MATC: Providing Workforce Solutions for Residents, Businesses

As business and educational leaders from across Wisconsin deliberate on how to best help both businesses and our residents recover from the economic recession, it is clear to me that the state’s technical colleges will play an integral role in that recovery. Tim Sullivan’s The Road Ahead: Restoring Wisconsin’s Workforce Development suggests a number of solutions to address the state’s skills gap, and I appreciate the herculean effort Mr. Sullivan made in developing the report. and I hope others spend time digesting it.

Mr. Sullivan identifies the need for real-time labor market data. I wholeheartedly agree with him. That is why key administrators at MATC have access to EMSI, a cloud-based database of real-time labor market data for every job title in America. In addition, MATC provides current and prospective students with job and salary growth projections for each associate degree and technical diploma through the Career Coach feature on our website (matc.edu). Students can use this information to map their occupational interests to jobs that have a strong future. They can also learn what education and training is necessary (and available at MATC!) to get started on a rewarding career.

Mr. Sullivan rightly targets the byzantine process we have in Wisconsin around the transferring of college credits. While I am proud of the many transfer options MATC students currently have, both inside and outside of Wisconsin, I support anything we can do to ease the logistics and the sheer weight of processes on our students,

That said, the report’s lack of accurate data and consistency in places undercuts the overall effectiveness of Sullivan’s report for me. On one hand, Mr. Sullivan concludes correctly that using a simple “graduation rate” metric for the state’s technical colleges is not the best way to measure our success, since so many students will opt for employment (or “job out” as we call it) before graduating. Yet, one page later, Mr. Sullivan takes MATC to task for low graduation rates in welding. Mr. Sullivan’s overlooks the rather significant fact that 100 of the 148 students he cites in 2010 were taking classes part-time and simply could not have successfully graduated in that timeframe. Yet, MATC is blamed for a low graduation rate, the metric previously described as ill-conceived and ill-fitting. If you are confused, imagine how I feel.

In addition, I struggle with Mr. Sullivan’s recommendation to charge a higher tuition for students who already hold a baccalaureate degree. Why would we, as a state, penalize students financially when they seek enhanced technical skills that are complimentary to their other degree? There are countless examples of university graduates who are successful in their given profession and who come back to us to further improve themselves in order to get a promotion, a salary raise, or a new career altogether. Honestly, I did likewise, pursuing college course work in fundraising after my Ph.D. I’m just saying….

Mr. Sullivan is right – we need to immediately come together to address the issues that hamper workforce development. However, in our haste to move forward, we cannot rush to judgments that could result in setting the state back even farther. Regardless, I remain committed to being a part of the solution that benefits Wisconsin’s residents and businesses.