Third Sector joins teams in Massachusetts and Texas to implement workforce programs through the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Good Job Challenge

Third Sector Capital Partners (Third Sector) is excited to join two multi-sector teams in Massachusetts and Texas to implement transformative workforce programs that will secure good jobs for more than 1,600 people. This is part of a larger initiative by the Department of Commerce to build and expand regional workforce development systems in critical sectors.

Together with our partners in Texas and Massachusetts, we will build sectoral partnerships that help employers identify the working people they need while also equipping job seekers, specifically people from underserved and historically marginalized communities, with the skills and credentials they need to find, secure, and retain jobs that will pay them a living wage.

In Massachusetts, Third Sector is working in the greater Boston area to strengthen workforce development in the early education and care sector. We are partnering with the City of Boston's Office of Workforce Development, the Community Advocates for Young Learners (CAYL) Institute, and the Department of Early Education and Care. Additional partners are MassHire's workforce boards and career centers, local community colleges, training and wraparound support providers, and more than 100 child care employers and family child care entrepreneurs. 

In Texas, Third Sector is working with Workforce Solutions Rural Capital Area, Workforce Network, Inc., Smithville Workforce Training Center, training partners, and employers to build and strengthen partnerships in the skilled trades, health care, and finance/IT sectors. This effort will recruit, train, and place working people in six rural counties in central Texas into quality jobs. It will focus on providing opportunities to women, immigrants, people with conviction or substance use histories, people of color, and low-income individuals.  

Leveraging more than 10 years of expertise supporting state and local government agencies to implement outcomes-oriented programs, Third Sector's support will include project management/operations, stakeholder engagement, data measurement, continuous improvement, and sustainability of investments made by the Good Jobs Challenge. We will help our partners clearly define success, measure success along the way, convene employers and training providers to codesign recruitment and training services, and seek input from jobseekers — all to ensure that workforce services are relevant, accessible, and effective and that they lead to good jobs with opportunities for career advancement. 

The Good Jobs Challenge is a $500 million program administered by the Department of Commerce and funded through the American Rescue Plan Act. The teams in Texas and Massachusetts represent two out of 509 teams that initially applied to the challenge. A total of 32 awards were made. Learn more here.