SVCC Awards 20,000th Career Readiness Certificate

Published 2:09 pm Tuesday, June 16, 2015

Southside Virginia Community College recently awarded its 20,000th Career Readiness Certificate (CRC),  becoming the first member of the Virginia Community College System to reach the benchmark. The recipient was Isaiah Godfrey, a rising senior at Prince Edward County High School, who scored at the platinum level.

Virginia’s Career Readiness Certificate (CRC) is an assessment-based credential that gives employers and career seekers a uniform measure of key workplace skills. The WorkKeys system was developed by ACT (formerly American College Testing) to meet the demand from business and industry for a reliable screening tool that could help employers identify the best candidates based on the work-related skills needed to be successful on the job.

“The CRC is a wonderful tool for workforce development,” said Dennis Smith, Director of Workforce Development on the John H. Daniel Campus at SVCC. “The WorkKeys system was established to provide a common language for employers, educators, and job seekers. SVCC has been involved with the WorkKeys program since 1995 and we understand the importance of the system in helping to develop our local workforce. We are delighted that many of our high-school partners are offering the assessments so students can document the skills they have to enter the workforce.”

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The CRC is based on three assessments that are universally used by most employers: Reading for Information, Applied Mathematics and Locating Information.

The assessments validate workplace skills by utilizing situations and scenarios that occur in the workplace. Participants readily recognize that these are not academic questions but rather problem-solving situations that occur every day in America’s workplaces.

Individuals testing in Virginia earn one of three levels of Career Readiness certificates based on their test performance. A bronze level signifies that a recipient possesses skills for approximately 17 percent of all jobs while silver signifies that a recipient possesses skills for 69 percent of jobs and gold signifies skills for 93 percent of jobs.
The CRC allows the employer to evaluate the skills offered by the candidates against the skills required for success in the position which eliminates a large portion of poorly qualified and unmotivated individuals while quantifying the skill sets of those who do apply with the CRC as a part of their applications.

For incumbent employees and recruits, the CRC provides a baseline for training and development.
For more information about the CRC, contact Dennis Smith on the John H. Daniel Campus at 434-736-2008 or by email at dennis.smith@southside.edu or Debra Smiley on the Christanna Campus at 434-949-1027 or by email at debra.smiley@southside.edu or Pam Taylor in South Boston at 434-572-8289 or by email at Pamela.taylor@southside.edu