In 2010, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) launched round one of WDQI to fund development of state workforce longitudinal databases. It was a joint undertaking with U.S. Department of Education (ED) fostered to build on the Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems (SLDS) initiative that ED. The goal of the initiatives is to encourage the development of state education and workforce longitudinal administrative databases. Collecting data longitudinally will provide a comprehensive picture of earnings that demonstrate the relationship between education and training programs, as well as the additional contribution of the provision of other employment services. In 2012, Illinois was awarded $1million in the second round of WDQI funding opportunities.  State partnerships have invested the money in researching, securing and analyzing workforce data to create materials on state workforce performance to share with workforce system stakeholders. 

The purpose of WDQI is to provide state workforce agencies (SWA) the opportunity to develop or expand State workforce longitudinal administrative databases. The State workforce longitudinal databases will, 1) include information on programs that provide training, employment services, and unemployment insurance; 2) connect with education data contained in Statewide Longitudinal Data Systems (SLDS) databases; 3) be linked at the individual level to allow for the evaluation of federally and State-supported education and workforce programs; 4) be capable of generating workforce training provider performance information and outcomes in a standardized, easy to understand format (e.g., scorecards; and 5) lead to better information for customers and stakeholders of the workforce system.

The WDQI grant is truly seen as the “sister project” for the ILDS. The ILDS focuses on education and educational institutions which encompasses the majority of longitudinal data. WDQI focuses on employment and employment training activities. Therefore, it supplies a smaller portion of the data but an extremely important piece of the data, nonetheless.

Conventional quantitative data is a snapshot, a still life picture of a glimpse of data. What IL’s work with WDQI and longitudinal data has allowed is for us to start expanding those pictures and telling more complete data stories.

WDQI data is showing enhanced outcomes -  people exiting workforce services are moving from multiple part-time jobs into 1 job – a job they are attaching themselves to and receiving salary increases and advancement. With WDQI data we see long term gains, sustainable life changing results, and return on investment.