Pittsburgh Public Schools announced this month that all seniors and selected 9th and 10th graders will participate with Keys2Work during the current 2000-2001 school year.

The district’s participation means that over 3000 students will be matched to suitable employer positions in Southwestern Pennsylvania. Regional employers will be able to market themselves and their available jobs to graduating seniors. Underclass students at South Vo-Tech and Alderdice High School will participate with Keys2Work as a part of their current career development program.

Student participation with Keys2Work at Pittsburgh Public Schools is being sponsored by the Heinz Endowment through the Commission for Workforce Excellence and the Grable Foundation in conjunction with Workforce Connections.

Earlier this month, the Heinz Endowment in Pittsburgh awarded a grant to the Commission for Workforce Excellence to help implement a scalable Keys2Work system in Southwestern Pennsylvania.

The Commission will use the money to outreach to Community Based Organizations through the Commission’s CBO Network, and to support usage of Keys2Work as a career development and recruiting tool within schools, colleges, and community-based organizations.

The Heinz Endowment indicated that their interest is in seeing Keys2Work achieve scale and hopes that other foundations might follow their lead in supporting connecting Keys2Work to various schools and workforce development organizations in the region.

The City of Pittsburgh and Allegheny County’s one stop job services system, Career Links, and the Mon Valley Career Links, have decided implement Keys2Work as a core service it offers to its customers. Testing will be offered each week to persons registering for services at Career Link.

Job seekers will take the Applied Mathematics, Reading for Information, and Locating Information tests. Scores will be matched against participating employers jobs. Employers will receive lists of recruits and will invite matching recruit to begin the interviewing process.