$8.4 million EDA Good Jobs Challenge Grant awarded to Charleston Chamber Foundation, E3 Foundation and Roper St. Francis Healthcare

The Charleston Chamber Foundation, through the Charleston Metro Chamber of Commerce, along with Educate, Empower and Elevate Foundation (E3) and Roper St. Francis Healthcare have been selected to receive an $8.4 million grant through the Good Jobs Challenge funded by President Biden’s American Rescue Plan. This project is one of 32 Good Jobs Challenge grantees, from a competitive pool of 509 applicants, to receive funding.

The Good Jobs Challenge, administered by the Commerce Department’s Economic Development Administration, brings together employers who have hiring needs with other key entities to provide in demand skills training that leads to good-paying jobs and jobs that lead to better economic mobility for historically marginalized communities. Through the grant, the Chamber, E3 and Roper St. Francis will ignite inclusive and equitable workforce growth within the healthcare industry.

“The Good Jobs Challenge grant is a transformational opportunity for our community to create career pathways offering upward mobility for our region’s underserved populations,” said Bryan Derreberry, Charleston Metro Chamber President and CEO. “Working alongside E3 and Roper St. Francis will ensure our efforts are equity-centered and are meeting the demands of one of our most important sectors, healthcare.”

Through the grant, the three partners will develop the Lowcountry Careers Collaborative in Healthcare, an equity-centered, employer-led approach that builds upon existing regional training systems to offer pathways to higher level careers. This will be accomplished by:

• Empowering underserved populations to seek opportunities in promising sectors
• Collaborating across sectors to address skills gaps identified by employers
• Addressing workforce barriers within our community and with employers that have prevented inclusive work environments and equitable growth for all community members
• Improving access to training for communities of color that will enhance pathways to high-earning potential jobs in healthcare, simultaneously boosting representative healthcare options
• Delivering thoughtful integrative services

“We believe that the Lowcountry Healthcare Careers Collaborative could be a blueprint for how we increase the family wages of traditionally marginalized communities,” said LaTisha Vaughn, E3 Chief Programs Officer. “We are not just working on getting people ready for jobs; we are also working on making sure employers are ready for all members of the Charleston community in their work environments.”

Efforts will initially focus on the healthcare sector; however, the infrastructure is being established to add on additional sectors in the future.

Healthcare is a vital and important industry for our community. Earnings per job in healthcare in our region average $73,993, a wage 66% higher than the median household income for African American families in 2019. Of healthcare postings in 2021, 82% did not list a requirement for a bachelor’s degree. This signals a significant opportunity for targeted engagement of individuals without a college degree.

“At Roper St. Francis Healthcare, we want our teammates to be a reflection of our greater community. We are thrilled to partner in this meaningful effort to create more career pathways for residents in underserved communities because we know we are our best together,” said Dr. Michael Moxley, Vice President and Chief Diversity, Inclusion and Health Equity Officer at Roper St. Francis Healthcare. “As coworkers and healthcare providers, we must be committed to not only embracing our differences but pursuing them for perspective. This is central to carrying out our mission of ‘healing all people with compassion, faith and excellence’ and making our communities stronger.”

The Lowcountry Careers Collaborative in Healthcare is designed to bridge historic gaps in employment representation by training a diverse coalition of healthcare workers. Partnering with E3 will ensure the program is inclusive to populations that have historically been excluded from accessing quality career pathways in the local healthcare industry. Roper St. Francis will serve as the leading employer and backbone organization to identify real skills needs and facilitate job placements.

“By integrating industry in every step of the talent development process, these awardees are focused on supporting underserved communities in diverse areas across the country, helping to remove systemic barriers for workers and connecting employers with the trained workforce they need to grow and sustain competitive local economies,” said Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Economic Development Alejandra Castillo.

The Good Jobs Challenge is part of a suite of  American Rescue Plan programs  developed by EDA to equitably distribute its $3 billion allocation to assist communities nationwide in their efforts to build a better America by accelerating economic recovery from the coronavirus pandemic and building more resilient, shockproof local economies.