March 29, 2022 - In early 2022, the CWDC and partners launched empowermentscore.org to measure indicators of economic mobility for Colorado’s frontline workforce. The Empowerment Score aims to measure individual, community, and economic characteristics that lead to greater employment stability and increased wages for Colorado workers, and empower state and local decision makers to increase opportunities for individuals to improve their economic status.
The new website presents data about economic mobility – the ability of someone to change their income or wealth – in an interactive map or chart format that allows users to sort the data by county or region and explore how their area is faring in regard to eight economic mobility indicators (e.g. industry growth and diversity; regional education and training opportunities). This data intends to equip Coloradans to better understand the complex and interrelated factors contributing to economic mobility and inspire state and local action to remove barriers to increasing income and wages for frontline workers.
Who should use the Empowerment Score?
The Empowerment Score provides a birds-eye view of the indicators of economic mobility for Colorado’s frontline workforce. Viewing the score on the map and in chart format helps understand the variation in the status of indicators across counties in Colorado.
- Policymakers should use the Empowerment Score to consider the factors facilitating and impeding the results that they are seeking from the employment and training system. The score should provoke questions and suggest data sources for data-informed decision making.
- Sector partnerships, Chambers of Commerce, Workforce Development Boards and other industry-led groups should use the Empowerment Score to focus employers on improving the education and training system, to suggest data sources that could be helpful for tracking key milestones, and to identify the information missing from the score that only employers can provide to drive strategy and assess progress.
- TalentFOUND Network partners should use the Empowerment Score to identify data sources to inform the continuous improvement of their programs, and invite new perspectives and partnerships that inform work with communities statewide as well as to identify opportunities for data sharing and data enhancements.
Visit empowermentscore.org to explore the data, and view the frequently asked questions to learn more about how the Empowerment Score was created, the economic mobility indicators being measured, and more.
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Thank you to the Center for Regional Economic Competitiveness (CREC), BrightHive, and UMass Amherst College of Social & Behavioral Sciences for their work to develop the Empowerment Score. A special thanks to Colorado’s Workforce Intelligence Data Experts (WIDE) group and community stakeholders throughout Colorado for sharing their insights and experiences to strengthen the score and ensure it was applicable to local Colorado communities.
In an effort to build on decades of experience working to promote economic mobility and advance frontline service workers, the Empowerment Score was piloted as part of Lives Empowered, a statewide initiative to upskill frontline service workers in the retail and hospitality sectors. Lives Empowered was made possible by a $4.1 million grant from Walmart to the Colorado Workforce Development Council.