Located in:
- Program-Specific Requirements for Wagner-Peyser Program (Employment Services)
All Program-Specific Requirements provided for the WIOA core programs in this section must be addressed for either a Unified or Combined State Plan.
e. 6. D. Assessment of Progress
The plan must include an explanation of what was achieved based on the previous AOP, what was not achieved and an explanation as to why the State believes the goals were not achieved, and how the State intends to remedy the gaps of achievement in the coming year.
Current Narrative:
ESD has provided additional Wagner Peyser funds to all offices in the state to increase outreach to MSFWs in every area of the state. This will increase the number of MSFWs served, and we believe, improve our performance related to equity.
Equity up to this point has not been achieved. Partially, this is due to the number of MSFWs being served continuing to diminish. There are fewer MSFWs in the state as fewer farmworkers migrate into Washington for work, and more and more farmworkers in the state are foreign workers brought in through the H-2A program.
6/10 Updates to Sections in Correction Follow:
All Significant MSFW offices were informed about the requirements to have a full-time outreach person dedicated 100% to conducting outreach duties on a year around basis and must spend the majority of their time out of the office providing services to farmworkers that do not access services through our job centers. Additionally, in 2023, USDOL published the Wagner-Peyser Act Staffing Final Rule. This rule clarified that outreach staff are limited to performing only the duties as described in 20 CFR 653.107.
In addition to clarifying the requirements for outreach, the final rule also clarified that full-time outreach staff are not able to provide services within the job center except as a follow up to an outreach contact. This requirement was shared with all Significant MSFW office staff and leadership, along with training on ensuring that other Wagner-Peyser funded staff are serving farmworkers within the office.
In April, 2024, ESD’s Employment Connections division held a 3 day summit for all staff conducting outreach to farmworkers, their supervisors, their administrators and Wagner-Peyser program staff. The focus of this summit was on training staff on the requirements of conducting outreach to farmworkers. The National Monitor Advocate and her office presented for two hours on the Wagner-Peyser Act Final Rule.
In addition to ensuring that all full-time outreach staff in Significant MSFW offices are performing outreach appropriately, in 2023 ESD allocated additional Wagner-Peyser funds to all job centers in order to ensure that some level of outreach is occurring in all areas of the state as required. Staff and leaders in these offices also were in attendance and trained at the April, 2024 summit.
Washington State has set minimum standardized targets for each of the nine Significant MSFW offices for both days of outreach and MSFW contacts. ESD has far exceeded these targets consistently year over year. With the addition of outreach activities in the non-Significant MSFW offices, the state has increased our targets and performance.
One area that ESD identified as an area for improvement in the previous AOP was the development and implementation of indicators and/or targets that communicate results produced beyond an outreach contact. Although ESD has developed tools and reports to provide performance data to field staff on equity indicators, which has been helpful in addressing performance in this area, ESD has not moved forward sufficiently to address what is a quality contact and how to measure the impact of our outreach in improving the lives of farmworkers we serve. The Wagner-Peyser program team is currently working with data integrity staff to identify which indicators might provide the information needed to measure outcomes and inform how to improve performance overall.
Another area where ESD is struggling is coordination and collaboration of outreach efforts with our NFJP grantee. The State Monitor Advocate developed an MOU with the NFJP grantee and progress was being made in some areas where coordinated outreach efforts were taking place. Some offices were seeing great results, whereas other areas were struggling to create an effort that was effective. Some of this is due to turnover for both ESD and the NFJP grantee, and particularly the NFJP leadership. Leadership buy-in is key to success. The State Monitor Advocate will be addressing this with the NFJP grantee in order to address areas for improvement.