Skills and Workforce Budgets Are Cut but Survive

The CompTIA mission is to advance the global IT industry. A cornerstone of that mission is to support a national network for career training and education. Tomorrow’s IT entrepreneurs may be today’s student or dislocated worker that needs access to training and knowledge. Hence our deep engagement and support for federal, state and local programs that meet these objectives.

On April 15th the President signed into law H.R. 1473, the long-term continuing resolution that will fund the federal government through the end of FY11 (September 30, 2011). As a political document, this makes clear that support for career and technical education will be diminished.

The bill cuts $39.9 billion from federal programs across the board. Some very key education and technical training programs were not immune to the budget axe. For example:

• The Tech Prep program (grants to support secondary and post-secondary pursuit of CTE) program was eliminated.


• The Perkins Career and Technical Education program basic state grants were cut by $37.3 million. The cut is said to impact funds to be disbursed on July 1 for the 2011-2012 school year.


• The Workforce Investment Act (WIA) state formula grants were reduced by more than $300 million


• The Career Pathways Innovation Fund, a Department of Labor Program that provided support to community colleges for career pathway programs, was cut by $250 million ($125 million in FY 2011 funds, plus a $125 million rescission of FY 2010 funds).

Clearly these collective cuts represent a very serious setback for CTE. Nevertheless, the “good news” is that this could have been much worse. The original continuing resolution budget for 2011 (H.R. 1) would have zeroed out all new funding for the Workforce Investment Act (title I) Adult, Dislocated Workers and Youth formula grant programs in Program Year 2011. In addition, it would have eliminated nearly all funding for WIA’s national discretionary grants and rescinded $175 million in unobligated Dislocated Worker Reserve and Emergency Grant funding. HR 1 would also have cut the maximum Pell Grant award by $845 from current maximum level of $5550. Clearly, vigorous lobbying by the CTE community averted deeper cuts.

What conclusions can we draw from this exercise? Budgets are tight and there are no sacred cows. Nevertheless, it is up to the IT community to join in chorus with workforce development and education proponents across the country. Congress needs to know that career and technical training is a vital component to economic growth.

Congress is voting on the 2012 budget outline as we speak. The President already targeted Perkins grants for deeper cuts in his proposed 2012 budget. We need to speak out and let Congress and the President know that CTE is exactly the sort of strategic investment in the future that our economic prosperity relies upon.