Business-education partnerships are critical for economic growth
Education has long been called “the great equalizer” in the United States. One of its long-held, core beliefs has been that through hard work and perseverance, anyone born into any rung of the socio-economic ladder can accomplish anything.
But it has become increasingly apparent over the last 20 to 30 years that the great equalizer has been weighed down by a “great demoralizer”: the increasing burden of debt borne by college students after they receive their degrees, compounded in some cases by a lack of job opportunities for them to build and refine the work skills they laid the foundation for during their years of study.
Therein lies the reason behind greater scrutiny of the return on a family's investment in higher education, as well as an increased emphasis on preparing students to enter the full-time workforce over merely earning a college degree.
The colleges and universities of Central Massachusetts know this all too well. Even at the high school level, the quantum leap made by Worcester Technical High School over the last several years in churning out graduates with skills that can vault them to college or the workforce has been held up as a national example of success with President Obama's commencement recent address to this year's graduating class.
The Worcester Tech success story has been helped along by the involvement of the business sector, led by Edwin “Ted” Coghlin, who catalyzed the creation of the new school (which opened in 2006), including the construction technology academy on its campus that bears his family's name. He also formed unprecedented partnerships between the school and the private sector, helping strengthen the increasingly critical connection between business and education that have been key to Worcester Tech's success. This success should serve as an example throughout the U.S.
The Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce is also strengthening that business-education connection. Last week, it announced a new undertaking to link Central Massachusetts college students with internships. This will help answer the call by students and their parents for what many believe to be the most critical factor in moving new college graduates into the business world as quickly as possible: gaining relevant job experience that goes beyond the classroom. “Our goal is to strengthen the connection between the business and higher education communities with a focus on developing our economy, retaining students to stay and work in the region after graduation, and building a pipeline for … employers,” chamber president and CEO Timothy Murray said in a statement.
As part of the chamber's initiative, it will become part of the Internship Collaborative, a partnership led by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston and the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce. That will help bring its InternHub website — which posts open internships — to students, employers and career counselors in this region.
The chamber's new initiative and the joint efforts between the business and education sectors are critical and necessary to propel Central Massachusetts' economic fortunes. We hope they pay both short- and long-term dividends for both sectors.
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