The Bridge

Regional Educational Initiative

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Initiative Focuses on Work Force Prep: Las Cruces Bulletin, 11/09/07

 

Initiative focuses on workforce prep

REI to set recommendations and solutions by January 2008

11/9/07

By Natisha Hales

The Las Cruces Bulletin

By January 2008, a task force that has brought together major players in

education, workforce development and business will outline its solutions

and recommendations to prepare all graduating high school students to

compete in a global workforce.

The Regional Education Initiative , which was commissioned in May 2007

after it was developed within the Greater Las Cruces Chamber of Commerce’s

Education Committee, has members such as New Mexico State University

President Michael Martin, Doña Ana Community College Campus Executive

Officer Margie Huerta and Las Cruces Public Schools Superintendent Stan

Rounds, as well as members of both chambers of commerce and several

business owners to create a shared vision throughout the region.

“This initiative revolutionizes education and workforce development in our

community,” said Patsy Duran, chair of the Greater Las Cruces Chamber of

Commerce’s Education Committee, during a presentation at the Mesilla

Valley Economic Development Alliance’s Business on the Border Forum. “This

initiative must revolutionize education and workforce development in our

community for us to succeed.”

Duran said the task force has come a long way in a short period of time

and will continue to meet several goals in an even shorter period because

“this needs to be changed today for our future.”

While the group initially met, members established that there were good

programs implemented by several educational institutions, but there was

seldom interaction with each other. The high dropout rate and the lack of

a tracking system also was addressed.

Duran said U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman identified 2,000 schools nationwide

that directly affect the dropout rate – New Mexico houses 23 of those schools,

 and three are in Las Cruces, she said.

The group identified several common factors between inte­gration programs,

and Duran said there were three common factors in their success – all had

the collaboration of education, business and economic devel­opment;

technical trade educa­tion in the community was a priority; and according

to the National Center on Education and Economics, it’s important to

“assume you do the job right the first time.”

“I am confident that we would not have the dropout rate like we do if we

get it right the first time,” Duran said.

The group has broken up into an executive committee and sev­eral

subcommittees, including legislative, finance and commu­nication and

public relations. 

“We’ve been really focused and quite aggressive,” said Kari Mitchell of

Las Cruces Machine, who has been heavily involved in REI. “The challenge

is how do we get all these people to stay interested and passionate long

enough, and how we’re going to get from talk to action.”

The task force has worked to find several ways to measure its success, and

Mitchell said that it is also working to identify the gaps. Once the GAP

analy­sis is complete and members have identified the six or seven best

practices internationally, Mitchell said a “key component to have is to

deliver education and workforce development in an integrated manner and

have a synergetic vision.”

“I’m so impressed with the leadership of this task force,” she said.

Recently, the group also con­ducted focus groups of employ­ers, educators

and students to determine its solutions and recommendations, and Mitchell

said she realized that there were several “sister organizations” to the

REI, such as the newly commissioned Doña Ana County Legislative Coalition

and the Doña Ana County Truancy Task Force.

By February 2008, Mitch­ell said, “Hopefully we can tell everyone that we

made it.”

Once recommendations and solutions are made, Duran said the next step is

implementation, which will be done through an oversight committee.

Currently, there is a nonprofit organization, the Doña Ana County

Workforce Action Council – also known as E2E – that has been dormant and

can be taken over.

“The possibility of that will probably be very, very high,” she said.

“Shift must happen, and it’s a community issue.”