Education centered on workers’ rights literacy, worker voice, and worker empowerment is essential for modern-day job readiness training and strategic workforce development.
A critical component of being “job ready” is knowing one’s rights at work.
By connecting workers’ rights training to workforce development programming, this curriculum seeks to teach current and future workers about their rights on the job, how to enforce these rights, and how to improve their working conditions and job quality.
This Curriculum was designed to be used by front-line workforce development staff to educate program participants about their rights as workers and strategies for protecting those rights. Although all workers are at risk of violations of employment and labor laws, workers in low-paid and precarious jobs are especially vulnerable to wage theft and other workers’ rights violations such as illegal discrimination and occupational health and safety hazards.
As a wide range of organizations, both private and public, engage in workforce development activities, we developed this Curriculum to be flexible and adaptable to different kinds of programs, participants, and geographies. Within an organization, job roles may vary, but we believe that learning workers’ rights is useful for all direct service staff. As these front-line staff learn more about workers’ rights, they will see how their own work – as case managers, instructors, business service representatives – can be more effective with participants if they include training about workers’ rights.
The Curriculum can be implemented in a variety of ways and can be used in a multitude of settings. Units cover specific topics and areas of workers’ rights. Each unit has 6-9 lesson plans, accompanied by handouts, slide decks, readings, and activities. Lessons are designed to explore contemporary issues and trends in workers’ rights, as well as make connections to historical struggles.
The learning methods employed throughout are varied with an intention of making this subject matter accessible and impactful for a majority of American workers. Curriculum lessons are participatory and validate participants’ life experiences, helping them to develop both awareness and critical consciousness.
We want to hear from you!
Please contact us if you have any questions about the Curriculum or if you need advice on how to best adapt its contents to fit the needs of your program and participants. We may also be able to provide direct training for your organization’s staff on how to use the Curriculum.