National Career Readiness Certificate testing coming to Columbia Area Career Center

Columbia Area Career Center’s vision is to:

                   -   Empower individuals to achieve career and academic success
                   -   Be vital to the educational and economic growth of our community
                   -   Be a national leader in career and technical education 

This vision helps to support the current effort by Boone County to become a Certified Work Ready Community.  The Certified Work Ready Program (CWRP) is a volunteer initiative in which businesses agree to actively recognize and recruit potential employees with National Career Readiness Credentials. As of July 2013, Boone County was designated as a county “In-Progress”.

The National Career Readiness Certificate (NCRC) is an evidence-based credential that certifies essential skills needed for workplace success. It was developed and issued by ACT, an independent not-for-profit that provides a broad range of assessment and research in the areas of education and workplace development. The NCRC testing covers three of the foundational WorkKeys assessments, a system developed by ACT that is the gold standard in workplace assessment used by thousands of companies throughout the world. The NCRC documents the important workplace skills of Reading for Information, Applied Mathematics, and Locating of Information.

Boone County’s Certified Work Ready Community Steering Committee has two years to attract 111 businesses to participate in the program to attain full certification.

For an up-to-date list and to learn more about how CWRC could benefit your company, visit http://workreadycommunities.org/MO/019 . It takes just moments to sign up as a company in support of recognizing the NCRC. More than 1,145 employers in Missouri currently support the NCRC.

Soon the Columbia Area Career Center will be a testing center for junior and senior high school students, who are part of the “Emerging Workforce” category. The students who take the NCRC will find out their “career readiness” level (bronze, silver, gold, or platinum) and would have a credential that may distinguish them in a job applicant pool. Adults who are 18 years and older are able to test in Columbia at the Missouri Career Center, a division of Workforce Development, on Vandiver Drive.

In order for the program to succeed, employers and employees have to buy in. The career center’s mission is to prepare today’s learners for tomorrow’s careers. Students can document these skills by taking the NCRC test and having this portable credential that documents their skill level. As more employers sign on, the recognition and importance of this credential in this region will become evident.

Jasper county is the first certified work ready community in Missouri. Thirty four counties are participating in the program.

To find out more about NCRC, click here.