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Rhode Island: Keep Those Kids in the Pipeline
Note: What an image: school children in a pipeline. The question is asked: "How does public education -- K-16 -- operate in service to the public need for a much improved work force?" Our answer should be--why the hell should public schools answer this public need? We--teachers and parents--must keep reminding ourselves: Our job is to look out for the needs of children.
At a recent school-to-career conference, Neeta Fogg, senior economist of the Northeastern Labor Market Institute, spoke about the importance of work force development to the Rhode Island economy.
She said -- and I paraphrase -- the good news is that Rhode Island is not really suffering a bad recession, as are so many states. The bad news is that the reason behind our good fortune is that Rhode Island never had much of an economy in the first place.
If real estate is about location, location, location, the Rhode Island economy is definitely about work force, work force, work force. Apparently, with New England's crummy weather -- don't look at me; I like the weather -- the region's only economic hope is to develop and market a high-skilled work force.
Last year at this time, when the Rhode Island Board of Governors for Higher Education went looking for new leadership, it went specifically searching for someone who could help it prepare these better-educated, more highly qualified residents. No longer could it afford just to have someone manage the endless siblingesque warfare between Rhode Island's institutions of higher education, challenging though that has always been.
In the end, Jack Warner, previously an associate chancellor of the University of Massachusetts system was chosen to be the new commissioner of Higher education.
The question Warner feels charged with is: How does public education -- K-16 -- operate in service to the public need for a much improved work force?
With the encouragement and endorsement of the Board of Governors, Warner wrote a 2002-2005 goals and priorities statement that makes it very clear this board feels responsible for improving Rhode Island's work force. It says, "In the next decade, Rhode Island's colleges and universities will play a make-or-break role in the development of a new state economy that will be based on innovation, information and technology. Higher education must deliver the knowledge and skills the state's residents need to secure well-paying jobs."
". . . Make-or-break role . . ." The governors are holding themselves to a refreshingly high standard.
The statement goes on: "According to the 2000 Census, 26 percent of adult Rhode Island residents possess a bachelor's degree or higher. In contrast, leading states show baccalaureate attainment rates of 32-34 percent for adults. Rhode Island ranks 18th nationally and fifth in New England on this measure."
Maine, by the way, is the lone laggard New England state, burdened by better excuses, such as intractable rural poverty, than we have.
Warner says, "Our overall goal is to position Rhode Island as a leader with a highly educated population. We'll use the work forceto attract and retain high-skill jobs. But of course, this is a chicken-and-egg situation. Those states that already have highly skilled work forces tend also to have the really good jobs. Massachusetts has its technology sector; Maryland has government and Connecticut feeds off of the braintrust of New York City. We have to develop the work force, but we'll also have to create good jobs in order to keep them here. For that reason, the governor is entirely correct to focus so much on biotech."
Naturally, the work's scope begins with making sure more K-12 students are in the pipeline to higher education. Historically, Rhode Island's public service agencies have had a tendency to isolate themselves, to create little fiefdoms that operate according to their own arcane traditions, often with a less-than-entirely scrupulous eye to their public purpose. This Rhode Island tendency, coupled with academia's intrinsic snobbery, often separated K-12 from the higher orders of college.
By working with K-12 -- in various ways I'll discuss next week -- higher education can assure itself of better student raw material, if you will, with fewer remedial needs. Individual students will endure less redundancy between high school and public colleges and get better value -- hopefully -- from all public education, from kindergarten through their baccalaureate.
Once these better-prepared K-12 students make it to the public colleges, the college degree has to mean something substantial. The colleges are currently shoring up both their curricula and techniques for supporting students, so more of them persist to complete their degrees.
The statement of Goals and Priorities -- available at http://www.ribghe.org/goalprior0205.htm -- promises a number of specific actions designed to make the public colleges of higher quality, more accessible and more affordable.
Having accomplished all that -- and of course, everything needs to be underway at once -- Rhode Island's university and college need more flexibility and encouragement to generate practical research that can spin off into innovative new businesses. Warner is currently working with various allies, shepherding legislation that will facilitate just that.
The community college can focus on adult education, including literacy and work force readiness.
Warner notes that the strong language, goals and actions set forth in the Board of Governor's statement are intended not only to assert a leadership role in ramping up the emerging work force, but to express a sense of urgency about the issue itself.
Good thing, too. At the above-mentioned school-to-career conference, teachers and other educators drifted off into private conversations during Fogg's talk and later were heard wondering out loud what on earth a presentation about the local economy and work force development had to do with them.
Warner has his work cut out for him.
Julia Steiny is a former member of the Providence School Board; she now consults and writes for a number of education, government and private enterprises. She welcomes your questions and comments on education. She can be reached by e-mail at juliasteiny@cox.net or c/o Providence Journal, 75 Fountain St., Providence, R.I. 02902.
— Julia Steiny
Robust K-16 system key to economy
Providence Journal
May 25, 2003
http://www.projo.com/education/content/projo_20030525_edwatch25.75f5b.html
INDEX OF OUTRAGES
Pages: 380
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