How SUNY is Producing New York’s Workforce

Posted on February 23, 2012 by Casey Vattimo

Producing New York’s workforce is one of nine initiatives that SUNY will focus on this year, as outlined by Chancellor Zimpher in her State of the University Address.

SUNY will throw the weight of its systemness behind two key programs to achieve this goal. Strategic enrollment management will be used to determine workforce demand by region and program offerings and enrollment patterns at campuses locally will be adjusted to directly meet those needs; and co-operative education will be brought to scale, incorporating paid internships for students in their field of study into the curriculum, helping students gain invaluable work experience while making money and giving them a job placement edge upon graduation. Not to mention the benefits co-op presents for employers and the state workforce as a whole.

But SUNY’s efforts aren’t contained to what can be accomplished at the system level. Each campus will contribute. For example, three of our campuses – University at Buffalo, Stony Brook University, and SUNY Upstate – are partnering with the American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP) to create more medical laboratory jobs in New York by expanding educational access to laboratory science programs.

The partnership, which also includes a coalition of clinical lab organizations, government agencies, and industry partners, is being made through the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) and comes with a commitment to increase the number of graduating laboratory professionals in New York by 10 percent over the course of a five-year project, upping the annual graduation rate of 237 to 355.

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News Brief 2/14/12

Posted on February 14, 2012 by Casey Vattimo

Today’s Newsday Editorial Says SUNY Is “Among the Nation’s Greatest Bargains.”

Newsday Editorial: Make sure the student debt is worth it

CBS News: Program Helps Unemployed Reinvent their Careers

Inside Higher Ed: Guarding the Hen House

Times Union: Firefighter scholarships aim for recruits

Times-Herald Record: Federal budget’s $8B proposal could assist local colleges (Ulster, Orange & Sullivan)

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Zimpher: We do not have a system of public education in this country

Posted on February 1, 2012 by Casey Vattimo

SUNY Chancellor Nancy Zimpher testified today at a legislative hearing on the 2012-13 Executive Budget proposal. But it was her off-budget remarks about SUNY’s efforts to repair the education pipeline that held the room’s attention.

“I’m an educator. And I can say, unequivocally, we do not have a system of public education in this country.

“We do not adequately connect the preparation of early childhood to kindergarten readiness. Forty to 50 percent of the children in this country come to kindergarten underprepared, and I’m not talking about taking an SAT test. There are variables that tell you whether children, young children, have the vocabulary and the sensitivities to do kindergarten work.

“We have attrition in third and fourth grade. Even though third and fourth graders typically don’t physically walk out of school, they walk out of early math and early English instruction. And then they fail early on in the pipeline. Where we’re catching this is in the transition from high school to college, but trust me, it starts a long time before that.

“Rather than rewrite the law of who’s in charge of which grades, I have been a profound proponent of working collaboratively with early childhood educators, elementary and secondary educators, we at the college level, and even the workforce development people to say: This is a pipeline.

“SUNY is on record as trying to meld that pipeline into a more systematic way of educating our young people and it brings everybody to the table.

“Part of our job is to create these partnerships at the local level. We are doing this in Albany. We’re doing this in Rochester. We’re doing this in Harlem. We have a rural partnership in Clinton County. We have 23 early college high schools where students take college courses – students that you would never expect to be going on to college.

“I actually think it would be really important that we have a discussion – maybe even a hearing – about this issue, where we can put the pieces together that are ultimately going to serve New York’s young people. And that’s all I think I can say today, but we are all over this issue.”