When we talk about “workforce education”, we should be talking about addressing the critically important issue of finding a way for the large number of students who lack the skills necessary to succeed at a four-year college – or the interest in developing those skills – to achieve a middle class lifestyle in the modern economy.
But too often, educational leaders emphasize “workforce education” because it’s a way of deemphasizing the importance of a bachelor’s degree. Such an emphasis risks steering students with the potential to earn bachelors’ and graduate degrees away from that path and into the shorter path to industrial certifications and terminal associates’ degrees.
An opinion piece in this morning’s Tampa Bay Times provides a clear example of such an argument. The writer, a member of the Hillsborough Community College Board of Trustees, starts with this call to action:
Tampa Bay has a multitude of strengths to help attract businesses to the region, from its welcoming neighborhoods and strong educational ecosystem, to low taxes and enviable weather. For those tired of the cold and high taxes, this is truly a tropical paradise.
Yet a recent competitiveness study by the Tampa Bay Economic Development Corporation reveals one issue may hold us back: the lack of a long-range talent pipeline. The report notes that while Tampa Bay remains competitive, there are fewer bachelor’s and graduate degree holders in the overall population compared to other markets. This can discourage specialized industries such as research, technology, health and life sciences from relocating or expanding here.
So far, so good. But then the writer immediately derails his own argument:
That’s one reason why Hillsborough Community College Southshore Campus’ $30 million Workforce Education Center is so critically important. Located at the campus in Ruskin, the center will provide job seekers a single point of access to comprehensive career training programs and support services in Hillsborough County’s fastest-growing region.
Let’s be clear: the Hillsborough Community College Southshore Campus Workforce Education Center will do little to address the shortage of bachelor’s and graduate degree holders. The focus will be on industrial certifications and associates’ degrees.
But before I get back to that, I should point out that the general problem identified by the writer is real, and not just in the Tampa Bay area but statewide. The percentage of the Florida workforce working in science or engineering occupations in 2020 was 37th in the nation, according to the National Science Foundation. And we are not educating our way out of this problem. The rate at which individuals in the 18-24 age group were earning bachelors’ degrees in science and engineering fields in 2019 was only 35th in the nation.
The work that the Southshore Campus Workforce Education Center will be doing is very, very important. But it is no replacement for the hard work that should be done to increase the rate at which Florida’s young people earn bachelors’ and graduate degrees – and especially in fields like engineering, computer science, the physical sciences and the health professions. We can’t wait until students reach college campuses to do that work – it must begin sooner, with proper preparation for college STEM majors in high school.
Fortunately, Hillsborough County’s public schools took a step forward in that regard this past year. In the spring of 2021, the district changed the way it registers high school students for science classes. With the changes, a student who completed a biology course during the 2020-21 school year was automatically registered for chemistry for the 2021-22 school year. And a student who took chemistry in 2020-21 was automatically registered for physics in 2021-22. Students had the option to remove themselves from these chemistry and physics classes, and many did. But the change in the course selection procedure resulted in a 29% increase in the number of students taking physics in 2021-22 – a remarkable change for a mega-district.
Hillsborough County is now the second-ranked district in the state for the rate at which public high school students take chemistry, and fourth in physics. Because these subjects are important parts of the preparation for college STEM majors, Hillsborough can take credit for improving student success in STEM bachelor’s and graduate degree programs. That has a lot more to do with improving the “long-range talent pipeline” about which the writer of the Tampa Bay Times piece expressed concern than the writer’s own Workforce Education Center solution.
Florida’s exclusive emphasis on “workforce education” at the expense of giving students a leg up toward bachelors’ and graduate degrees in STEM fields risks steering students (particularly those from working-class families) away from those higher targets toward the easier industrial certification and associate’s degree goals. It’s time for our state’s leaders to deliver a more balanced message so that all of Florida’s students, regardless of skill level, can fulfill their potential.
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