Getting Education and Training
From CalWORKs | Welfare Resources
Contents |
Your Rights
- Getting Education
- There are two ways to get CalWORKs education:
- If you are already enrolled in school when you start welfare-to-work. (See Self-Initiated Programs: Getting Education Through CalWORKs.)
- If your “assessment” shows you need it for employment.
- Assessment
- If you don’t find a job through Job Search, you will go to “assessment.” This is where the county reviews your work and education history, in order to make your welfare-to-work plan.
- Talk to the assessor about:
- Why you want education or training.
- Ask for career testing if you don’t know what you want to do, and what the wages are for different careers.
- The county must look at your skill level, and not just that you have worked or finished a certain amount of school.
- Note: CalWORKs law says “every county shall provide ... education and training the participant needs to find self-supporting work.”
- Basic Education
- The county must assign you to Basic Education (reading, math, GED or English Language) classes if “appropriate and necessary” to remove your barriers to employment.
- Ask your county for its written rules on how it will decide if these classes are “appropriate and necessary.”
- Hours of Education
- New rules, effective December 1, 2004, require that the first 20 hours of welfare-to-work be in “core” activities.
- “Core” activities are work, self-employment, unpaid work, work study, job search, and the first 12 months of Vocational Education.
- If you are not in Vocational Education, this means that your education will be assigned to the remaining 12-15 “noncore” hours.
- If you are making satisfactory progress in a degree or certificate program leading to employment, you may be able to do some of your school time during the “core” hours.
- Example: Jane’s must do 32 hours/week. Her assessed program is job skills training for 20 hours. This is 8 more hours than fits in the “non-core” activities time. If this is a degree program, the extra 8 hours can “spill over” into her “core” time. Jane would then be doing 20 hours of education, and 12 hours of a work activity.
- Other Ways to Get School
- Two-parent households. If the other parent is meeting the 35 hour requirement, you can go to school on your own or through CalWORKs. If you go on your own, you don’t have to follow the CalWORKs rules, but, you won’t get CalWORKs support services.
- Volunteer to do extra hours through CalWORKs. You will get support services. CalWORKs must let you drop the extra hours without sanctioning you. Talk to your worker first.
- Do school on your own, in addition to CalWORKs, if the county won’t approve school or you don’t want to follow the CalWORKs school rules. You won’t get support services.
- On sanction. If CalWORKs won’t give you education, you may want to take a CalWORKs sanction. You will lose your share of the cash aid and (in some cases) food stamps. The rest of your family will still get aid. If you have subsidized rent, your rent won’t go down even though you have less income. Talk to a legal advocate first.
Solving Problems
You have the full 60-months on CalWORKs to get the training you need to get off welfare!
- You don’t have to do job search if it would interfere with your existing job or county-approved schooling.
- The County cannot have across-the-board limits on education. It must see what you need.
- For example, it cannot limit education to 1 year programs, or say that everyone has to do work experience first.
- Note: You should not be sanctioned for not signing a plan when you have disagreed with the assessment or the assignment.
- If your assessment doesn’t recommend education or training, or you don’t like what county assigns you for education, ask for a “Third Party Assessment.”
- A neutral person will look at your employment needs.
- Ask your worker to count “noncore” activities to core hours if you need more time. Ask for a hearing if denied.
- Problems? Ask for a state hearing! Fill out the back of any Notice of Action or call (800) 952-5253.
Need More Help?
For more legal help and information, you can use LawHelpCalifornia to contact a local legal advocate.
