Upskilled: Preparing Long Island’s Workforce for the Future

JLP+D was contracted with the Long Island Regional Planning Council to advance the planning and development of a regional workforce development initiative that would strengthen Long Island’s employment pipeline, foster the agglomeration of key competitive industries, and promote collaboration across sectors.

JLP+D conducted qualitative and quantitative analyses of Long Island’s labor market and workforce training ecosystem, and identified opportunities and strategies to enhance and build upon the work of regional stakeholders. The report presents information and insights that can help Long Island stakeholders evaluate existing workforce training resources, pursue data-driven program design (the report includes the list of recommended skills for training by industry and educational level), and build out a new workforce development initiative that addresses its current workforce challenges and enables it to tackle those that may arise in the future.

JLP+D’s report envisions economic and workforce development as a unified strategy that thrives on multi-institution, cross-sector, and bi-county collaborations. The report provides recommendations to build a regional workforce development strategy that prioritizes bottom-up development, equity, flexibility, and creativity. The report also details the components and resource needs for the region to implement three workforce development models to achieve the goals.