Collaboration with community partners and industry engagement are key factors in cultivating successful IET programs. Resources in this section support providers in building and maintaining partnerships with students, employers, and community service providers to ensure that IET programs meet the community’s evolving needs. This includes tools and processes that can be considered and/or adapted for various contexts.
Vision and Purpose
The resources in Vision and Purpose support approaches to meeting community needs and adjusting needs during the planning, implementation, and evaluation of IET programs.
Integrated Education and Training Design Toolkit and Train-the-Trainer Resources
American Institutes for Research and Safal Partners (2024)
When choosing the focus of your IET program, it is important to consider local partners in the implementation. Page 7 of the toolkit provides an IET Readiness Assessment and guiding questions to help explore and refine your vision and purpose.
Business-Adult Education Partnerships Toolkit
This toolkit, developed as part of an OCTAE federal initiative, provides an organized set of reports, toolkits, and training resources to support local business leaders and adult educators in establishing effective partnerships.
Linking Adult Education to Workforce Development in 2018–19: Early Implementation of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act at the Local Level
American Institutes for Research (2023)
This Institute of Education Sciences−funded report evaluates how local adult education providers are implementing Title II of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) to strengthen the link between adult education and workforce development. The report highlights the instructional approaches used, the extent of collaboration with workforce partners, and the challenges faced in meeting performance-reporting requirements.
Processes and Tools
The resources in Processes and Tools offer processes and/or tools to support communication with partners.
Promising Practices for Collaborating with Industry and Workforce Development Partners in Integrated Education and Training Programs
American Institutes for Research (2024)
This publication highlights how IET program providers can collaborate with industry and workforce development organizations to establish IET program design with learner-worker training or work-based learning opportunities. These program design strategies—work-based learning and learner-worker training models—can be implemented in combination with strategic co-enrollment in WIOA Title I and Title II and the use of alternative assessments that align with learner-workers’ career goals. The brief highlights state efforts in Pennsylvania and Rhode Island and program examples from the College of Western Idaho, Northampton Community College in Pennsylvania, Cranston Adult Education Programs in Rhode Island, and Workforce Solutions Brazos Valley in Texas.
Expanding Boundaries: Taking a Regional Approach to IELCE/IET
RTI International (2024)
This brief from the Enhancing Access for Refugees and New Americans project outlines a series of regional approaches aimed at delivering IET programs that leverage resources across providers and expand access for Integrated English Literacy and Civics Education participants. The brief introduces several regional approaches, including virtual statewide offerings, correctional educational offerings, workforce regions, and regional offerings. It concludes with a chart to guide approaches to overcoming challenges.
Tips & Tools to Connect the Adult Ed Community to American Job Centers
Illinois Center for Specialized Professional Support (2022)
This recorded webinar features a director and a career pathways navigator who discuss strategies to build partnerships between adult education providers and American Job Centers while also connecting local digital literacy efforts to the network. The content emphasizes the importance of building and maintaining strong relationships, understanding partner ecosystems, and communicating effectively to improve service integration.
A Resource Guide to Engaging Employers
Jobs For the Future (2015)
This resource guide for engaging employers provides working models of successful employer engagement and lessons for securing and sustaining partnerships with employers in the development of career pathways and IET programs.
Competency Model Clearinghouse
U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (2024)
The Competency Model Clearinghouse is a website sponsored by the U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration, and it provides competency models for twenty-six key industry sectors. Each competency model was developed by industry-leading organizations and includes worksheets to support employers and trainers in analyzing curriculum and credentials, identifying key competency needs, and assessing existing and missing competencies within training programs. The clearinghouse also includes tools that employers and training providers can use to build their own models that reflect the skills, knowledge, and abilities needed for targeted industries and occupations.
How Educators and Employers Can Align Efforts to Fill Middle-Skills STEM Jobs
RAND Corporation (2019)
This study examines the oil and natural gas fields in three states to understand how educators and employers are working together to meet the demand for workers in STEM fields. The study provides suggestions for what institutions, instructors, and employers can do to prepare individuals for well-paying middle-skills jobs that require specialized education beyond high school but not a four-year college degree.
Expanded Relationships with Training Partners: Innovations from CBOs
Illinois Center for Specialized Professional Support (2022)
This webinar features presenters from a variety of Illinois adult education providers describing some of their Integrated Career & Academic Preparation System courses and their related partnerships. Literacy Chicago describes their UNITE HERE Chicago Hospitality Institute and how they partnered with union and high-end restaurant employers and staffing agencies to provide English speaker of other languages (ESOL) and contextualized applied math content via their Extra Seasoning curriculum; they include some expansion and scaling plans as well as advice about how to manage a successful partnership, adapt to changing needs, and prepare instructional staff for an IET environment. Other providers explore their certified nursing assistant ESOL program with placement and clinical partners; plans for future information technology, entrepreneurial, and energy IETs; and additional culinary manager courses.
Collaborating with Local Businesses for On-site Learning
Illinois Center for Specialized Professional Support (2022)
This video describes a collaboration among Mundelein High School, John Wood Community College, and an employer, Ruprecht Company, in Illinois to offer work-based learning opportunities for adult learners. Through this partnership, adult learners receive on-site English classes and are supported by financial incentives from the employer. The effort has resulted in high attendance, significant learning gains, and even job advancements for participating employees.