Column: Filling the skill gap
North Carolina has landed over 50,000 jobs over the last several years.
However the education system needs to reform in order to meet the increased demand. Engineering prides itself on setting up structure, guidelines, protocols and procedures, however to fill the skills gaps in our society, we have to figure out ways to fill in the gaps.
Did you know that many collegiate educators' performance measures include a planned failure rate?
Yes, you heard that right some education systems expect a percentage of failures or the educators are deemed not making content challenging enough for the student according to archaic education requirements.
With the severe workforce gaps, our society needs to figure out ways to fill in these skills gaps and enable more to succeed and flourish in STEM pathways that our society depends on.
Education systems need to develop more fun and enriching, memorable experiences that expose youth to prosperous careers to attract the talent industry needs.
Failure is not an option, we need all currently interested in technical pathways and lots more to also backfill the retirement of boomers and Generation X workers.
The trick is to make education so fun that the students are not even aware that they are learning and building confidence in themselves to consider higher level options.
We need to provide more structure and make education liquid, so to speak. By setting up skills challenges we can host more than just sports pep rallies but also STEM pep rallies too.
The new innovative Spark Labs at LSHS has been making high tech skills attainable to the masses by setting up a collaborative and reaching into the middle schools. Not only exposing youth to advanced technology but also providing opportunities to learn public speaking skills, teamwork and leadership development.
More of these initiatives need to be funded so that the masses can turn on their advanced technology switches and become excited about pursuing in demand lucrative pathways than just sports and entertainment.
So that more of the in demand jobs get filled, we need to align the aspirations of our youth with the needs of area employers. The faster youth can connect with current workers doing their future path, the faster competency and skills can get developed.
