Mr. COONS. Madam President, something important, something unusual, something worth noting happened this week, happened yesterday in this Chamber that I don't want to let pass without a few moments of comment.
Yesterday a broad bipartisan majority of this Senate came together to pass the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act.
First, I congratulate Senators Murray, Isakson, Harkin, and Alexander who led so capably on this bill. Senators Murray, a Democrat of Washington, and Isakson, a Republican of Georgia, spent years working through the details, policy, and language, and months making sure that they got this bill to a point where the Senate and the House in a bipartisan, bicameral way could adopt legislation.
What is this about? It is about something simple, important, and powerful: investing in America's workforce so we can compete with anyone around the world in the 21st century.
This is an area I have focused on a lot here in the Senate which I believe is critical to our Nation, our competitiveness, to strengthening our middle class, and to growing good jobs.
In manufacturing, it is a core challenge for us to ensure that our workers have the training employers are looking for, and that our manufacturing companies are globally competitive. Manufacturing is important to America, to our future, to our middle class, to our communities, and to our families because it pays well, it drives innovation, it contributes greatly to other sectors in our economy and in communities.
That is why a few months ago I launched the Manufacturing Jobs for America initiative that has brought together dozens of Senators. We initially pulled together Democrats from across my caucus to introduce 34 bills, some of the best and broadest ideas we could bring to the table about how to accelerate America's recovery of employment and steady growth in manufacturing. Roughly half of these bills are bipartisan.
Part of the goal of this Manufacturing Jobs for America initiative was to put good ideas out on the floor and get them in the mix as we debate things going forward. So I wish to take a moment today and celebrate that the ideas of many of our partners in this campaign, ideas drawn from many of the bills that are part of this initiative, ended up being important parts of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act that was passed this week.
Let me briefly touch on the five most important who contributed ideas that were embedded in this bill that passed.
First, the Adult Education and Economic Growth Act which was sponsored by Senators Reed and Brown. In our rapidly changing economy, ensuring we can train Americans of all ages for all jobs is critical. Senator Reed's bill takes an important step in that direction by investing in adult education, expanding access to technology and digital literacy skills and improving the coordination of State and local programs.
A bill that was endorsed by the National Association of Manufacturers is the AMERICA Works Act, sponsored by Senators Hagan and Heller.
Another challenge we face is ensuring employers can quickly recognize whether a worker has the skills they need. So Senator Hagan's bill helped solve this by ensuring we prioritize programs that invest in training that delivers portable national and industry-recognized credentials. This encourages job training programs to match the skills of workers with the needs of local employers, training individuals for the jobs currently available in their communities right now.
A third bill that contributed importantly to this bill that was enacted here yesterday, adopted by the Senate yesterday, was the Community College to Career Fund Act, sponsored by Senator Franken and Senator Begich. Senator Franken came to the floor yesterday and gave another passionate, important floor speech in support of these ideas. It is something that as I presided--and I have been with Senator Franken in caucus and have heard him speak many times. It is about equipping workers with the skills they need by investing in partnerships between our community colleges and our employers. Senator Franken, Senator Begich, myself and others have seen this work in our home communities. We have seen community colleges learn from manufacturers what today are the actual relevant modern manufacturing skills they need and then deliver customized training courses that make a difference in the skills, in the lives, in the college affordability and access of those who seek to join today's manufacturing workforce.
The fourth bill, the On-the-Job Training Act, cosponsored by Senators Shaheen and Cochran, contributes to the idea that we need to invest in on-the-job training. Because of Senator Shaheen's leadership on this bill, we will now make new and important investments so workers can learn what they need to do in the job that needs to be filled, rather than in an academic setting and then search the skills that may match the skills they learn. On-the-job training in this bill sponsored by Shaheen and Cochran is an important contribution to modernizing America's workplace skills.
The last, the SECTORS Act, cosponsored by Senators Brown and Collins, is a provision that helps meet the fundamental challenge of connecting our schools with our businesses by requiring State and local workforce investment boards to establish sector-based partnerships.
With all of these bills there is an important and common theme. In the 21st century, rapid economic change is a given. In order to compete, in order to grow our economy and grow employment, in order to be productive and to have a successful and growing workforce, we need to be able to adapt as quickly as our economy does and we need to invest in modernizing the skills of the American worker.
With the passage of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act yesterday, we have made a strong statement that in a bipartisan way we are willing to invest in America's workers, the jobs of today and the jobs of tomorrow. This is just one of many encouraging moments here in the Senate that sometimes go without note or commentary in our communities at home, but I thought it was important to bring to the floor today this range of five different bills, three of them bipartisan, all of them strong, whose ideas were part of the package adopted on the floor yesterday and that I am confident will be adopted by the House and signed into law by our President. This Senate can, will, should continue to make bipartisan progress in investing in American manufacturing.
I thank the Chair.
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