Overview

There is a strong demand from students, community college systems, and employers for short-term workforce training that creates paths for students to attain college degrees and credentials that in turn help them achieve better wages in the workforce. However, workforce development programs at community colleges tend to be locally developed and have widely variable outcomes. There is some evidence that effective workforce programs align with high-demand jobs and offer “stackable” short-term credentials (credentials that can be added in sequence as a person moves up a career ladder), strong advising, and additional comprehensive support, but the field has yet to identify community college models that can be replicated across different contexts.

Lorain County Community College (LCCC) in Ohio has developed the promising Fast Track program. Through this program, students can gain credentials in high-demand industries within one semester while also earning college credits. Industries include healthcare, IT, finance, and advanced manufacturing. After earning the credential, Fast Track is designed for students to receive monetary incentives and advising support to stack additional advanced certificates and degrees (including associate’s and bachelor’s).

MDRC and RAND are partnering with LCCC on a mixed-methods study and technical assistance project with the goal of building evidence on the Fast Track model and exploring the feasibility of replicating the program in community colleges across several states and assessing its efficacy there. In addition, the study will reveal more about how states and systems are supporting community colleges in strengthening their short-term training programs and about the factors impeding and facilitating efforts to replicate this promising model on a larger scale.