State establishes Employer Training Grant
DeKalb County Economic Development Partnership
More than one million jobs must be filled in Indiana over the next 10 years. Thousands of these jobs require specialized training or an industry-recognized certification in addition to a high school diploma. To help Hoosier employers fill these jobs, Indiana has created the Employer Training Grant. This grant reimburses employers who train, hire, and retain new workers to fill in-demand positions within recognized priority sectors.
The Employer Training Grant is available to employers in six priority sectors aligned with Indiana’s economy: Advanced Manufacturing, Building & Construction, Health Sciences, Information Technology & Business Services, Transportation & Logistics, and Agriculture. Within those sectors, the grant pays for training associated with the most in-demand “middle skills” occupations – those defined as requiring more than a high school diploma but less than an associate’s degree. Click here for a list of eligible occupations.
The Employer Training Grant will reimburse an employer for up to $5,000 per newly trained employee that is trained, hired, and retained for 6 months with a limit of $50,000 per employer. The 6 months can be at the employer that received the ETG or another employer (as long as employment is continuous and training is complete). There are no wage requirements for new hires in this program and the employee must see a wage gain from the start of training to the completion of training.
If the employee or employer receives another state grant that directly ties to training costs for the employee (e.g., Workforce Ready Grant, SEF Grants, etc.), an employer would be ineligible for this grant opportunity.
For training to be eligible for reimbursement, the training must be occupational skills training that directly correlates with one of the approved in-demand middle-skills occupations and must be greater than 40 hours. DWD can authorize training linked to local in-demand occupations with Regional Labor Market Information data. HR training and job shadowing will not qualify.
Employers can use training providers on DWD’s eligible training provider list (ETPL). For non-ETPL providers (e.g. customized training programs), the employer or training provider will be required to submit training information to DWD, including the curriculum for the training, to verify that the training is (1) occupational skills training, and (2) aligns to one of the approved middle-skills occupations.
Employers can seek reimbursement until 6/30/2019. To request reimbursement for a new hire, the employer will provide employee level data, including the information about the new employee trained, dates and type of training, date of hire, and the 6 month retention window. DWD will crossmatch this information against data collected in the agency’s new hire and wage record database to verify that requirements of the grant program were met.
