ACT in the News 
WCCC to offer training for skilled jobs – Detroit News
The program, called Right Skills Now, is an expedited manufacturing training program led by The Manufacturing Institute, The National Association of Manufacturers, The National Institute for Metalworking Skills, American College Testing and the President's Council on Jobs and Competitiveness. WCCCD, Michigan's largest urban community college, is the first state college to launch Right Skills Now.
Local program aims to help teens find summer jobs – KOAM TV
Sarcoxie businesses and economic leaders will pay for all juniors and seniors to get the assessment created by the A.C.T. Company. The pay off for the community is its ability to show prospective businesses it has a ready workforce. "It's a way to prove what you can do," says Bubba Evansco, the Workforce Investment Board Outreach and Recruitment Coordinator. "You'll earn the certificate, there's different levels of the certificate, you show that to an employer. Now a hundred kids that came out of accounting class have same degree you have NCRC, you've verified, your work skills send you to the top of the heap immediately."
ACT mandatory for teens – The Baton Rouge Advocate
All [Louisiana] public high school juniors will be required to take the ACT test, which measures college readiness, as part of a sweeping plan announced Tuesday to better prepare students for college and careers.
Corridor Families React To Education Director’s Decision To Take The ACT – KGAN TV
Parents that spoke with CBS2/FOX28 at Iowa City West High School said they don't mind mandatory ACT testing as long as it isn't the only measure of student achievement. The folks at ACT agree. “It shouldn’t be the only measure. As an organization we say it’s a combination of many factors, it's your test scores, it's your high school GPA, it's some of the extra circular activities," Steve Kappler, the Assistant Vice President of Market Strategy and Educational Services with ACT said.
Student wins ACT’s national poster contest – South Florida Sun Sentinel
The ACT is utilizing Christian Klein's shadow to encourage students around the country to prepare for college. Klein, a senior at Cardinal Gibbons High School in Fort Lauderdale, won first place in the ACT's annual poster contest, earning him a $5,000 college scholarship. His artistic creation is of himself — as a silhouette — in front of three bold red stripes with the text, "4,140 colleges, 16.3 million students, only one you."
Ready to Work program prepares job seekers – AlexcityOutlook
After completing several weeks of classes, Ready to Work students have finished up their finals and are ready to start looking for jobs. All of the students who participated in RTW over the past several weeks highly recommended the program and said it is “informative and refreshing” especially for individuals seeking to further their education, [...]
Manufacturing Training Can Get You A Job Fast – WSPA
Stephen Young signed up for free Work Keys certification where he learned skills in math, reading and finding information. Once Faiveley Transport saw the Work Keys training Young had, they jumped at the opportunity to hire him. Experts from marketplace staffing said many companies will follow suit.
Local managers: on-the-job training needed to improve workforce-BusINess
Job profiling and having applicants take skills exams such as WorkKeys can help reduce turnover by 30 to 60 percent, said Keith Hamilton, an Anderson, Ind.-based regional corporate college program manager for Ivy Tech Community College. Through these processes, he said, new hires are less likely to get frustrated and quit or be fired because of poor performance.
Changes in Metalworking Trades Mean Changes for Apprentice Training-American Machinist
Today’s metalworking environment has changed dramatically over the past two decades but many apprenticeship programs haven’t matched those changes. One trade organization that is transforming the way metalworking apprentices are trained is TMA. TMA is a Park Ridge, Ill.-based, full service manufacturing association for companies with various services and programs....Getting started in TMA’s Apprentice Training Program requires potential students to begin with a WorkKeys job skills assessment program, developed by ACT. WorkKeys also can help employers to select, hire, train, develop, and retain a high-performance workforce. WorkKeys assesses employee competence in several areas to assess the participant’s readiness for training. WorkKeys focus on three areas: Applied Mathematics, Locating Information, and Reading for Information.
Gov. Haley, ACT Announce SC Job Training Initiative-WSPA Spartanburg
ACT, a non-profit, chose the Palmetto State and three others for the year-long Certified Work Ready Communities Academy. The initiative, which starts next week, will integrate all of the state’s job training and employment programs and bring together several state agencies including Commerce and the Department of Employment and Workforce. The main goal is to work with business communities around the state to see what types of training and skills companies are looking for in new employees. Workforce centers across the state already use ACT products, like the WorkKeys certification, to assess workers’ skills, train them and give them credentials. Some of the programs test “hard skills” like working with machinery and others prove communication or technical document literacy. According to WorkReady SC more than 160,000 South Carolinians already have some form of ACT certification.
The Growing Potential Of Free Market Education-Forbes Magazine
While the United States should be pushing alternatives to the traditional four-year college, it also should be pushing alternatives to the way we gauge preparedness for the workplace. The market can provide that as well. A good example is the five-year-old National Career Readiness Certificate (NCRC) program, developed by ACT, Inc. – the nonprofit organization that created the American College Testing Program, the primary alternative to the SAT.The idea behind NCRC, which has been endorsed by the American Association of Community Colleges, is to make it easier for employers to assess the skills of potential employees. As Mac Macllroy, past president of the Michigan Manufacturers Association, observed, “Predictability, uniformity, and certainty are universal goals of executives. The NCRC does this for the hiring process.”
Advanced Systems, Inc. to begin job-profiling program-Brandon Valley Challenger
Advanced Systems, Inc. has announced their intention to partner with the Department of Labor and Regulation (DLR) in their National Career Readiness Certificate (NCRC) job-profiling program...“We see this program as a very positive move for our company and the community,” said ASI Human Resources Director Mary Drumm. “We are excited to move forward.”
Employers hear how job applicant assessments can cut costs-Quincy Herald Whig
Knapheide Manufacturing Company hosted the program on WorkKeys assessments and the National Career Readiness Certificate (NCRC). Vice President Jim Rubottom said assessment programs are appealing to employers who want to avoid high employee turnover among new hires...Berner Foods Inc. of Dakota, Ill., reported that in 2009 a single department there had 13 terminations that cost the company $215,000. In 2010 there were 12 terminations in the same department at a cost of $188,000. After adding NCRC and WorkKeys assessments to the hiring system, the company had only one termination in 2011, with minimal costs.
Showing our leaders what manufacturing is-Plastics Today
Hoffer Plastics is one of the U.S. plastics industry's oldest family-owned molding businesses, having been founded in 1953 by Robert Hoffer. ...Sen. Durbin participated in a roundtable discussion with Hoffer executives and representatives from local business and educational organizations about the innovative ACT WorkKeys assessment program. WorkKeys administers a battery of tests which measures an individual's proficiency and suitability for various jobs. During 2011, Hoffer added 18 employees whose reading skills and qualifications were certified by the WorkKeys assessment process, which Hoffer executives said helped them streamline the screening, interviewing and hiring process.
A National Career Readiness Certificate Has Emerged to Connect Minnesota Businesses With a Skilled Workforce – Park Rapids Enterprise
A National Career Readiness Certificate has emerged to connect Minnesota businesses with a skilled workforce, the initiative stemming from the challenge employers face in finding qualified applicants. The test not only demonstrates job seekers’ abilities, but helps employers hire and promote skilled employees.
Aligning the Common Core and the National Career Readiness Certificate-The Center for Energy Workforce Development
One of the many stackable credentials now being used by those in the energy and other industries to determine work readiness is the National Career Readiness Certificate (NCRC), which measures foundational skills (such as problem-solving and critical thinking) needed for success in the workplace. Recently, ACT, Inc. undertook an analysis of how this new credential aligns with the Common Core State Standards for education, which define the knowledge and skills students should learn from kindergarten through the end of high school. What it found was that there are many areas where the two overlap, and some in which they do not.
Removing hurdles-Salt Lake City Tribune
For some high school students nearing graduation, the fee they must pay to take the ACT is the first financial hurdle standing in their path toward college. For these teenagers from low-income homes, the $34 minimum cost to take the test one time is hard to come by. Still, it’s in their interests and the best interest of the state for all high school students to take the ACT. That’s why the Legislature should pass Sen. Margaret Dayton’s bill to make the ACT the required standardized test for high school juniors, at state expense.
Nebraska schools experimenting with ACT-KTIV Television
As part of a multi-year project set up by the Nebraska legislature some students will take the ACT test during their junior year. It could become the new standard for testing for students."It will expose all of our students to the ACT and it will also give us really good information about where our kids are and then how can we improve as a system to ensure that we're providing those experiences," said Vernon Fisher, superintendent at South Sioux City high school.
Handling the learning curve: Career readiness certificate puts workers at the “head of the line”-VTDigger.org
The significant challenge for businesses is finding enough qualified people and helping them to develop necessary new skills. Many Vermont workers meanwhile struggle to keep a job or prepare for something better. And for those who are under- or unemployed, adds Bill Morison, a former New Hampshire businessman who coordinates workforce development initiatives for the Community College of Vermont, the problem can be anything from learning how to succeed in an interview, developing more confidence, dealing with stress, or obtaining a credential that will provide an edge. In response, the Labor Department and CCV have been building and refining a collaborative approach to workforce education and development in recent years, highlighted by an employee credentialing program that leads to a National Career Readiness Certificate.
Looking for a job in Juneau County? Here’s a way to impress employers – Star Times
Gesler said one way to prove those skills to employers is to earn the National Career Readiness Certificate (NCRC) - Wisconsin's work-readiness credential. According to Gesler, the NCRC is a "tool that demonstrates to employers that an individual possesses the basic skills required for success in today's workforce."
