Congresswoman Barbara Lee Announces $14.9 Million in Federal Grant Funding for Regional Job Training for Workers Displaced by Foreign Trade
Contact: Katherine Jolly, 510-763-0370
Oakland, CA – Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-CA) announced today that a consortium of 10 East Bay community colleges, which includes Merritt College, Laney College, and Berkeley City College, will be awarded $14.9 million in grants for Design it-Build it-Ship it (DBS), a regional workforce initiative that seeks to retrain displaced workers in emerging manufacturing and technology fields through the Department of Labor’s (DOL) Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training Grant Program.
The DOL grant program provides eligible institutions of higher education funds to expand and improve their ability to deliver education and career training programs that can be completed in two years or less. The grant program was intended to meet the educational or career training needs of workers who have lost their jobs as a result of foreign trade.
The Los Medanos College Consortium was awarded $14.9 million to fund DBS. DBS will create a regional workforce system by developing a regional “career path” educational system with stackable certificates within and across the 10 DBS Community Colleges, strengthen and link training and referral placement systems that integrate the work of the colleges One Stop Career Center System, and the develop “career transfer pathways” from the community colleges to the University of California and California State University to facilitate advanced Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics training and education. Colleges in the consortium receiving awards include:
· Berkeley City College
· Chabot College
· College of Alameda
· Contra Costa College
· Diablo Valley College
· Laney College
· Los Medanos College
· Merritt College
· Ohlone College
· Solano College
“I am pleased and excited that the consortium representing East Bay colleges was selected to receive this critical and highly competitive funding,” said Congresswoman Lee. “This funding will provide area community colleges critical funding to help retrain individuals who lost their jobs to foreign trade in emerging manufacturing and technology fields. I have worked closely with many of the education and industry partners in this consortium and am confident that their collaboration will yield real results for the East Bay. Together we are rebuilding an East Bay economy of the future that is built to last.”
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