I am in favor of job training

I can’t be sure, but I’m almost positive that the four Democratic candidates for Senate have said the above phrase at some point during the campaign.

So, my question for them is: what kind of job training? Pagliuca seems to favor job training related to math, science, and life sciences, but he never gets too specific. Capuano talks about emphasizing community colleges but again, never gets too specific. Coakley supports some type of voke-tech, but its all pretty hazy. Khazei is a bit more specific — supporting community colleges linking with businesses and the Workforce Investment Act.

Job training is one of those motherhood and apple pie issues — everyone supports it. But almost no one can explain what really works. The Commonwealth has taken a few shots at evaluating its own programs — but there are no standard metrics and absolutely no one is setting any policy priorities based on this information.

How about one of the candidates move beyond the platitudes and niceties, and give us a specific example of what types of job training they would support and what they would de-emphasize? Not going to happen, I know.