Sixteen states have published Workforce Pell approval frameworks. Fifteen published eligible-occupation lists running from Pennsylvania's 19 to Colorado's 434; Florida instead issued a 31-program inventory. The federal law lets a program qualify if it is high-skill or high-wage or in-demand, but every state has layered its own screens on top of that floor. This page compares those frameworks side by side, for state and federal readers tracking what other states are doing: how long the list is, how high the wage bar sits, and what each state demands beyond it.
The first approved-program roster has landed: Pennsylvania posted its final 2026-27 list July 8, approving 2 of the 40 programs submitted by 11 institutions, both truck-driving programs. Iowa (window closed May 15) was first to launch; Texas (closed Jun 19) and Arkansas (closed Jun 30) are in state review; Minnesota extended its provider deadline to August 15; Nebraska opened its NDOL application portal July 8 with a 49-occupation list; Maryland opened rolling applications July 10 through the Maryland Workforce Exchange under GWDB Policy 2026-01, with quarterly determinations from August; South Dakota announced July 7 that its inaugural window is open (July 1 to August 31, determinations by October 30) against a 56-occupation list; Ohio accepts year-round; Michigan notifies institutions in August and reopens January 15; Florida has published a 31-program inventory; Alabama launched a rolling per-program approval process Jun 30; North Carolina's first deadline is July 15. At the July 1 launch, South Carolina opened its first quarterly window, Mississippi and Tennessee began accepting applications, and Colorado opened its certification platform ahead of a July 15 to August 15 window. The federal final rule published May 19; programs went live July 1.
The same federal statute produced lists ranging from 19 occupations to 364, a roughly nineteenfold spread. Two philosophies: publish a short, targeted list, or publish a broad list and do the real filtering at the program level. Ohio sits at the broad end, screening against its existing statewide Top Jobs list. Florida is the one state off this axis: it published a program inventory directly rather than an occupation list, so it carries no fixed occupation count.
Scroll horizontally to see all sixteen states. Each column links to the state's primary source.
The convergence is procedural, mostly forced by federal law. The divergence is philosophical, and it is where states are making real choices.
Heavy-truck (CDL) drivers sit on every one of the ten published occupation lists. Electricians, HVAC technicians, and plumbers sit on nine of the ten: South Carolina's 24-occupation pilot list, effective July 1, includes CDL and the heavy-equipment trades but not those three building trades. Florida, which publishes a program inventory rather than an occupation list, also includes CDL but not the building trades, skewing instead to public safety and health care. These four remain the most widely shared occupations across the published lists. A common worry about widely shared occupations is over-enrollment: too many providers piling into the same fields. The numbers run the other way. Certificates the federal data can see are a small fraction of projected annual openings.
| Occupation | Short-certificate completions (2023) | Projected annual openings | Pipeline fill |
|---|---|---|---|
| Electricians | 9,791 | ~81,000 | ~12% |
| HVAC mechanics and installers | 7,736 | ~40,100 | ~19% |
| Plumbers, pipefitters, steamfitters | 945 | ~44,000 | ~2% |
| Heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers | 22,624 | ~237,600 | ~9% |
Completions: IPEDS 2023, certificates of less than one academic year (award levels 20 and 21), first majors, each occupation's primary CIP. This is the band most trade and CDL certificates fall in: a separate one-to-two-year level adds 12,056 electrician, 11,341 HVAC, 1,068 plumbing, and 278 truck-driver completions, but those longer programs are the exception for these occupations. Openings: BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook projected annual openings, 2024-34 projections (electricians, truck drivers).
Before South Carolina's pilot list, exactly these four occupations cleared all nine then-published lists; fourteen lists in, no single occupation clears every one. Heavy-truck drivers appear on thirteen of fourteen: Colorado's, the broadest list, is the only one published without them. Electricians, HVAC technicians, and plumbers also clear thirteen of fourteen (every list but South Carolina's); computer user support specialists twelve of fourteen (every list but Minnesota's and South Carolina's); carpenters eleven of fourteen (missing from Minnesota's, South Carolina's, and South Dakota's); and phlebotomists eleven of fourteen (missing from Texas's, Arkansas's, and South Dakota's). The broad lists include nearly everything; the tight lists, Pennsylvania's 19, Minnesota's 22, and South Carolina's 24, together with Colorado's two-of-three rule, decide what is most widely shared.
Why the visible pipeline looks this thin, and where over-enrollment could still appear:
As of today, these four occupations are undersupplied by Pell-visible providers, not oversaturated.
The cleanest way to read it: Iowa gates hardest on definition (all three criteria at once), Pennsylvania gates softest on wage (a poverty-line floor) but hardest on list size (19 occupations), Minnesota gates hardest on wage (a family-sustaining benchmark) while carving out priority sectors, and North Carolina keeps the widest list (364) while pushing the real filtering down to the program level. One statute, applied through markedly different state screens.
Opportunity Data provides independent Workforce Pell policy mapping, program-capacity analysis, crosswalk audits, and executive briefings.
Alabama's approval process was operating on the day Workforce Pell launched, and nearly every working part predates the program, some by seven years. The governor's memorandum names four instruments the state already ran. This analysis maps each federal requirement to the instrument that answers it, and reads the same mapping as a scope of work for states building from less.
As states move from passing Workforce Pell to running it, the demand for sound data, clear comparison across states, and an honest read on outcomes grows with it. Opportunity Data works with partners to help get the rollout right.
Counts are distinct occupations on each state's published eligible-occupation list, verified against the published list files (Florida publishes a 31-program inventory rather than an occupation list). Definitions of high-skill, high-wage, and in-demand, the wage thresholds, the employer-alignment requirements, and the program-level screens are taken from each state's published policy instruments, adopted under H.R. 1 (2025) and the U.S. Department of Education's final rule of May 19, 2026.
The methodology note documents the counting rules, verification dates, source links, and legal basis, state by state, for the frameworks compared above (Maryland, added July 22, is documented in its table column and the tracker row pending the next note revision).
Read the methodology note (PDF) →
For where every state and DC stand in the approval pipeline, see the State Implementation Tracker.
A program must exist for a year before it can qualify. Florida's program-first and Colorado's occupation-first implementations show why educational supply decides what Workforce Pell can fund.
Early state frameworks fall into two camps, curated occupation lists and permissive ones, and the choice shapes what institutions can offer.
Much of short-term training lives in noncredit programs federal data cannot see. Workforce Pell's reporting requirements could make that pipeline visible.
In Census PSEO data on 10,025 short-term certificate programs, 97 percent clear the earnings bar; two-thirds are too small to be measured at all.