Sector-Based Apprenticeship Supplemental Statement

Funding Opportunity Announcement

Scaling Apprenticeship Through Sector-Based Strategies

Supplemental Justification

Supplemental Supporting Statement A: Justification

This request seeks OMB approval under the Paperwork Reduction Act for the unique information collection requirements in the Scaling Apprenticeship Through Sector-Based Strategies Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA). The Employment and Training Administration (ETA), U.S. Department of Labor (DOL), announces the availability of up to $150 million in H-1B funds authorized by Section 414(c) of the American Competitiveness and Workforce Improvement Act of 1998 (ACWIA), as amended (originally codified at 29 USC 2916a and transferred to 29 USC 3224a) for individuals older than16 years and not currently enrolled in school within a local educational agency, and are unemployed and seeking entry or reentry into the workforce, underemployed workers, and incumbent workers who need to increase their skills to remain competitive. This grant balances projects that provide apprenticeship training and services to individuals that will gain the skills and competencies required to enter middle- and high-skilled jobs along a career pathway in a variety of H-1B industries and occupations.

DOL hopes to serve 2,500 to 10,000+ participants during the grant period of performance, with approximately 15 to 30 grants awarded across the country. Individual grants will range from $1 million to $12 million and require a 35 percent cost share or match from applicants, using sources other than Federal funding.

Grants will be awarded to an apprenticeship partnership; the lead applicant and include public and private sector entities. Lead applicants include: a) an institution of higher education representing a consortium of institutions of higher education, (IHEs), as defined in Section 102 of the Higher Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 1002); or b) a state system of higher education, such as a community college system office or a single state higher educational board.

Applications will include the following information collections: 1) Form SF-424 “Application for Federal Assistance,” separately cleared under OMB control number 4040-0004, 2) Project Budget, 3) Project Narrative, and 4) Attachments to the Project Narrative.

Electronic availability:

This grant solicitation will be available on the www.grants.gov Web site. Based on past DOL experience, the Department anticipates 85 percent of responses will be submitted electronically and 15 percent of responses will be submitted through a hardcopy.

Small Entities:

This information collection will not have a significant impact on a substantial number of small entities.

Assurances of confidentiality:

These grant solicitations do not offer applicants assurances of confidentiality.

Special circumstances:

This solicitation implicates no special circumstances.

Burden:

The DOL expects to receive approximately 100 applications from an equal number of respondents.  The public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 20 hours per response, including time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, gathering and maintaining needed data, and completing and reviewing the collection of information.

100 applications x 20 hours = 2,000 hours

The DOL has increased the average hourly earnings in the professional and business services industry to $31.96 per hour to monetize this burden.  See The Employment Situation—February 2018, DOL, Bureau of Labor Statistics, https://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/empsit_03092018.pdf at page 33.

2,000 hours x $31.96 = $63,920

The DOL associates no other burden costs with this information collection. In addition to the application, each grantee will be required to submit quarterly financial and performance reports to the ETA. Those information collection requirements will be cleared under a separate control number.

Total burden: 100 respondents, 100 responses, 2,000 hours, $0 other cost burden.

Supplemental Supporting Statement B: Statistical Methods

This information collection does not employ statistical methods.

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