through increasing the pool of instructors, creating programs to enhance recruitment within traditional student and adult-learner populations and developing courses in such functional areas as finance, accounting, supply-chain management, business data warehousing, customer-relationship management.
  • Marywood University will receive $92,000 for the Master's of Science Degree in Financial Information Systems Program. This initiative will develop a five-year Bachelor's of Business Administration / Master's of Science degree program in Financial Information Systems. This first-of-its-kind program will include topics in investments, portfolio management, data mining and warehousing, business intelligence and financial software applications.
  • East Stroudsburg University will receive $89,450 for the Business Continuity Training and Marketing Analysis, which will create a business continuity training environment in a data center environment. The goals of the project include providing experiential learning opportunities, technical training and infrastructure to support the workforce needs of Operations/Data Centers; creating a Virtual Operations/Data Center; raising awareness of careers; creating a pipeline of trained workers; and identifying the potential market of financial services companies in the nine-county region.
  • Penn State Berks will receive $55,377 for the Leveraging Information Security Education and Training through Web-Based Distance Learning Program, an online modular approach to expand information security learning in the region for all high school through college level students and then to incumbent workers through continuing education opportunities. The main goal is to design online learning modules and problem-based cases specific to core information assurance subjects that will be used to create customized training programs targeted at specific needs and student levels.
  • Luzerne County Community College will receive $31,850 for the WorkKeys Assessment to Provide a Baseline for Curriculum Development and Skills Gap Identification Program. This initiative will create a model to provide a baseline for curriculum development and skills gap identification based on valid, reliable benchmark data.

Career Development and Pathway Programs

To be more competitive, the Northeastern Pennsylvania region must prove they can develop the workforce as strongly and as quickly as New York City or other competitive regions. The following programs aim to address this issue by ensuring individuals and students understand where the career opportunities are and the variety of educational pathways to attaining those careers.

  • Junior Achievement of Northeastern Pennsylvania will receive $374,000 for the Junior Achievement of Northeastern Pennsylvania and Wilkes University Collaboration for Workforce Readiness. The program will create scholarships to allow students to attend Junior Achievement's 'Finance Park Program' and 'CEO Program,' as well as create new career awareness programs for high school students.
  • Penn State Berks will receive $341,233 for Project Lead the Way, a pathway program in engineering for diversely populated areas. Each county will have one high school that will oversee the program's pre-engineering courses and will receive both educational and administrative support to aid in the initiative's development.
  • Misericordia University will receive $167,486 for a program entitled Preparing Tomorrow's Financial Services Manpower. In partnership with Lackawanna College, Luzerne and Northampton Community College, and 60 regional school districts, the initiative will create a fast-tract program for grades 11 through MBA that will allow students to move into technical jobs in the financial services industry more quickly.
  • The Pike / Wayne Education Partnership will receive $84,000 to develop 21st Century Career Guidance Partnership which will implement a comprehensive career development framework allowing students the opportunity to identify career paths and begin taking the necessary steps to be successful in them.
  • Junior Achievement will receive $55,000 to create a Middle Grade & High School Traditional & Non-Traditional Program Expansion. Junior Achievement will develop hands-on learning programs in Berks, Lehigh and Northampton counties that will focus on economics and personal finance.
  • The Northeast Pennsylvania Employment Consortium will receive $29,560 for The Financial Industry Training and Support Program, a comprehensive career awareness and skill development program that will create a structured and highly focused forum to connect students, guidance professionals, and businesses. The goal of the initiative will be to increase awareness of financial service opportunities and facilitate the appropriate connections to ensure successful matches between students and industry employers.
  • The Lehigh Career & Technical Institute will receive $20,000 for the creation of the Wall Street West Business and Finance Dual Enrollment Initiative, a partnership that will allow high school students to enter the financial services workforce quicker by taking college-level classes. The overall goal will be to develop a pipeline of students that are work ready for careers in business and finance.

Workforce Development Systems

Companies frequently site the quality of the workforce and the talent development system as factors in deciding whether to remain or locate in a specific area. While this mind set exists in Northeastern Pennsylvania, it needs to be stronger and more efficient if the region expects to be an industry leader and a premier locale for financial services firms. The following programs aim to integrate systems and align education, economic development and employment:

  • The Lehigh Valley Workforce Investment Board will receive $1 million and be the lead project manager for the NEPA Business Education Workforce Partnership. In cooperation with the region's four other Workforce Investment Boards, 69 superintendants, four business education partnerships and the state Department of Education, the goal will be to develop business education partnerships, implement structured career exploration models and to provide a regionalized career pathway awareness program throughout the nine-county region.
  • GSP Consulting Corporation will receive $655,000 to create the Wall Street West Higher Education Consortium, an official collaboration of the region's educational assets that is expected to be recognized as the primary source for employers to build a well-trained workforce.
  • Workforce Wayne will receive $285,000 to create the Building a 21st Century Workforce Delivery System, a model and strategic plan to create an operational framework for delivery of services based on collaboration and regionalism that supports high skill and high wage opportunities.
  • TeamPA will receive $250,000 for the Northeast PA - Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) Center. This project, being developed in other regions throughout the state and county, will create new and strategic methods for teaching these core curriculum topics in classrooms across the Wall Street West region. This project will be completed in collaboration with the National Governor's Association.

Incumbent Worker Skills Enhancement

Because the financial services and information technology industries are among the most rapidly changing business environments, a significant shift in the training of the current workforce to support retention and growth of incumbent firms is as important as attracting new organizations. The following programs aim to address this issue:

  • The Lackawanna County Workforce Investment Board will receive $500,000 to further develop the commonwealth's Industry Partnership and Worker Training Program. This initiative supports the formation of industry partnerships to address competitiveness and enhance incumbent skills.
  • The commonwealth's WEDnetPA Program will receive $475,000 for the continuation and expansion of their training and skill development programs. WEDnetPA partners with the community colleges and state higher education system schools to administer these programs to employees at incumbent companies.  

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