Helping Career Connect Washington enroll and inspire 15,000 students
Helping Career Connect Washington enroll and inspire 15,000 students
Today, young people in the US have too few pathways to success. The US education system is not adequately preparing students for good careers and Washington State’s governor was interested in solving this. Bain got involved to help launch a public-private partnership called Career Connect Washington (CCW) to address it.
These Bain teams helped form and launch the career system
Bain consultants led the project and worked with the research and knowledge teams to analyze employment data and learn how other states were addressing this. They created a strategy for an entity that’d operate outside of government, business, or education, but work with all three.
These Bain teams helped form and launch the career system
Bain consultants led the project and worked with the research and knowledge teams to analyze employment data and learn how other states were addressing this. They created a strategy for an entity that’d operate outside of government, business, or education, but work with all three.
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Executive / Manager Assistant
Executive and Manager Assistants managed a truly complex set of timelines and schedules to ensure this project went well. They arranged workshops with attendees from dozens of businesses, government agencies, branches of the education system, and regional networks.
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Bain Marketing
The creative services team helped redesign and upgrade CCW’s presentation materials. They also contributed to presentations that were delivered to some of the most senior business leaders and government officials in Washington State.
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General Consulting
Bain consultants led the project. They quantified the overall economic opportunity in the state, then researched career-connected learning systems around the US and world. They held workshops and held dozens of conversations with leaders in business, education, government, and philanthropy.
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Product, Practice, and Knowledge (PPK)
Bain’s knowledge team captures, stores, and disseminates knowledge so all teams can bring the best of Bain’s insights to bear. On this case, they studied career-connected learning initiatives in several US states and other countries such as Switzerland to produce case studies.
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Research & Data Services (RDS)
Bain’s research team brings an added layer of insight to cases by searching and analyzing vast amounts of third-party data. For this case, they helped the consulting team and client generate accurate labor market statistics for Washington State.
Background
Roughly 70% of jobs in Washington State require a post-secondary school credential such as a college degree. Yet only 40% of young people there complete a credential. That’s a sizeable gap and if it persists, businesses won't be able to find people to hire while young people won’t find good jobs.
This challenge exists nationwide, but Washington State’s then-governor was eager for their state to lead on this issue. One philosophy for addressing this challenge is called career-connected learning, which advocates creating education programs to help students align their learning to a promising career. Bain had previously applied this to public schools in Denver, Colorado, and got involved in the effort in Washington State.
The plan
Bain consultants launched a project to study the problem. The research team gathered employment data for the state of Washington and the knowledge team studied other career-connected learning initiatives in the US, and in Switzerland. In partnership with several other organizations including a public-private coalition called Career Connect Washington (CCW), which would take a leading role, Bain proposed a plan to create a statewide career-connected learning system. It would unite high schools, higher education, and employers to ensure all young people are prepared for good jobs.
That system would intentionally focus the greatest effort on those furthest from opportunity, including students of color, those of low-income, those from rural areas, and those of indigenous descent, among others. The goal was to give young people multiple pathways toward economic self-sufficiency after high school. “'College bound vs. not' is an old way of looking at the world,” says Maud Daudon, a former Seattle deputy mayor turned CEO who was the executive leader of CCW.
Bain teams worked closely with CCW to propose an entirely new system as well as a few strategic directives. One directive was that the education programs should prepare students for good careers, which meant the programs would need to combine college-level classroom learning with paid work experience. And two, those managing the system should focus their limited time and resources on finding already functioning programs that could be expanded, replicated, and pushed to improve.
- Could career-connected learning improve outcomes in Washington State?
- What defines a “high-quality” career-connected learning experience?
- What high-demand career pathways would benefit from career-connected learning?
- What statewide, public-private system could drive career-connected learning?
- How would they ensure the system had an enduring impact?
The approach
The CCW team went on a road tour to visit stakeholders. They met more than 3,000 individuals in business, government, education, and more, and traveled a total of 12,000 miles to build support. Three programs emerged from these conversations: Career Prep, Career Explore, and Career Launch. CCW set ambitious growth goals of a 100% completion rate for Career Prep and Explore, and a 60% completion rate for Career Launch.
The effort was not without its challenges. CCW had to consider that programs that worked locally might not scale effectively. There were also many stakeholders with conflicting beliefs and input. Bain and CCW had to craft the system and programs to genuinely serve all stakeholders, as well as get the fourth and most important group—students—excited to participate.
The results
In just a few years, CCW has helped Washington State meaningfully scale several high-impact programs that united the three primary stakeholders. Nearly 15,000 students enrolled in Career Launch programs, exceeding similar programs in other states. Bain has since returned to help CCW define its long-term vision. While Washington State still has further to go, it’s now cutting-edge on career-connected learning. This work has also contributed to career-connected learning conversations nationwide. It inspired several career-connected learning reports, aided other Bain social impact work, inspired major foundations to join the cause, and led to a project in New York that has impacted 1.5 million students.
students in the program were from low-income backgrounds
million in federal grants earned in 2022
students enrolled in Career Launch
