Community Education program brochures Metro North ABE - Consortium newsletter, Feb. 2016 | Page 4

Workforce Partnerships
Bridging the gap between what we teach our students
and what employers need from their employees
Under the Workforce Innovation and
Opportunity Act (WIOA), and the federal guidelines that fund ABE (Title II)
and workforce activities (Title I), programs between WIOA titles are required
to partner to produce shared education
and employment outcomes that benefit
the community.
Metro North ABE has long collaborated
with the Anoka County Workforce Center (WFC), and especially Anoka Technical College (ATC) and Anoka Ramsey
Community College (ARCC), to ensure
that our community has access to relevant education and training opportunities that result in employment and a
career or education ladder that impacts
participants for a lifetime.
The economic landscape of Anoka
County is routinely surveyed by the Department of Employment and Economic
Development (DEED) and the Anoka
County WFC to ensure the needs of

local employers are being
addressed. These departments work directly with
employers to seek out potential employees, and
advocate training for hard-to-fill or
entry-level positions by working with
ABE and post-secondary schools. Training programs are then developed in
partnership with employers to address
those needs.
Some of these training programs are
made possible through local, regional,
or state grant revenue. Some local ABE
programs integrate industry-specific
training into their regular programming.
This practice ensures there are skilled
workers for the current jobs in the communities where the workers live.
Healthcare Pathways
The Healthcare Pathways program addresses the need for skilled nursing assistants in the long-term healthcare

A Healthcare Pathways Success Story

In November, 2015, eleven Metro North
Adult Basic Education (ABE) students
celebrated their completion of the
Health Care Pathways program.

One of the students, Amy Plemel, 43,
struggled through high school academically before she dropped out over 26
years ago. It took going through the
ABE program three times before she
was finally able to turn things around.

A few years after Plemel dropped out of
high school, she enrolled in adult basic
education in Forest Lake, but something
still just wasn’t clicking. “I couldn’t get

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Metro North Consortium

the math, it was just way too advanced
for me,” Plemel explained. She enrolled
in ABE classes again in 1997 through
Metro North ABE in Blaine, but missed
earning her GED by just a few points.

Plemel went on to have twin boys, now
age 10, one of whom was diagnosed
with autism at age 5. After watching
how health care staff worked with her
son at occupational therapy appointments each week, she developed an interest in the nursing and health care
field. “I saw how much they changed
his life and how important they were in
his diagnosis,” Plemel says.

field. Working in partnership with local
healthcare employers, the colleges,
Metro North ABE, and workforce centers developed a 100-hour bridge class
to help prepare learners for their college
classes in the healthcare field. The
bridge class includes building employability and academic skills such as medical terminology, research paper writing,
and reading for healthcare careers.
When learners complete the bridge program, they move onto the college-level
courses.

Local employers play a critical role in
two parts of the project: first, in development of the curriculum and course selections based on their employment
needs; second, in providing tours and
clinical sites for participants. With over
Plemel came back to Metro North ABE
in April 2015 and learned about the new
state diploma program. She thought, “I
need to do everything I can to change
my family’s life and give them opportunities.” Plemel earned the new Minnesota state diploma, and the title of a
CNA and a Home Health Care Aide
through Healthcare Pathways, a collaborative program between Metro North
ABE, Anoka-Hennepin Technical College, ARCC and the Anoka County
Workforce Center.

Plemel left the Healthcare Pathways
program with a job and another interview lined up, after attending recruitment days coordinated by the Anoka