House Education and Workforce Committee advances workforce bill

On April 21, the House Education and Workforce Committee passed H.R. 8210, A Stronger Workforce for America Act of 2026, by a vote of 19-14, along party lines. This partisan legislation seeks to reauthorize the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA), the primary federal law governing our nation’s workforce development system.

WIOA was last reauthorized in 2014 and is designed to help job seekers access employment, education, training, and support services to succeed in the labor market and to match employers with skilled workers. Several authorizations in the law are designed to help young people develop the skills they need to succeed in the workplace and in life.

The provisions in this bill partially mirror the bipartisan WIOA reauthorization that the House passed in 2024, but which stalled in the Senate. However, notable differences remain. For instance, this bill does not change the term “out-of-school youth” to “opportunity youth," as the 2024 version did. Importantly, this bill formalizes the interagency agreement between the Department of Education and the Department of Labor by transferring responsibility for adult education under Title II to the Department of Labor.

The bill, which must now go to the House floor, includes a number of changes to federal youth workforce development programs that could help the afterschool and summer learning field continue to support older youth:

• Spending Floor and Age Expansion for Priority Population
  
  Requires that 70% of statewide youth funds be dedicated to serving out-of-school youth, down from the current 75% requirement and higher than the 65% that was proposed in 2024. States are also permitted to determine the allocation of funding for each local area based on its specific needs, rather than requiring every local area to meet the same requirements. It also decreases the minimum age eligibility for out-of-school youth from 16 to 14.
   
• Foundational Skills / Basic Skills Deficiency
  
  Digital literacy is elevated to a core skills criterion alongside reading, writing, and math. Specifically, the bill replaces the phrase "basic skills deficient" with "foundational skill needs" and expands the definition to include individuals who "do not possess digital literacy skills at a level necessary to function in the individual's education or occupation, in the individual's family, or in society."
   
• Work-Based Learning Requirements
  
  Emphasizes work-based learning for youth, including by formally defining it through the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act definition and increasing the percentage of funding dedicated to work experiences to 40%. This bill also encourages opportunities to gain skills in emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence, and raises expectations for the quality of summer and year-round employment opportunities.
   
• State and Local Workforce Plan Requirements Regarding Youth
  
  Local workforce plans must identify community-based organizations that primarily serve youth outside of school hours and are available to provide workforce development activities for in-school youth. State and local plans must also include an analysis of the out-of-school youth population and service gaps, as well as a description of the availability of youth-serving apprenticeship and pre-apprenticeship programs.
   
• Local Workforce Board Membership - Youth Representation
  
  Expands mandatory youth representation on local workforce development boards. New requirements include representatives from community-based organizations with expertise in youth workforce development; out-of-school youth themselves (including those with disabilities); at least one representative of a public or nonprofit agency that serves youth (including juvenile justice and child welfare agencies); at least one representative of a local public housing authority; and, at least one representative of any Job Corps campus or YouthBuild program in the local area.
  
  The bill also creates a new standing committee engaging educational entities in the local area. These committees must have representation from a local educational agency, an institution of higher education, and entities administering education activities, such as career and technical education programs or afterschool and summer learning programs.
   
• Allowable Youth Activities
  
  Broadens the list of statewide allowable youth activities to include raising public awareness about community-based and youth services organizations, as well as career and technical education programs. Additional activities added include coordination with youth pre-apprenticeship and apprenticeship programs and building partnerships between educational institutions and employers to address high-demand local workforce needs, including the use of emerging technology tools.
   
• Youth Apprenticeship
  
  Establishes a dedicated Youth Apprenticeship Readiness Grant Program, prioritizing youth apprenticeship opportunities and directing investment in expanding non-degree career pathways for youth. This new program is authorized at $65 million.
   
• Individual Training Accounts for In-School Youth
  
  Authorizes the use of individual training accounts (ITAs) for in-school youth aged 16 to 21 to participate in skills development programs outside of the courses offered by their school district. This would permit younger, school-enrolled participants to access the same market-driven training purchasing power that adult workers use, giving them more flexibility to pursue credentials in industry-recognized fields not offered through their schools.
   
• Streamlining the Enrollment Process
  
  Permits programs to begin serving youth while an eligibility determination is being made and aligns the documentation requirements to determine foster or homeless youth status with those of the Higher Education Act. 
   
• Eligible Providers of Youth Services
  
  Extends the definition of eligible youth service providers to include providers of youth-serving pre-apprenticeship and apprenticeship programs. The bill also adds a formal definition of "evidence-based" and requires programs to demonstrate statistically significant outcomes to continue qualifying. This could advantage larger, well-documented programs but create barriers for newer community-based organizations serving hard-to-reach youth.
   
• Out-of-School Youth as a Barrier to Employment
  
  Explicitly adds "out-of-school youth" as a recognized individual barrier to employment, giving it the same formal status as other barriers like homelessness or disability.
   
• Reauthorizes and Modifies the YouthBuild Program
  
  Reauthorizes YouthBuild, an existing, comprehensive pre-apprenticeship program for youth who left school without a diploma. The bill modifies the program by directing the Secretary to reserve not less than 5% of any amount appropriated to grants to tribes, tribal communities, Native Hawaiian organizations, or organizations serving tribes, and not less than 10% of any amount appropriated for grants to rural areas. This section also clarifies that grantees can provide supportive services to ensure full participation in a program (including services for individuals with disabilities), provide meals to participants in conjunction with program activities, and may refer participants to federal and state assistance programs.

Similar to the 2024 proposed WIOA reauthorization, this bill unfortunately does not include the Youth Workforce Readiness Act, which would have provided grant funding to afterschool and summer program providers working directly with older youth on workforce skill development.

It is uncertain when the bill will go to the House floor for consideration. If it passes the House, though, it will likely face hurdles in the Senate.

To learn more about the bill, read the document at Congress.gov.