Rhonda Suda, Chief Executive Officer at SWWDB
Editor’s note: This spotlight is part of a series highlighting Blackhawk’s partnerships with businesses and community organizations. A new feature will be published each month through 2025. You can read other spotlights at blackhawk.edu/partners.
The Southwest Wisconsin Workforce Development Board (SWWDB) offers workforce services to both employers and job-seeking adults and youth. By aligning its employment and training services with Job Center partners under the American Job Center framework, SWWDB collaborates with organizations like Blackhawk Technical College to enhance workforce development efforts in the region.
Colleen Koerth, Workforce Development Manager at Blackhawk, highlighted the vital role that SWWDB plays in connecting qualified workers with meaningful job opportunities in the area.
“The partnership we have brings together planning, funding and an awareness of industry workforce and training needs to create opportunities for youth, adults and employees at area businesses,” Colleen said. “We’re very much joined at the hip.”
The SWWDB is one of 11 workforce boards in Wisconsin created under the Workforce Investment Act of 1998. In 2014, this federal program was enhanced and repackaged into what’s currently known as the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA). As a result, the SWWDB receives funding from state and federal sources to coordinate its employment and training activities. The organization is responsible for guiding and overseeing local workforce development services across six counties in southwest Wisconsin, including Grant, Green, Iowa, Lafayette, Richland and Rock.
The organization’s Board of Directors has 24 members from the public and private sectors, including Blackhawk’s President, Dr. Tracy Pierner. The mix of board members helps ensure balanced, effective policy-making, strategic planning, oversight and accountability.
How SWWDB works
Rhonda Suda, Chief Executive Officer at SWWDB, said the organization’s mission is to build a talent pipeline in the region.
“We use grant-funded resources to assist individuals, adults and youth in developing their skills and finding employment that can support them and their families,” she said.
SWWDB staff use a series of assessments to measure where job seekers are in their current or professional development, where they want to go, and what it would take to get them there, Rhonda said. Staff then assist individuals with finding training and/or providing financial assistance.
“Since our goal is to ensure people are choosing good options for themselves, not only based on what they want to do but what careers are going to be available in five years, we always try to stress the value of long-term employment security,” Rhonda said.
Grants that come from the federal and/or state government can help job seekers with costs for tuition, books, transportation, child care and other costs related to training. A couple of formulas are used to determine how much money each local workforce board gets. The SWWDB helps more than 800 people each year, according to Rhonda, who has led the organization since 2014.
Many people helped by SWWDB have more than one barrier to employment, and people seeking training may have negative perceptions of school or feel out of place, which can make taking that first step difficult.
“Our programs are set to address those barriers, so they can be successful in employment, whether that’s through training or just through some intensive career and/or occupational planning,” Rhonda said.
‘It’s priceless’
The relationship that SWWDB has with Blackhawk is vital to the success of workforce development in the southwest region.
“Blackhawk Tech has taken very methodical steps to make sure there’s a connection between education and training and workforce development,” Rhonda said. “A partner like Blackhawk Tech who is fully engaged in the community and is open to ideas and partnerships and welcomes you to the table–you really can’t put a price on that. It’s priceless.”
Rhonda said Blackhawk and the SWWDB constantly share information, which helps both entities develop programs and pivot to what is offered based on current or future workforce needs and trends.
“I know that SWWDB can refer somebody to Blackhawk, and they’re going to be taken care of,” Rhonda said. “It’s just a natural connection.”
To find out more about SWWDB, visit swwdb.org.