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Saturday, June 02, 2012

All They Need is the Sheet of Paper

When you are in the military--unless you are infantry or a tanker or something like that--you learn a skill that should prepare you for civilian work.

The problem is that every state has their own credentialing and so it is tough to translate military skills into certification for troops leaving the service.

After doing some work on this at the state level several years ago and seeing what a problem translating military jobs into civilian certification is, this is welcome news:

President Obama will unveil a new initiative today that will, for the first time, allow some U.S. service members to receive civilian credentials and licenses for skills they learn in the military.

The effort, announced by the White House late Thursday, is aimed at boosting employment among post-9/11 veterans, some of whom have had difficulty obtaining jobs in high-skill industries because their training is not immediately transferable to the private sector.

A military truck driver, for example, is not automatically certified to operate a rig in his or her home state, just as a military EMT requires extra certification to obtain a civilian EMT job.

Of course, whether we require too much certification before allowing someone to work in a field is another question altogether.