Applicants for New Jersey’s Literacy Skills Training Grants for Fiscal Year 2010 must meet the following requirements:

PROGRAMMATIC

• Adhere to the General Provisions of the Department of Labor and Workforce Development’s (LWD) Customized Training grant agreements.
• Business (es) lists newly created jobs with local One-Stop Career Centers or through America’s Job Exchange. Also, demonstrates a commitment to establish and maintain a working relationship with local One-Stop Career Centers to assist with the recruitment of new workers. Information about local One Stop Career Center services is available at: http://lwd.state.nj.us/labor/employer/busres/BusinessResources.html

• Participating business (es) must be current on all New Jersey tax obligations. Tax Clearance Form 
• Complete Development Subsidy Job Goals Accountability Act Form for grant requests of $25,000 or more. 
• Provide at least a 50% match toward the total program costs; however, applications that focus on training low-wage, low literacy level workers will be considered even if they have a lesser percentage of employer matching funds.
• Identify type of training. The training costs and hours must adhere to the cost per instructional hour and the number of training hours per course allowed by the Department.
• Average cost of instruction per trainee should not exceed $1,000.
• Training must be targeted towards low-wage workers.
• Must clearly identify the organizational needs to be addressed by the proposed training.
• Ensure that each course includes pre- and post- training assessment tools to measure improvements of the trainees. 

• Participating business (es) must identify the number of part-time workers to be trained. If part-time workers are being trained, provide an explanation in the narrative portion of your proposal. NOTE: part-time workers must work no less than 20 hours per week.

• Must clearly identify the name and location of the approved training provider(s). For assistance in identifying an eligible training provider, visit http://lwd.dol.state.nj.us/labor/wfprep/coei/training/training_index.html 

• Must provide the Federal Employer Identification Number (FEIN) of all participating business (es) – additional information @ http://lwd.dol.state.nj.us/labor/employer/ea/ea_index.html
• Must provide the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code of all participating business (es) – additional information @ http://www.census.gov/epcd/naics02/.
• Submit a narrative proposal that is consistent with the requested on-line CTTS application.                                                                    

TECHNICAL

• Prepare applications using the on-line Customized Training Tracking System (CTTS) with the following personal computer requirements:
• A personal computer with Window 98 operating system or higher, with a connected printer.
• Internet Explorer browser, version 5.5 or higher, 128 bit cipher strength and active X enabled on the computer desktop,
• Internet E-mail Address

• Online Pre-Qualification 

• Online Application in Customized Training Tracking System (CTTS) 

• Supplemental Narrative to address Rating Criteria listed below 

RATING CRITERIA

A thorough review of each application will be made by a review panel which will evaluate the applications against the rating criteria listed below.

Company Information (Maximum of 20 points)

• The business (es) employs 100 or less employees.

• The business (es) is located in an area designated as a “Labor Surplus Area” by the United States Department of Labor.

• The business (es) has not received a Customized Training Literacy grant in the prior fiscal year.

Special Points (5 points)

Applicants utilizing training facilitated by competent instructors who are employed by an approved New Jersey based training provider on the Eligible Training Provider List.

Expected Outcomes (Maximum of 75 points)

In addition to the on-line application, each applicant should address the participating business information and training desired outcome measures listed below. Since the on-line application does not allow for narrative information, a supplemental narrative should be submitted to the assigned Business Representative. Applications will not be considered complete until the narrative information is submitted.  Narrative must be submitted in the format below.

STEP-BY-STEP ONLINE APPLICATION PROCESS
PREQUALIFICATION APPLICATION:

To apply for the grant, all applicants must express a notice of intent to apply by completing the prequalification portion of the application. For fiscal year 2010, applications will be considered for a grant on a rolling basis; however, the final submittal date for a pre-qualification is April 28, 2010.

Before proceeding, review the General Provisions document.  All grants awarded by the Office of Grants Operations are subject to these General Provisions.  Any organization that wishes to apply for a competitive grant: Click Here. 

In the section of the Pre-Qualification Questionnaire that asks for the Type of Desired Application, select Literacy if you are applying for assistance for your organization.

Once you complete the Pre-Qualification, print a copy for your records by selecting the Print button at the end of the Pre-Qualification Questionnaire, and then select the Submit button to submit the Pre-Qualification Questionnaire for review by the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development.

Once the Department’s review is completed, the Office of Grants Operations will send a message to the e-mail address specified in your Pre-Qualification Questionnaire. If additional information is required before proceeding with the application, the e-mail will contain instructions. If no additional information is required, you will receive two e-mail messages as follows:

1.   The first e-mail message will contain instructions for setting up your access to the My NJ Portal as well as an authentication code you will use as part of the setup.
2.   The second e-mail message will contain instructions for setting up your access to the    Customized Training Tracking System (CTTS) as well as a security code you will use as part of the setup.

Both steps are required and must be followed in the above order.

APPLICATION:

Once you have established access to the My NJ Portal and to CTTS, click on the Welcome to the Customized Training System link on the portal page. This will take you to the main menu screen for CTTS. Look in the upper right corner of the menu; there is a description box that will display Literacy.. If this description box displays anything other than the Type of Desired Application you requested when you completed the Pre-Qualification Questionnaire, please notify the CTTS Help Desk at 609-633-6799 for assistance.

In the upper left corner of the menu screen there are a series of selection boxes. If you run your cursor over the boxes, another series of boxes will drop down from the menu box you select. These are the action boxes that direct CTTS to the function you wish to perform.

From the Application select box, choose the Create/View/Modify function. This will bring you to the first section of the Literacy application. Most of the data in this section will be populated with information you provided in the Pre-Qualification Questionnaire.

Complete the information in this section. Then select the Next button at the bottom of the section to move to Section Two. After you move to Section Two of the application, a staff member will assist you in completing your application. You will receive an e-mail message providing the name, office address, e-mail address, and work telephone number of your designated contact person.

Technical Resource Contact Information