The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) improves the workforce system, aligning it with regional economies and strengthening the network of 2,500 American Job Centers to deliver more comprehensive services to workers, job seekers and employers. It strives for a more job-driven approach to training and skills development by building closer ties among key workforce partners – business leaders, workforce boards, labor unions, community colleges and non-profits, and state and local officials. In South Carolina, the American Job Centers (AJCs) are called SC Works Centers.
The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) will help job seekers and workers access employment, education, training, and support services to succeed in the labor market and match employers with skilled workers they need to compete in the global economy. The WIOA reaffirms the role of the American Job Center (AJC) system, a cornerstone of the public workforce investment system, and brought together and enhanced several key employment, education, and training programs. In recent years over 20 million people annually turn to these programs to obtain good jobs and a pathway to the middle class. WIOA continues to advance services to these job seekers and employers.
The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) promotes the use of career pathways and sector partnerships to increase employment in in-demand industries and occupations. To help local economies target the needs of job seekers, WIOA allows the full transfer of funds between the Adult and Dislocated Worker programs and adds basic skills deficient as a priority category for Adult services. WIOA also focuses Youth program services to out-of-school youth. The Act strengthens services for unemployment insurance claimants and it merges core and intensive services into a brand new category called career services, clarifying there is no required sequence of services.
The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) increases individuals with disabilities’ access to high-quality workforce services to prepare them for competitive integrated employment. It requires better employer engagement and promotes physical and programmatic accessibility to employment and training services for individuals with disabilities. Youth with disabilities receive extensive pre-employment transition services to obtain and retain competitive integrated employment. It creates an Advisory Committee on strategies to increase competitive integrated employment for individuals with disabilities.
The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA)
makes access to services easier by requiring the co-location of the Wagner-Peyser Employment Service in AJCs and by adding the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program as a mandatory partner. Other mandatory WIOA partners include:
- Employment and training programs authorized under the WIOA for adults, dislocated workers, and youth;
- Adult education and literacy programs;
- Vocational Rehabilitation programs;
- Senior Community Service Employment programs (i.e., AARP, Goodwill);
- Post-secondary vocational education programs (college and technical education);
- Trade Adjustment Act programs;
- Veterans employment and training programs;
- Employment and training programs through Community Action Agencies;
- Employment and training programs through public housing authorities;
- Unemployment Compensation programs; and
- Programs authorized under the Second Chance Act of 2007 for the responsible reintegration of ex-offenders.
The SC Works system can offer access to all of the programs above based on need.
Interested in the WIOA Program?
Please call (864) 467-8080 and schedule to attend an orientation meeting(s) to further discuss the WIOA services made available through SC Works Greenville. The orientation meetings are held in order to ensure that customers are fully aware of the available options and services provided by the SC Works Greenville One-Stop Delivery System to assist in obtaining full-time employment.
The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) may be found at the following website www.doleta.gov/WIOA/