Worker Retraining Program Stop Gap Employment Stop Gap Employment – New in 2014-2015 Intent: This policy has been developed to ensure students who are dislocated workers and who have secured stop-gap employment, as defined below, may be determined eligible for worker retraining enrollment and able to receive funding and support in order to re-engage with the workforce in livable wage jobs. Authority: This policy was recommended by the Workforce Training Customer Advisory Committee and approved by the State Board for Community and Technical Colleges. Colleges must create local policy that defines the criteria that will be used to validate eligibility under the stop gap employment category. Definition of Stop Gap Employment Stop-gap employment is temporary work an individual accepts only because they have been laid off of work or otherwise terminated from employment due to no fault of their own from the customary work for which their training, experience or work history qualifies them. Stop-gap employment must be temporary in nature with the intent to end employment upon the completion of training, obtaining self-sufficient employment as specified in the individual education plan. Typically, stop-gap employment will pay less than the individual’s wage of self-sufficiency. However, there may be specific circumstances where stop-gap employment does provide a sufficient wage temporarily but is not considered, or intended to be, permanent employment that leads to long-term self-sufficiency. Definition of Stop Gap Employment WRT Student Eligibility: Colleges are required to establish a local policy that outlines the eligibility requirements that will be used to determine and document student eligibility. College policies must be in alignment with the definition of Stop Gap Employment outlined above. It should be noted that dislocated and unemployed students have priority for WRT services and financial aid. Colleges may base their determination on any of the following:  Lower living standard income level as defined in determining that the student’s income does not exceed 175 percent of the federal poverty levels.  A certain percentage of the wages earned at the time of dislocation  An evaluation of the individual’s self-sufficiency utilizing the Washington State SelfSufficiency Calculator to establish student need August 2014 Page 1 Worker Retraining Program Stop Gap Employment   A definition of temporary employment (e.g. duration) and scenarios where temporary employment alone can verify that employment will not lead to self-sufficiency. A multi-tiered evaluation of labor market demand, wages at time of dislocation, number of hours worked, unemployment benefits and job of dislocation. The policy must clearly identify the type(s) of documentation which will be maintained in the student file to prove eligibility at the time of enrollment. Coding: Students meeting stop gap employment eligibility may be enrolled with the work attend code 81 – Dislocated Worker (formerly short –tenured) with unusual action code “W!” This policy does not require that college’s revisit the student’s eligibility determination code after initial enrollment. Colleges using work attend 81 should remove the code from the student’s record when the student ceases to meet the criteria as listed above. August 2014 Page 2