Wisconsin

Shifting Gears in Wisconsin is known as the Regional Industry Skills Education project (RISE). The goal of the RISE initiative is to help secure good careers for low-income Wisconsin adults and a skilled workforce for employers by increasing the number of low-skilled adults who earn postsecondary credentials related to high-demand jobs. RISE seeks to create a state policy environment in which career pathways, including bridge programs, can flourish.

In the initial planning phase of Shifting Gears (1.0), Wisconsin:

Created the RISE career pathway model and defined career pathway operational elements;
Convened stakeholders throughout the state’s technical college and workforce development systems to increase understanding of the career pathways model:
Constructed a technical college “pipeline” data set to explore postsecondary transition and completion rates among adult education and developmental education students and conducted some descriptive analysis;
Funded the development of prototype career pathway and bridge curricula;
Funded regional projects to engage industry in career pathway work and to create tools for future RISE industry engagement work;
Defined the RISE initiative’s target population and middle-skill career job opportunities; and
Identified workforce development and technical college system administrative policy challenges and began work to develop policy solutions.

As part of Shifting Gears implementation (2.0), Wisconsin is working to address workforce development and technical college system policy challenges to implement RISE career pathway and bridge programs statewide. Wisconsin’s other policy priorities include:

Improving the state’s ability to formally recognize technical certificates and diplomas that are part of an associate degree pathway;
Using new WIA waivers to begin to recognize career pathway chunks as credentials for purposes of WIA accountability measures;
Developing a communications plan to build public and private support for career pathways;
Revising its adult learner pipeline, conducting deeper analysis, and extending the analysis to the local college level. This data work is part of a broader effort to put in place the data infrastructure needed to examine adult learners’ educational transitions and outcomes to inform RISE policy change efforts, strategic communications campaign, and career pathways development and evaluation; and
Creating career pathways across the state.

For more information, see Wisconsin's Shifting Gears Policy Agenda and Action Plan and a graphic overview of Wisconsin RISE Career Pathways.

Read more about successful RISE programs in Northcentral Technical College and Moraine Park Technical College.

State Profiles

RISE Career Counselor Testimonial – Alfonso Studesville, Madison Area Technical College
RISE Administrator Testimonial – Colleen Hruska, Marywood Center
RISE Student Testimonial – Coralie Benson, Northcentral Technical College
RISE Student Testimonial – Della Bloom, Madison Area Technical College
RISE Student Testimonial – Josie Stetson, Moraine Park Technical College
RISE Student Testimonial – Juana Ines Anderson, Madison Area Technical College
Program Administrator Testimonials – Lisa Lomasney and Amy Lemkuil, Madison Area Technical College
Program Administrator Testimonial – Valerie Donnelly, ADVOCAP Head Start (partner with Moraine Park Technical College)

State Resources

Building Bridges in Wisconsin: Connecting Working Adults with College Credentials and Career Advancement (May 2010)
This report presents recent data and analysis on the educational and workforce challenges facing the state, and provides an overview of statewide efforts to meet this challenge by moving more working adults through the educational pipeline and towards family-sustaining careers. The report profiles various "bridge" programs from technical colleges throughout the state, including several bridges developed under the RISE initiative.

RISE Guidelines and Operational Elements (April 2010)
The principles of the RISE initiative and an operational description of Wisconsin's model for career pathways and bridges.

RISE Bridges and Career Pathways to Advance Student Success in Postsecondary and Developmental Education (October 2009)
This presentation, given by RISE partners and CLASP at the National Council for Workforce Education conference in October 2009, provides a detailed overview of the work on developmental education bridge programs supported by Shifting Gears.

Key Middle-Skill Opportunities in Wisconsin (September 2009)
This analysis of labor market projections for 2006-2016 indicates the types of occupations in Wisconsin with sufficient demand, adequate pay potential, and appropriate education and training requirements that merit attention for career pathway development.

Local News Station Report on a Welding Bridge Project Sponsored by RISE (February 2009)
Students studying welding at Chippewa Valley Technical College were interviewed for this report on a RISE-sponsored bridge program.

ABCs of Wisconsin’s RISE initiative (May 2007)
This overview of RISE describes the policy goals and strategies of Shifting Gears in Wisconsin.

Skilled Workers, Quality Jobs : Meeting the Needs of Wisconsin’s Workers and Businesses
This policy brief by the Center on Wisconsin Strategy (COWS) provides an analysis of the key challenges for Wisconsin’s workforce and economy and outlines critical state policy changes, particularly within the state’s education and training systems that can improve the skill-building efforts of the current Wisconsin workforce.