In the fall of 2009—at the request of the Council of Economic Advisors (CEA), the Office of Statistical and Science Policy (Office of Management and Budget, OMB), and the Under Secretary of Education (OUS)—the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) began a new interagency effort to improve federal statistical data on the education, training, and credentials that out-of-school youth and adults need for jobs. An Interagency Working Group on Certificates and Certifications was founded to oversee this work. In 2012, the group's scope expanded to include measures of participation and enrollment in federal surveys and its name changed to the Interagency Working Group on Expanded Measures of Enrollment and Attainment (GEMEnA). GEMEnA consists of senior representatives from the Bureau of the Census, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics, as well as CEA, NCES, OMB, and OUS.
With GEMEnA's expert guidance and support, NCES has embarked upon a multi-faceted effort to apply best-practice survey development principles towards the goal of developing valid national measures of the participation in and credentialing of education and training for work, and to build government-wide consensus for the adoption of these measures.
GEMEnA's portfolio includes four main strands of work:
To ensure the relevance if its work for answering critical policy and research questions, GEMEnA has established an Expert Panel to offer guidance and support as its work progresses. The Expert Panel is comprised of senior researchers and policy makers who use data to understand the role of education and training for work.
