New York State is seeing unemployment rates that rival the Great Depression, with significant and disproportionate impacts on low wage workers, young adults and people of color. Join Melinda Mack, executive director of the New York Association of Training and Employment Professionals as she overviews the current labor market challenges across New York State, the unique opportunities to reframe the existing education, job training and employment system to address equity, and challenges ahead.

Attending this discussion you will learn:

• • Current statistics and data on the labor market
  • Federal, State and NYS response to mass unemployment
  • Opportunities to reemploy millions of New Yorkers
  • Current roadblocks and challenges to getting New Yorkers back to work

About our Presenter:

Melinda Mack is the Executive Director of the New York Association of Training and Employment Professionals (NYATEP), a nationally recognized, leading non-profit membership association in the field of workforce development. As a steadfast advocate and expert in system’s change; she champions the investment in and expansion of promising and evidence-based practices to improve outcomes for New Yorkers; the use of data to drive decision-making; and for eliminating silos that deter from high quality services. Ms. Mack is a co-lead of the Invest in Skills NY initiative and campaign that successfully engaged the State in 2018 to invest more than $175 million in job training and workforce development. In her previous roles, Ms. Mack was the founding Director for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation program, Graduate NYC! and served as the acting Executive Director for the New York City Workforce Board under the Bloomberg Administration. Before working in New York City, Ms. Mack worked in Upstate New York in local government working in both municipal finance and economic development in Buffalo and Albany.

Ms. Mack has received a baccalaureate degree in Urban and Public Policy from SUNY Buffalo, a master’s degree in Public Administration, and a master’s degree in Regional Planning with a specialization in housing from SUNY Albany. She also is a graduate of the Columbia Business School’s Senior Leaders in Non-Profit Executive program, the New York City Workforce Leaders Academy, and Leadership Buffalo. Ms. Mack proudly serves on the National Skills Coalition Board, NYS Economic Development Council, New Ways to Work, and Albany Can Code. In 2018, she received recognition by City and State Magazine as 40 Under 40 Rising Stars in politics in New York State.