2024 In Review: Bridging Gaps Through Collaboration - Expanding Career Pathways and Building Arizona's Healthcare Workforce

We couldn’t let 2024 pass by without reflecting on the wins, lessons, and partnerships that moved us closer to The Arizona We Want.

At Center for the Future of Arizona (CFA), we believe that a thriving Arizona is built on the aspirations of Arizonans. By focusing on the outcomes Arizonans want, we approach the state’s most pressing challenges — addressing root causes, removing barriers, and driving progress that leads to meaningful change.

Our work goes beyond identifying problems. As a “do tank,” we advance solutions that empower individuals, strengthen communities, and position Arizona for long-term prosperity. We do this through impact initiatives that, among many things, expand access to quality education, align workforce skills with job market needs, and foster civic engagement. We also regularly check-in on Arizona’s progress on the issues that matter most to Arizonans through the Arizona Progress Meters, which include over 80 metrics that signal areas of improvement and strength.

We are working towards a future in which every Arizonan has the opportunity to thrive. Our work also positions the state to remain prosperous and competitive in a rapidly changing world.

As we close the chapter on 2024, we’re proud to reflect on the strides we made and the partnerships that amplified our impact.

Take a look at 2024 highlights from our education initiatives.

The Big Picture of Arizona’s Education Landscape

One of Arizonans’ Shared Public Values is Education. Arizonans value a highly educated and skilled population.

To achieve this vision of success, educators, industry, and local businesses must work together to ensure access to high-quality education for all students that is also relevant to job market needs.

CFA is working to improve Arizona’s educational landscape by reimagining curriculum that fits individual's best learning strategies, connecting students with opportunities to learn soft skills and explore potential career opportunities, and equipping educators with executive development that focuses on ensuring their leadership improves outcomes for their students.

Education Trends in 2024

CFA’s Arizona Education Progress Meter shows opportunities for improvement and positive strides.

Post-high school enrollment was stagnant with only 48% of high school graduates enrolling in a post-secondary institution in the year following graduation.

The Progress Meter also shows only 48% of working-age Arizonans hold an associate degree, professional certification, or higher — far below the level needed to meet evolving job demands, particularly in healthcare, and technology. This percentage is below the state’s goal for 60% of the state’s working adult population to have a certificate, license, or degree by 2030.

Postsecondary education is crucial for Arizona’s workforce needs as workers retire or exit their roles. At the current rate, Arizona’s exits and net growth of new jobs will require new skilled workers.

Through community-first conversations and expansion of innovative solutions, CFA is committed to helping improve educational outcomes for every Arizona student. The following highlights from 2024 show how our efforts are identifying opportunities for complex challenges, introducing potential skills and careers to students, and connecting employers and students for life-changing mentorships.

Expanding Career Exploration at No Cost to Schools

CFA’s Arizona Pathways to Prosperity initiative expanded the Possible Futures Career Exploration Curriculum to include grades K-5. Building on the successful offerings for middle grades, schools now have a free, quality resource for K-10 career literacy – designed by and for educators.

This groundbreaking move brings career exploration to students earlier in their educational journey to start developing critical career literacy and preparing for their future Education and Career Action Plans. This early start is crucial—familiarizing students with the modern labor market and in-demand industries while they are still discovering their interests better empowers them to build out their future educational and career paths over the long term.

Within the new curriculum, students learn about different types of careers such as Agronomist or Veterinarian. Students can see what skills might be helpful for that role and what tools the role requires. Supplemental activities include learning how to budget and planning a vacation.

Developing and providing this curriculum at no cost to districts, schools & educators, is making early and ongoing career exploration possible and accessible.

Increasing Access to Work-Based Learning

Not only did CFA make it possible for more Arizona students to explore potential career opportunities, but CFA also gave more students of all backgrounds access to opportunities that build their resumes and skill sets.

Over 150 students successfully completed virtual internships after expanding opportunities in partnership with the Work Based Learning Alliance.

Virtual internships allow students to complete up to 100 hours of paid work in teams of five with one employer providing the project and mentorship. This means that students from across the state can collaborate and grow together.

From our work with school and industry partners, we know that scaling and sustaining internships is a challenge. We also know that low-income and rural students have even less access to these due to financial barriers, transportation limitations, and lack of social capital.

It’s critical that we reach more students & better reach disadvantaged students with opportunities to develop necessary skills and apply those skills to their education and career goals.

Facilitating Collaboration in the Healthcare Sector

There is a growing need for Arizona to attract and retain more healthcare professionals by 2030 to keep up with the needs of a growing and aging population.

Siloes can often be a barrier to successful collaboration among industries. In response to requests from statewide leaders and partners, CFA’s Education team focused its efforts in 2024 on community-based healthcare conversations that include education as a solution.

More than 100 partners across sectors, including education and healthcare, attended CFA’s second Statewide Healthcare Workforce Summit on April 4-5. This convening provided an opportunity for leaders to swap expertise about workforce partnerships, nursing readiness and retention, and community and home-based care.

According to the Arizona Gallup Survey, only six in 10 Arizonans are satisfied with healthcare quality overall, with the satisfaction lowest in rural areas. As Arizona’s population ages and expands, the healthcare workforce must be supported and improved.

Our state recognizes the urgent need to build education and career pipelines to meet the needs of healthcare providers and Arizonans. Especially as funding is earmarked for this challenge, collaboration across regions and sectors can unite efforts and drive real progress.

As a continuation of the conversations about healthcare workforce needs from April’s Summit, CFA convened healthcare providers, government officials, educators, and nonprofits during region-specific healthcare workforce forums across the state in 2024. Forums were held throughout 2024 in Northern Arizona, Southeast Arizona, Southwest Arizona, and Maricopa County.

The goal of these regional forums is to foster cross-sector collaboration, enhance communication between stakeholders, optimize grant writing efforts, and improve data sharing and access. By bringing together leaders from a variety of organizations, efforts to increase the healthcare workforce can be more intentional, streamlined, and most importantly, not duplicative.

In Maricopa County, attendees of the forums realized that Radiology Technologists were the greatest workforce need. Therefore, meetings have focused on how to expand educational and training opportunities in the West Valley.

In Southwest Arizona, participants identified behavioral health as the most pressing workforce issue in the area. In this region, the Yuma Healthcare Workforce Action Committee worked to conduct a SOAR analysis (Strengths, Opportunities, Aspirations, and Results) to determine the next actionable steps for enhancing the behavioral health workforce pipeline.

Every region faces unique challenges. By empowering communities to address their individual needs and opportunities, stakeholders can solve problems and make real progress.

Conducting Critical Research to Inform Next Steps

Another way CFA’s Education team assisted with statewide efforts to improve education, retention, and recruitment of the healthcare workforce is through a partnership with the Arizona Health Care Cost Containment System (AHCCCS).

The AHCCCS is Arizona’s Medicaid agency that provides health insurance to Arizona residents. The state agency has a vested interest in ensuring Arizonans have the healthcare access and quality they need, which includes promoting a stable and consistent workforce.

The AHCCCS asked CFA to help build the infrastructure for collaboration among state and local agencies to build up Arizona’s home- and community-based services (HCBS) workforce. HCBS is the network of care that serves individuals, mainly elderly people, who need home-based assistance with daily activities. Some of the services of HCBS include adult day care, respite care, and housekeeping.

There are many partners, stakeholders, and agencies interested in the success of HCBS. At CFA, we are uniquely positioned to support the need for a stronger and more robust healthcare workforce because of our work within healthcare-based career-connected pathways for students and the statewide healthcare workforce summits & forums.

We know that listening to Arizonans is foundational to solving the problems they face.

In conjunction with the Workforce team, CFA engaged over 50 organizations in a survey of state agencies, providers, and non-profits to identify priorities for a newly formed Home Community Based Care Workforce.

The surveys showed there needs to be more collaboration among participant groups; more streamlined training standards for HCBS workers; better recruitment methods for job seekers and direct care employment opportunities; and improved reimbursement methods for HCBS workers.

The data collected will inform healthcare partners and stakeholders’ actions to address workforce challenges for Home and Community Based Services in 2025.

Looking Ahead: Building a Robust Education System That Suits Students, Educators, and the Workforce’s Needs

Education remains a top priority for Arizonans, and CFA is committed to continuing this critical work.

A robust education system that ensures the success of every child is essential to Arizona’s future. CFA has led the way in driving equity and excellence in education, envisioning a future where every child thrives.

We'll expand and deepen our focus on closing achievement and opportunity gaps, increasing educational attainment, preparing exceptional school leaders, creating career-connected pathways, and helping schools tailor learning experiences to meet the needs of every student.