Adapting Work Readiness Training for People in Recovery. Strategy Spotlight. Innovative Employment and Training Interventions to Address the Opioid Crisis

The workforce system offers work readiness training through nearly 2,400 American Job Centers (AJCs) nationwide. However, people in recovery can face unique barriers to employment not covered in traditional work readiness curricula. New Hampshire has a work readiness program called WorkReadyNH, which it offered free of charge to customers receiving services through AJCs. Before shifting to a virtual format during the COVID-19 pandemic, WorkReadyNH was offered at community colleges in the state. The program consisted of a 60-hour course offered over a three-week period: it covered soft skills as well as online math and reading tutorials, and included an assessment at the end that enabled participants to earn a National Career Readiness Certificate issued through American College Testing (ACT). This strategy spotlight focuses on an innovative effort, funded through a National Health Emergency (NHE) Dislocated Worker Demonstration Grant to Address the Opioid Crisis to the state of New Hampshire, to adapt work readiness training for people in recovery. [This is the second report of a four-part series. For the first report, "Embedding Employment Services in an Opioid Treatment Facility," see ED617973.]