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San Antonio’s major workforce development program, Ready to Work SA, celebrated 3,000 job placements for program graduates on Wednesday.
Workforce Development Office Executive Director Mike Ramsey said in a statement that the program was proving the value of investing in people.
“These jobs are changing lives and helping our local businesses to thrive,” he said. “San Antonio residents voted to have this program, and we should all be proud that it is helping local residents obtain in-demand skills, good jobs, and a better quality of life for their families.”
The average annual salary for graduates of Ready to Work in approved jobs is $45,000, a more than $33,000 increase on average compared to what they were making at the time of program enrollment, according to the press release.
But the $200 million sales tax-funded program voters approved in 2020 has consistently failed to reach its job placement goal.
Despite a goal of placing 80% of graduates in “approved jobs” in six months, the program has never reached that milestone.
Approved jobs are those that pay at least $15 per hour or $31,000 annually with access to benefits in a target occupational field.
Ready to Work is currently only placing 56% of graduates in these approved jobs within six months. That’s down slightly from July of last year, when 58% of graduates were in approved jobs within six months.
Despite the program’s current shortcomings, San Antonio Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones has committed to a far more ambitious goal: 90% of graduates placed in approved jobs within 90 days of graduation.
She has said one way to do that is to narrow the number of jobs that program enrollees can train for so that they are only the jobs in the highest demand in San Antonio.
So far, placement numbers haven’t budged.
