by Eric Davis
Work-based learning programs involve many interconnected components:
- Student career exploration and preparation
- Employer engagement and opportunity creation
- Agreement management and documentation
- Placement coordination and tracking
- Reporting and compliance workflows
Managing these components separately across hundreds of organizations can be challenging without unified systems.
Integrated platforms can help coordinate these processes, allowing partners to manage agreements, track placements, and maintain documentation in one place. This enables schools and intermediaries to focus more on supporting students and less on managing fragmented administrative processes.
It also provides employers with clearer, more consistent ways to participate in work-based learning programs.
Enabling Regional and Statewide Scale
Indiana’s work-based learning ecosystem continues to grow, supported by strong collaboration between schools, employers, workforce boards, intermediaries, and industry associations.
As these programs expand, the ability to coordinate across regions becomes increasingly important.
Coordinated systems allow partners to:
- Execute structured agreements efficiently across multiple schools and employers
- Maintain consistent documentation and reporting
- Support employer participation across regions
- Track student experiences and outcomes
- Align student preparation with workforce needs
This creates a stronger foundation for connecting students to career opportunities while supporting employers’ talent pipeline needs.
Preparing Ahead of the July 2026 Implementation Timeline
Newly passed Indiana HEA 1098 requires written agreements between employers and intermediaries, schools, or industry partners when students participate in qualifying work-based learning experiences. To support these requirements, Skyepack is expanding the Career+ Pathways™ platform to include functionality that allows partners not only to track and store agreements, but also to upload and manage them within a centralized system. By centralizing agreement management, the platform increases transparency and reduces redundancy by minimizing the need for separate agreements between each individual school, employer, and intermediary, while maintaining clear documentation and accountability.
To support partners as requirements evolve, Skyepack is expanding agreement management and compliance support tools within its Career+ Pathways™ platform. These capabilities will be available beginning early Summer 2026, providing schools, intermediaries, employers, and industry associations time to prepare ahead of the July 1, 2026 effective date.
Career+ Pathways™ is already used across more than 130 Indiana school districts to coordinate career exploration, work-based learning placements, and talent pipeline development.
By providing structured workflows for agreement management, placement coordination, and documentation, the platform helps partners operate efficiently while supporting student success.
Building Sustainable Talent Pipelines for Indiana’s Future
Work-based learning is not just about individual placements—it’s about building long-term talent pipelines that connect students to meaningful career opportunities and help employers develop the workforce they need.
Achieving this requires strong collaboration and coordinated systems that support all participants.
As Indiana continues expanding work-based learning opportunities, investments in scalable infrastructure will play an important role in helping schools, intermediaries, employers, and industry partners work together effectively.
The goal is simple: make it easier for students to explore careers, easier for employers to engage, and easier for partners to coordinate—so that work-based learning can continue growing across Indiana.
