From the Executive Director’s Desk: A Focus on Work-Based Learning

On Wednesday, February 25, FLATE participated in a half day forum focused on Work-Based Learning hosted by Johnson & Johnson Vision Care (Jacksonville) and sponsored by the National Association of Manufacturers Manufacturing Institute. More than 60 people attended including representatives from the Florida TRADE consortium, state and community colleges, regional industry workforce development and others. The Manufacturing Institute provided some national data about the current and future skills gap for manufacturing. This information underscored the huge need for educated and trained professionals to service the manufacturing workforce in the next decade. CareerSource Florida provided similar information about this skills gap in Florida. Following those brief introductory remarks to set the stage, the audience heard from small and large manufacturers about their needs and work-based learning programs. Allowing that many manufacturers have college programs for engineering and science interns, the conversation quickly turned to the technical workforce below the four-year professionals.

In Florida, the growing complexity of the manufacturing workforce is constantly lowering the technical employment opportunities for unskilled workers.(Opportunities manufacturers relied on for decades.) The focus of the next panels was how to get a simple message to young people that “there are great and exciting skills-focused jobs and careers in manufacturing waiting for you after a couple years of post-secondary education and/or training.” We just have to get students to buy into this fact. Johnson and Johnson Vision Care, a large multi-national company and Metal Essence, a small Florida-based company, related their new experiences with partnering with schools and colleges to provide on-the-job experiences as well as  lessons learned and plans for the future. Most importantly, Al Stimac from Metal Essence summarized the Florida statute that deals with high school students as related to work they can do and the limitations on the number of hours worked without added company investment and liability.

From the Executive Director’s Desk: Taking Care of Business

Last year, FLATE hosted its 11^th annual National Visiting Committee (NVC) in Miramar, FL. Usually these meetings are held at an industry location somewhere in the state. This year, however, we  met at FLATE’s host institution and campus, Hillsborough Community College Brandon campus. The FLATE NVC provides advice, advocacy, assessment and assistance not just at this one strategic meeting each year, but also more informally, during the months in between. We are proud of not only the size of our committee, but also its composition of 12 dedicated individuals with interest in the state of manufacturing technician education in Florida and across the country. A typical one-and-half  to two-day meeting agenda includes a number of standard “sessions” including:

• Reporting and updating on activities and programs during the past year 
• Evaluation report from an external evaluator
• Overview of a local technician program and its students
• Visit to a local industry
• Discussions with the Center’s NSF ATE program officer (typically this is done remotely)
• Closed session for the NVC to discuss concerns, recommendations and plaudits
• NVC report out to the Center Leadership and NSF program officer

From the Executive Director’s Desk: Friends of FLATE-A Focus on Strategic Partnerships

FLATE will best achieve its mission in partnerships among other organizations locally,
regionally, statewide, and nationally.  We have active and ongoing partnership projects with a number of organizations – some big, some small, some narrowly focused and others crosscutting.  We use our FLATE guiding & operating principles to help determine if and how we should engage with other groups. We want our partnership projects to be richly meaningful, mutually beneficial to all involved and broaden FLATE’s impact on manufacturing education, outreach, professional development, and to strengthen our intellectual merit.  Our partnership projects have defined tasks, deliverables and projected outcomes that we would like to achieve.  FLATE also has non-specific project partnerships with a number of organizations.  These organizations have shared mission and visions, and we call on each other for events and activities which also have mutually compatible goals. You can read more about our current partner and partnership projects on our website at https://fl-ate.org/partners. 

From the Executive Director’s Desk: Become a Mentor. Join the Million Women Mentors Initiative

Million Women Mentors (MWM) is a collaboration of more than 58 partners, 30 sponsors with 30+ state leadership teams.The Million

Photo Courtesy: Muller Elem Magnet (Twitter Feed)

Women Mentors Leadership Council is chaired by Cisco, PepsiCo, Sodexo, and Tata Consultancy Services. To date, over 300,000 pledges to mentor girls and women in STEM have been made on their website (www.millionwomenmentors.org). The program is reaching over 30 million girls and women across the U. S. MWM supports the engagement of one million science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) mentors (male and female) to increase the interest and confidence of girls and women to persist and succeed in STEM programs and careers.

In August, Florida joined the ranks of the leadership teams when Hillsborough County Public Schools (HCPS) pledged to mentor 500 young girls in the district schools. The plan is to mentor five girls at the 100 schools who signed up to support the project. Each Tampa mentor will spend 20 hours with its mentee/s either in person at the school, online, or however they work out.  Other recommended methods of mentoring include paid internships and apprenticeships, workplace mentoring at a company, and through sponsorships. Anyone interested in mentoring can connect through the MWM web portal directly with a MWM partner including HCPS. It’s simple to sign up and simple to report your effort. One volunteer mentor at a time, HCPS hopes to start changing lives of young girls and women by providing guidance, examples, experience, and enthusiasm for science, technology, engineering and mathematics. Mentoring can help build confidence in young women to know their capabilities and be proud and strong so they will persist in careers that are often male-dominated.

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FLATE’s Executive Director Celebrates #GirlsLoveSTEM Month!

Welcome to the May issue of the FLATE Focus, our blog newsletter where we share our work, announce events we
are involved in, and highlight great programs and people across the state who are working hard to enhance and grow manufacturing education in the state.  For the past few years, we have used the May issue of the Focus to celebrate and promote women in Manufacturing. No matter how you slice and dice the data, there remains a significant gap between the number of women vs. men across all aspects of many manufacturing companies. The story in Florida mirrors the national picture. Where are the girls in manufacturing?

Of course, there are the historical, societal reasons and analyzing them is important to develop strategies that can be successfully implemented. Before delving into the ‘why,’ we have to answer two questions. How do we get them into manufacturing?  And, how do we keep them there? We sometimes think we know what to do, or know what can attract and retain women in these fields, but it’s good to get these perspectives from experts who can help pinpoint solutions.

A 2015 report, “Solving the Equation,” the Variables for Women’s Success in Engineering and Computing, published by the American Association of University Women (https://aauw.org/) finds that “women are making significant contributions to the fields of engineering and computing, yet are still a distinct minority in these fields”. Furthermore, the report concludes that “stereotypes and biases lie at the core of the challenges facing women in engineering and computing.” Educational and workplace environments are therefore dissuading women who might otherwise succeed in these fields. Increasing the number of women in engineering and computing will require focused attention by employers, educational institutions, policy makers and individuals to create welcoming work environments for women.

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From the Executive Director’s Desk: Defining Career Pathways for the 21st Century Workforce

For the past several years, there has been increased emphasis on career pathways by the Federal Department of Labor,
including the Career Pathways Initiative, the Workforce Innovation Fund Grant, the Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College and Career Training grants programs (TAACCCT), and most recently the 2014 Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA).  The WIOA legislation promotes career pathways as the primary strategies for workforce development design and implementation for most of the agencies they oversee.

How are career pathways defined in this new 21^st century environment?  Built on a couple of decades of experience across the country, WIOA defines a career pathway as having these characteristics:

• Alignment with the skill needs of industries in the economy of the state or regional economy involved 
• Prepares an individual to be successful in any of the full range of secondary or postsecondary education options, including apprenticeships
• Includes counseling to support an individual in achieving the individual’s education and career goals
• Includes, as appropriate, education offered concurrently with the and in the same context as workforce preparation activities and training for a specific occupation or occupational cluster
• Organizes education, training, and other services to meet the particular needs of an individual in a manner that accelerates the educational and career advancement of the individual to the extent practicable
• Enables an individual to attain a secondary school diploma or its recognized equivalent and at least 1 recognized post-secondary credential
• Helps an individual enter or advance within a specific occupation or occupational cluster

In early March, I was invited to participate in reviewing the draft of an update to the current 2011 version of the Career Pathway Toolkit.  The “Career Pathway Champions” review team was a group of 20 professionals from various agencies around the country who are working closely with career pathways and anxious to learn the impact of WIOA on their work.

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