The National Skill Standards Board was a coalition of community, business, labor, education, and civil rights leaders. It was tasked with building a national voluntary system of skill standards, assessment, and certification to enhance the ability of the United States workforce to compete effectively in the global economy.
History
NSSB gathered research on the creation of skill requirements, skill assessments, and certification processes. The board developed research protocols for validating skills across an entire Industry, the development of quality criteria for all elements of that system, and the designs for a continuous improvement strategy. In 2001, the Manufacturing Skill Standards Board released "A Blueprint for Workforce Excellence" the nation's first skill standards developed under a common format and common language for all sectors of manufacturing. The skill standards represent the best practices for high-performance work and define the skills and knowledge required to ensure a skilled, mobile industrial workforce. The standards include national validation of the specific job functions in best practice work sites which when the job is completed successfully. They also establish the level of technical knowledge and skills needed for the job. The three distinct levels of skill standards: core, concentration and specialized. In 2003, federal entity NSSB became The National Skill Standards Board Institute. This was a membership foundation which would continue research and development related to the development and use of Industry skills requirements, skills assessment for learning or selection, and certifications. David Wilcox, the Deputy Director of the NSSB in 2003, partnered with Joselito Lualhati, also of the NSSB, to start a new firm called Global Skills X-Change Corporation that focuses on building better connections between education and work.
Workforce categorization
The NSSB categorized the entire United States’ workforce into just 15 industry sectors. Those sectors include:
The National Skill Standards Act of 1994 established "a National Skill Standards Board to serve as a catalyst in stimulating the development and adoption of a voluntary national system of skill standards and of assessment and certification of attainment of skill standards:" $15,000,000 was authorized for fiscal year 1994 for this act.
