As the backbone for the WJI project, CFA has also begun a series of community of practice meetings with our partners where they can get updates on grant progress and share learnings and best practices.

At our kick-off meeting, our partners introduced their programs and roles in the WJI grant’s scope of work, which has led to connections between partners as they discover ways that they can leverage each other’s expertise.

We also had an equity meeting where guest speaker Lawrence Garrett, of 828, talked about the most impactful way to think about equity outcomes in their programs. Lawrence is considered a modern-day cultural savant. Known by many for his knack of decoding cultural behaviors that either support or undermine values and performance, Lawrence has grown a reputation for getting to the heart of the matter by identifying specific behaviors that are directly impacting business outcomes. Over the last 15 years, Lawrence was able to hone these skills through his current consulting practice, Eight-Twenty-Eight, LLC., focusing on Leadership and Inclusion in the greater Pierce County area.

We also celebrated our partner’s outcomes since the grant launch. Our partners have started the year off right with some impressive numbers of students engaged in their programs.

‌So far this year, our partners have placed 108 students in quality tech jobs and are working hard to place even more students in future quarters. Total outreach and recruitment for the first and second quarters of the year included more than 4100 people. Training providers enrolled 287 students and wrap-around support services were provided to more than 300 students.

These programs range from coding training programs to Washington State Community Colleges to rural K-12 Career and Technical Education programs. All of our training partners are focused on serving underrepresented and marginalized populations, leading to economic justice and quality jobs for participants.

The 108 job seekers were placed in roles at companies such as Allen Institute, Amazon Web Services, Costco, Google, Microsoft, Smartsheet, Sound Transit, US Coast Guard, and many more.