Quarterly Performance and Narrative Report

AMERICAN APPRENTICESHIP INITIATIVE QUARTERLY NARRATIVE REPORT

Identifying Grant Information

SGA Type: American Apprenticeship Initiative

Grantee Name: Official DOL Grant Name

Project Name: Official Project Name

Grant Number: Official DOL Grant Number (AP-2XXXX-15-60-A-XX)

Report Quarter Ending: Example 12/21/2015

Date of Submission: Example 2/13/2016

Program Contact Information: Name, Title, Location, Email, Phone Number

Overview of Grant Initiative

The American Apprenticeship Initiative (AAI) is intended to serve as a catalyst in supporting a uniquely American Apprenticeship system that meets our particular economic, industry and workforce needs. American Apprenticeships are innovative Registered Apprenticeship models that meet national standards for registration with the U.S. Department of Labor, or with a DOL-recognized State Apprenticeship Agency. Grants funded by this initiative will support dynamic and sustainable public-private partnerships that:

• Support the expansion of quality and innovative American Apprenticeship programs into high-growth occupation(s) and industry(s), particularly those for which employers are using H-1B visas to hire foreign workers, and the related activities necessary to support such programs (see Appendix A or visit the Foreign Labor Certification Data Center);

• Create career pathways that encompass American Apprenticeship and align with other postsecondary educational offerings;

  • Use strategies to significantly increase apprenticeship opportunities for job seekers and workers (particularly for women and other underrepresented populations in apprenticeship, including young men and women of color, people with disabilities; low-skilled populations; and veterans, including transitioning service members); and

  • Leverage and develop public policies that increase demand for American Apprenticeship and support sustainability

Through these methods, successful AAI grant projects will result in sustainable apprenticeship models, thus creating a supportive ecosystem for apprenticeship after grant funding ends.

Overview of the Quarterly Narrative Report

This narrative report supplements the quarterly data provided by grantees, and helps the U.S. DOL track and monitor the progress of individual grants as well as the Initiative as a whole. These reports provide an explanation of grantee progress and allow us to report to Congress, the Office of Management and Budget, as well as other stakeholders and oversight bodies.

Section A – Summary of Grant Activities

This section serves as an executive summary for the quarterly grant activities. With the above four goals as a framework, provide a short summary of your quarterly grant activities in the following areas:

Section A.I – Expansion and Outreach Activities

Provide a short summary on registered apprenticeship expansion activities during the quarter that will allow the project to achieve greater scale for existing apprenticeship programs or for new programs to lay the foundations for future scale at a regional, statewide, multi-state, or national level and general timelines. Describe how these activities contribute to the project’s larger expansion strategies to address the workforce skills and training issues identified in the statement of need as well as how these strategies align with the goals, milestones, outputs and outcomes of the project.

Section A.II – Service and Training

Provide a short summary of all service and training activities supported by the grant for the current quarter, highlighting key activities that contributed to the expansion of Registered Apprenticeship programs in your target industry(ies). This update may include additional information about apprenticeship training activities and outcomes to supplement the data submitted on the quantitative performance report.

Section A.III – Underrepresented Populations

Grantees that are providing supportive services and specialized participant services, especially those that focus on underrepresented populations, in accordance with the funding opportunity in which the grant was awarded, should include a description of the type(s) of services offered, how they were delivered, and how they contributed to a participants’ ability to fully participate in grant-funded activities. Examples of supportive services include but are not limited to materials, tools and/or other services to support participant completion of programs. Specialized participant services include but are not limited to On-the-Job Learning (OJL), Required Technical Instruction (RTI) and other pre-apprenticeship activities. Any outreach or promotion activities related to career awareness for underrepresented populations should be included in the description.

Section B – Status Update on Leveraged Resources

Report the cumulative amount of leveraged resources provided by the grantee and partners along with expenditures each quarter. Leveraged resources are those resources the grantee and its partners may be providing to support the implementation of the grants. Leveraged resources may take the form of cash or in-kind donations.  Please note leveraged resources must also be reported on the Financial Status Report (ETA-9130) quarterly.

Please use this section of the narrative to provide an update on the status of all leveraged resources. The update may include:

• The organizations that contributed the resources

• The ways in which the resources were used during the current quarter

• Cumulative amount of leveraged resources

• Type of leveraged resources contributed to the project

Section C – Status Update on Strategic Partnership and Employer Engagement Activities

Report the critical aspects of the Strategic Partnership, Employer Engagement and Registered Apprenticeship expansion activities during the reporting period.  The purpose of this section is to describe how the partnership is working together to implement the project and to communicate the dynamic growth and development of the strategic partnerships. Report how partners have been working with the State Apprenticeship Agency (SAA) or Department of Labor to register/expand apprenticeship programs. Discuss the partnership’s activities to increase alignment of apprenticeships with education, economic development and other public policy systems. This section is not intended to be a list of every partner meeting or communication. Completing this section of the report allows grantees to reflect critically on their partnerships and contributes to broader discussions among grantees on partnership development and management. 

This section should: (1) Discuss how partners have been engaged during the current phase of the project; (2) Outline specific contributions of each partner during this quarter; (3) Identify any challenges encountered/resolved in the development and management of the partnership; and (4) Report new partners that may have been brought into the project.

Section D – Timeline for Grant Activities and Deliverables

Provide a timeline of the progress of grant activities, key deliverables for this quarter and future quarters, and products available this quarter and in future quarters for broad dissemination to the workforce system. This includes identifying products and deliverables available for broad distribution via ETA-hosted web sites and other communication vehicles. Utilize the timeline in the grant’s statement of work to identify all major program activities and training, for the entire life of the grant. The timeline will paint a picture of project flow that includes start and end dates, schedule of activities, and projected outcomes. To benefit from the timeline, it is important that it be updated each quarter noting the actual date of completion as each activity is accomplished. Items to incorporate in the timeline include: project goals, benchmarks, milestones, special events, important deadlines and deliverables.

Section E – Status of Deliverables

Use this section to submit additional information that details the status of capacity building activities and/or the development of deliverable occurring under the grant, highlights those that have been completed, and assesses how well the capacity building strategies of the program are meeting the training needs of the targeted industries through your measures.

Section F – Key Issues and Technical Assistance Needs

Summarize any significant issues or problems encountered this quarter and resolution of previous issues and challenges identified in previous quarters. Describe any actions taken or plans for addressing issues, any questions you have for ETA, and any need for assistance from ETA, technical assistance providers, or others.

Section G – Best Practices and Success Stories

Please describe in detail promising approaches, innovative processes, lessons learned and participant-level success stories in this section each quarter. Additionally, if appropriate, please highlight one or two “success stories” from the grant per quarter, with the participant’s or partner’s express permission.

Section H – Additional Information (optional)

Provide any other grant-specific information considered to be important and not captured in other sections of the quarterly performance and/or narrative report, including but not limited to, any specific outcomes included in the statement of work.

PRA Disclosure Statement

According to the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, no persons are required to respond to a collection of information unless it displays a valid OMB control number. The valid OMB control number for this information collection is 201509-1205-007. The time required to complete this information collection is estimated to average 20 hours per quarter reviewing and verifying the Quarterly Performance Report as well as preparing the Narrative Report. If you have comments concerning the accuracy of the time estimate(s) or suggestions for improving this form, please write to: to John V. Ladd, Administrator, Office of Apprenticeship, Room C–5321, Employment and Training Administration, U.S. Department of Labor, 200 Constitution Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20210.