(remarks delivered by Alex Harris at Hawaii P20’s Education to Workforce summit)
Sometimes a simple question can spark a complex response.
“What do you want to be when you grow up?”
I asked this question of youth from the Center for Tomorrow’s Leaders. Many of these courageous young leaders come from your schools. CTL gives them the tools to better their community. And yet only 1 in 3 of these teens see a future for themselves in the islands.
Our increasingly complicated world presents confusing choices. These students can envision themselves in Las Vegas or Seattle more clearly than Hawaii.
Some concerns I expected. Our high cost of living. Families that are stretched too thin. But there was something else. These young leaders simply don’t know what opportunities exist right here in Hawaii. They don’t know how to find a career that gives them meaning so they can provide for their own family one day. And so they assume the grass is greener elsewhere.
When students have vision and purpose they find lasting success. Hawaii is making progress turning this aspiration into reality. We see more rigor in our high school career academies. We see vastly more early college opportunities for high school students to earn college credits. And we see better supports helping more students to succeed in college.
Business leaders are lending their voice to define the skills and abilities that students need to enter their industry. And for the second summer in a row, 25 high school teachers will work in places like Queens Medical Center helping their academic classrooms to better reflect workplace realities.
I see so many encouraging signs of progress. But now we must knit these pieces together.
In addition to my duties with the Harold KL Castle Foundation, I have spent the past six months as the interim director of career readiness for the Council of Chief State School Officers.
This Washington DC-based organization represents all 50 state superintendents of education. I lead a $35M initiative in ten states funded by JPMorganChase called New Skills for Youth.
The goal of New Skills for Youth is to bring together K-12, postsecondary and industry to prepare all students for high growth, high paying careers. You received a link to a short video in your registration that tells more about this effort.
Let me share five observations from these states that may also apply to us in Hawaii. Look, I know that we are quick to note how unique we are. And after living on Oahu for a decade this is absolutely true. But I have been surprised by the many similarities, especially in small states like Rhode Island and Delaware, but even in places like Wisconsin, Ohio and Nevada. So here is what I see.
First, each state begins with a clear, shared vision. “We will prepare all Rhode Island youth with the skills they need for jobs that pay.”
Cross-sector leaders from K-12, postsecondary, workforce and industry commit to helping far more students, especially those that are traditionally underrepresented, be prepared for the future of work. The agenda often builds upon a governor’s call to jumpstart the local economy with names like Tennessee Pathways, PrepareRI or Louisiana JumpStart.
Concrete student goals underpin this commitment. Nevada will engage 55,000 young adults in work-based learning by 2025.
Each state has an executive council that allows for regular coordination. Leaders also help line up public funds like Perkins, WIOA, and Title I dollars in support of this common agenda.
Second, leaders mobilize labor market data to identify which high skill, high growth industries are on the rise and pay a living wage. Prioritizing these industries within the education system takes heavy collaboration. We have not yet systematically done this in Hawaii, and we must do so soon.
Third, leaders use this information to build a limited number of career pathways for students that begin in middle and high school and end in a postsecondary degree that has real value to industry. Pathways expand on the runway of career and technical education. They combine a purposeful sequence of courses with relevant work-based learning.
Thematic examples include health care, advanced manufacturing, finance and information technology. Pathways and programs that reflect the old economy are being phased out or retired altogether.
More students are gaining the right knowledge and skills. Pathways often help students obtain industry-recognized credentials and college credits while still in high school.
Career pathways are for all students, including those on a traditional “college prep” path. After all, nearly 70 percent of new jobs require some postsecondary experience. So high schools and community colleges must work together so the pathway ends in certification, associate’s or bachelor’s degrees.
No longer is it “college or career”. These states embrace “college to career”.
Pathways help students to focus. But we must also provide on and off ramps as students explore different career fields. Counseling is critical. Most NSFY states have every single student complete a personal learning plan that really drives their learning for their remaining time in school.
Fourth, students gain employability skills through work-based learning as part of their pathway. We all know how hard it is to coordinate job shadowing and internships. So states like Ohio, Nevada and Rhode Island task regional intermediary organizations that straddle business and education to broker new opportunities for students.
Each state has a scaffolded framework for work-based learning. Ninth grade students are exposed to careers through short-term activities like career fairs. Older students engage more deeply through internships or service learning. That way, a student who doesn’t like what they see can always change direction before committing to a college major.
Finally, state and school leaders constantly look at data. Louisiana assigns a 5-star quality rating to each industry certification offered in high school. This creates pressure to understand which certifications really matter to employers. Delaware knows they are halfway to their goal of 20,000 students completing an industry-aligned career pathway by 2020.
Rhode Island can tell you that Black students are overenrolled in low demand pathways – but – the Black students that are in a high demand pathway are actually more likely to graduate than their white peers. And Kentucky can show a heat map of how many students complete a high-quality pathway in each of their 173 school districts. Why can’t we do the same in Hawaii?
Actions like these literally transform lives. I was just in Rhode Island where I met a 12th grader named Tyrell Miller. Tyrell told me about his educational journey. Nobody in his family has been to college. But he is on an advanced manufacturing pathway that includes courses at the community college and a paid summer internship with Polaris. He will start full-time as a second-year community college student in the fall.
His high school experience is radically different from my own. And I’ll never forget what he told me, “So, I get paid to learn things that excite me, I already know what college feels like and I don’t have to pay tuition thanks to the RI Promise? Sign me up!”
When we help students find purpose and passion, we increase equity and opportunity. I want all of Hawaii’s students to feel the same excitement for their future as Tyrell.
Employers in Hawaii face huge labor shortages. And students are desperate to understand a world that is changing faster than at any time in our modern history.
The power to do more is within us. Nearly half of Hawaii’s high school students complete a program of study. What if we anchored those studies to high-growth industries? We celebrate community partners that repaint aging school buildings. But what if we converted that aloha into more internships and apprenticeships? High schools now look at data on how many students enter college. But what if we also look at how many students complete a high-demand career pathway?
Complex problems demand collaborative solutions. That is your work today. Today is about finding those collaborative solutions across K-12, postsecondary and industry. Your success is critical for our students to see a future for themselves in these islands.
Let me end with wisdom from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, who urged us to “take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.”
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