25
Federally approved (final federal step)
69
State-certified, awaiting federal
103
Named programs tracked
33
States with published eligibility lists
24
Institutions in the race
The record — live trackers
The races — who's winning, who hasn't shown up
The state race
The Race to Free Career Education
Same starting gun, very different speeds: which states have delivered usable funds, which are mid-track, and the 19 jurisdictions that haven't left the gate. One chart, embeddable, updated as the record moves.
Watch the race →
The institutional field
Who's Actually Running
24 institutions, ranked. The leaders haven't finished, the finishers ran one program each, 81% of the field delivers non-credit — and no traditional four-year has entered.
See the field →
The durability screen
Two Federal Signals, Four Boxes
Every state's eligible list sorted by its own growth projection and BLS's new AI exposure category (released Aug 27). A scoreboard of how each list was built — which states carry occupations that are both shrinking and Very high exposure, and which carry none.
Open the screen →
The services — and a free screen
Service
Placement System
The state measures placement; this is how a program moves it. Read the market, brief the program, build the student tools from that reading, run the search on platform, coach what you can see. Per program, per year.
From certified to placed →
Service
Readiness Review
Before you submit: your program catalog run against your state's actual gates — which programs qualify now, which are near-misses, and what it would take by the next window. Fixed fee, one week.
See the six stages →
Screener
Workforce Pell Feasibility Screen
Six questions on whether a program can realistically pursue Workforce Pell — approvable, employable, documentable, survivable — every provision cited to 34 CFR part 690.
Screen a program →
Published analysis
Why career services isn't enough for Workforce Pell placement
A degree student's job search is her own; a Pell completer's is the program's accountability event. Time, scope, success, evidence — four things that changes, and what doesn't transfer from the existing stack.
Placing Workforce Pell completers: what the evidence says
5,579 postings behind NC's 43 certified programs, plus decades of placement trials: seven evidence-backed elements of a placement program — and two cautions, including the tool category with no outcome evidence at all.
25 states in. Nobody picked the middle.
Every eligibility list published so far is under 75 or 195-and-up occupations — none in between. States didn't choose a size; they chose a process, and the size fell out of it.
Does the credential actually stack toward a degree?
Every approved program carries a verified stacking trail, checkpoint by checkpoint — the promise 34 CFR 690.93 makes to students, checked against the public record.
One occupation is on 19 of 23 lists. BLS just rated it Very high.
Joining BLS's new AI exposure categories to state eligible lists: 158 below-bachelor's occupations are both shrinking in-state and Very high exposure. Five states have none; four of them wrote their list for this program. A third of everything listed requires a bachelor's degree.
Why the counts differ
One tracker says 32 states, ours says 25 — and both are defensible. What the gap consists of, and why the definition you choose decides the number you get.
How the record is kept
Method in one paragraph: automated sweeps and page monitors surface candidate changes across all 50 states and D.C. every week; every candidate is then verified by a human against primary documents — state artifacts, federal postings, regulatory text — before anything enters the record. Press reports are recorded as claims about government action, never as the action itself. Absence from this record is a statement about the public record, not about intent. Full methodology, per-row sourcing, and citation formats live on each tracker.
Stay on the record
State Watch — a concise memo when the record moves: new approvals, window openings, verified null results, and claim checks against what the press is reporting. No noise between issues.
Get the memo