The Aspen Institute

Job Quality Tools Library > Section 4: Strengthening Practices to Improve Job Quality > Tools: Education Benefits

Originally posted: May 11, 2020
Last updated: May 11, 2020

Section 4, the core of the library, includes tools designed to address specific components of job quality. Once organizations have determined their job quality priorities, they can turn to these tools to shift practices in the areas they have deemed most urgent, either in their own organizations or in the businesses with which they partner.

We’ve organized tools into categories that reflect the job quality attributes most commonly cited across the job quality frameworks and definitions included in Section 1. These attributes include wages, benefits, scheduling, legal rights, equity and inclusion, opportunity to build skills and advance, supportive work environment, worker voice, and employee ownership. Each attribute also includes sub-categories for ease of navigation.

↓ Tools and Resources Below the Box ↓

Tools

UpSkill America and the Institute for Corporate Productivity – From Tuition Reimbursement to Tuition Disbursement: Key Components and Considerations

Who’s It For: Employers, Economic Development, Investing and Lending, Worker Advocacy, Workforce Development

What’s It For: This step-by-step guide by Upskill America, an initiative of the Economic Opportunities Program, and the Institute for Corporate Productivity details the steps to change an organization’s tuition assistance program to a tuition disbursement program, providing financial support for education up-front rather than offering reimbursement after a worker has completed a program. This simple change to the structure of a tuition assistance program has important job quality and equity implications; it can make education and upskilling accessible to workers who are eager to learn but lack access to resources to pay for school. This tool is useful for employers and all practitioners who work with them to strengthen job quality.

Supplemental Resources

1. Upskill America and Institute for Corporate Productivity – Key Elements of Successful Tuition Assistance Programs: A New Model for Workforce Development. This publication details seven key components of a modernized tuition assistance program, including flexibility, inclusiveness, affordability, and support. This information can be useful to employers seeking to develop or enhance a tuition assistance program and to practitioners who work with businesses to improve worker mobility.