This quarter, UNITE-LA highlighted a critical challenge facing California's workforce development system: turning investments in career-connected learning into consistent, high-quality work-based learning opportunities for young people requires stronger coordination among employers, educators and workforce partners. In a CalMatters commentary, UNITE-LA President Alysia Bell outlined the need for stronger regional coordination around employer engagement, sustainable funding for paid experiences and better connections between education and employment. A new $500,000 award from the ECMC Foundation gives UNITE-LA an opportunity to help address these systemic barriers and put many of these ideas into action by building the foundation for a more coordinated statewide approach to high-quality work-based learning.

Through the 24-month ECMC-funded initiative, Building Statewide Regional Infrastructure to Scale High-Quality Work-Based Learning in California, UNITE-LA will develop the research, partnerships, coalition infrastructure and policy recommendations needed to strengthen that statewide system. The project will bring together education, workforce, employer, business, community and policy partners to examine promising models, map existing work-based learning initiatives and public funding, identify data and coordination needs, and develop practical strategies to strengthen employer participation and expand access to paid, career-aligned experiences.

A central component of the work will be launching a dedicated statewide work-based learning coalition. Through stakeholder interviews, briefings, webinars, site visits, employer engagement and coordination with existing statewide coalitions, the initiative will build shared understanding and alignment around the infrastructure needed to scale paid work-based learning.

By June 2028, UNITE-LA aims to move the conversation from a collection of fragmented programs toward a statewide policy and infrastructure framework that can support sustainable and equitable expansion of paid work-based learning. The work will focus particularly on the systems and policies needed to expand access for first-generation, low-income and historically underserved young adults and strengthen connections among education, workforce development and economic mobility.

For more information, please reach out to Edgar Castillo, Senior Manager, Workforce Development Policy & Systems, at [email protected].