Federal Jobs for STARs Act of 2024

[Congressional Bills 118th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[S. 4889 Introduced in Senate (IS)]

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118th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                S. 4889

 To remove educational barriers to Federal employment for workers who 
    are skilled through alternative routes, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                   IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

                             July 31, 2024

Mr. Brown (for himself, Ms. Baldwin, and Ms. Klobuchar) introduced the 
 following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on 
               Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To remove educational barriers to Federal employment for workers who 
    are skilled through alternative routes, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Federal Jobs for STARs Act of 
2024''.

SEC. 2. DEFINITIONS.

    In this Act--
            (1) the term ``employee'' means an individual appointed to 
        a position in the civil service (as defined in section 2101 of 
        title 5, United States Code) in an executive agency;
            (2) the term ``executive agency'' means a department, 
        agency, office, or other establishment in the executive branch 
        of the Federal Government; and
            (3) the term ``STAR'' means an individual who--
                    (A) is active in the labor force;
                    (B) has not obtained a bachelor's degree or a 
                higher degree; and
                    (C) has developed job-related skills through 
                alternative routes, which may include at a community 
                college, in an apprenticeship, through a bootcamp, 
                through military service, through partial college 
                completion, in other training programs, or through on-
                the-job experience.

SEC. 3. TRANSPARENCY AND DIRECTIVES ON EDUCATIONAL REQUIREMENTS FOR 
              FEDERAL PUBLIC SECTOR JOBS.

    To improve transparency and directives related to educational 
requirements for positions in executive agencies, the Director of the 
Office of Personnel Management shall--
            (1) prohibit the head of an executive agency from requiring 
        a minimum educational attainment as qualification for a 
        position as an employee of the executive agency, unless the 
        Director of the Office of Personnel Management determines that 
        such educational attainment is necessary for the position based 
        on specified skills required for the position that can only be 
        obtained through a certain degree;
            (2) prescribe regulations for hiring of employees by 
        executive agencies regarding alternative qualifications to 
        educational attainment that would meet the knowledge, skills, 
        and abilities requirements for a position;
            (3) review the addition of educational requirements for 
        employees during audits of hiring actions within executive 
        agencies; and
            (4) establish a hiring path dedicated to positions for 
        which STAR workers are eligible to apply within usajobs.gov, or 
        any successor website, and direct executive agencies to 
        identify job postings that are within that hiring path, so that 
        STAR workers may search for positions based on this criterion.

SEC. 4. FEASIBILITY STUDY ON TRAINING PROGRAMS FOR STARS.

    The Director of the Office of Personnel Management, the Deputy 
Director for Management of the Office of Management and Budget, and the 
head of any other appropriate executive agency shall jointly--
            (1) conduct a feasibility study regarding resources 
        required to establish a program to provide STAR employees with 
        pathways for acquiring further training and higher education, 
        including fellowships, scholarships, apprenticeships, and 
        tuition assistance, if the employee chooses to initiate or 
        continue pursuit of further training or higher education while 
        an employee; and
            (2) not later than 180 days after the date of enactment of 
        this Act, submit a report on the findings of the feasibility 
        study to--
                    (A) the Committee on Homeland Security and 
                Governmental Affairs of the Senate; and
                    (B) the Committee on Oversight and Accountability 
                of the House of Representatives.
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