PROVIDENCE – When experts gather to discuss long-term economic development in Rhode Island, the story line is often a tale of two economies. By traditional metrics, Rhode Island operates within a poor business climate, with a heavy tax burden, and huge gaps in its skilled, trained workforce.

For those who dwell within the health care and innovation ecosystems, the future Rhode Island economy looks much more promising, driven by startups and the new health care reform landscape, which are creating a demand for competitive, good-paying jobs.

Straddling both sides of this economic divide is Rick Brooks, the executive director of the R.I. Governor’s Workforce Board. It is his responsibility to develop policies and programs to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of the state’s workforce development system.

Brooks’ mission is to increase the education and skill levels of Rhode Island workers, and at the same time, address the workforce needs of Rhode Island employers.

Brooks, who became head of the Governor’s Workforce Board in November of 2011, is about to enter his third year navigating through choppy economic waters. ConvergenceRI interviewed Brooks recently to get a better understanding of how the state views the growing knowledge economy and the convergence of sectors within the innovation ecosystem in terms of workforce investments.

ConvergenceRI: How does the Governor’s Workforce Board invest in meeting the workforce needs of the knowledge economy? And how does this translate into jobs?
BROOKS: Our work is not organized within that kind of framework. In FY 2014, the Governor’s Workforce Board has about $9.5 million to invest. At the direction of the legislature, some $3.8 million supports adult education. The rationale for that investment is that a significant number of Rhode Islanders have not finished high school or had any education beyond high school.

The focus of adult education is core foundation skills, reading, writing, math and English-speaking skills, [targeted] at entry-level workers and preparing them for post-secondary education.

Another significant portion – about $1.8 million – is invested for incumbent worker training programs. These are grants to businesses to upgrade the skills of their workforce, so the worker and the business remain competitive.

These are public-private partnerships, with every business putting in the same amount, leveraging the public sector to increase productivity.

Another category is youth programs. We support programs that prepare young people for the workplace through career exploration, work readiness and subsidized work experiences. The total investment is about $2 million, most of which is for subsidized summer work experiences, through 1,500 summer jobs.

ConvergenceRI: Is there a direct correlation between workforce training and job creation?
BROOKS: Not all of these programs immediately result in a job. Some of the folks who receive adult education services already have jobs. We are helping to upgrade their skills, increasing their competitiveness, preparing them for the next job. Workforce development is a continuum.

Most public workforce funds in Rhode Island come from the federal government – about 77 percent are federal dollars. They tend to be somewhat prescriptive about services.

These services are networked through the Rhode Island unemployment office, helping the unemployed look for training and other services, training to find a match, to support people who are out of the workforce.

There are also funds that support people on welfare [to find jobs], the RIWorks program, and to help train people coming out of the prison system. There are other federal funds going into adult education.

ConvergenceRI: Are there any workforce programs that specifically address the needs of the Rhode Island’s knowledge economy?
BROOKS: The knowledge economy is a very broad, far-reaching concept that incorporates a number of different industry sectors. We typically make investments through sectors.

We have supported industry partners in a number of sectors, and many of those sectors contribute to the knowledge economy – such as health care, information technology, and biosciences. And, depending on how you define knowledge economy, you could include the defense and advanced manufacturing sectors.

What all of these sectors have in common is that there are a fair number of higher-wage jobs that require a post-secondary education. They provide important potential opportunities for the Rhode Island workforce and the economy.

The challenge to our work in workforce development is to be able to project what the workforce needs are likely to be in the future and not just what they are today.

In some cases, it will require a shift in the resource and priorities, so that the educational and training system are aligned better with those projected opportunities.

It’s not something that can be typically done on a dime.

Many institutions of higher education are already working well with information and knowledge economy types of businesses. And we have feeder programs both at the community college level and high school level that are developing pathways for traditional students as well as returning students, to move in the direction of jobs that are in the knowledge economy.

ConvergenceRI: Can you give some examples of these programs that the Governor’s Workforce Board has invested in?
BROOKS: We have a program with New England Tech in shipbuilding. And, we are supporting an advanced nurse residency program in Rhode Island. We have a program with the Tech Collective to retrain unemployed workers that have a background in information technology.

ConvergenceRI: What are the most important factors for success moving forward?
BROOKS: Public-private partnerships – partnerships between business and educational and training providers.
You can’t prepare people for the workforce if you don’t have engaged business partners who are providing information about what’s happening in the classroom, the technical skills as well as the core competencies, work readiness skills and expectations.

Another thing that needs to happen more is experiential learning – with internships not only for high school students but also for unemployed adults. Meaningful work experiences that introduce them to opportunities in a particular field, which, in many cases, leads directly to a job.

Employers tell us that candidates don’t have the work readiness and/or the work experience. Job seekers ask us: how do you get the experience if you can’t get the jobs.

The best work readiness skills come from working. We are looking to build linkages between workforce training and educational providers at all levels of the educational spectrum, within every sector, for jobs at all levels. [We want to build] a system of lifelong learning – continual educational opportunities to enable people to progress along a career path – to support their families with family-supporting wages.