As the largest funders of education, at the state level we have a responsibility to drive innovation within our systems, bolster our capacity to measure what works and what doesn’t, and most importantly, to prepare our students for workforce readiness, civic engagement, and well-being. Our citizens, our communities, our states and our nation deserve nothing less.

LEARNING AND EMPLOYMENT15RECORD .—The term ‘learning and employment16record’ means a digital, machine-readable17record of an individual’s educational and em-18ployment history that—19‘‘(i) contains information that may be20self attested and is verified by the employ-21ers, persons for whom the individual per-22formed services, and education and train-23ing providers of such individual;24March 30, 2026 (2:21 p.m.)G:\M\19\OWENUT\OWENUT_038.XMLg:\VHLC\033026\033026.020.xml (1052619|1)

The U.S. Department of Education says these integrated, next-generation strategies should feature a credential registry, learning and employment records (LERs), and a skills-based job description generator.