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May 30, 2018
 
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Higher Education & Employability: The Series ...
Launch Talent Pipeline Partnerships  
 
Welcome back to our series on the recommendations of NEBHE's Commission on Higher Education & Employability and its report Learning for Life and Work.

This week, we pick up with the Commission's recommendations on "Targeted Higher Education-Industry Partnerships." 
   
Higher education partnerships with business and other employers are essential to increase the employability of postsecondary graduates and address specific talent pipeline needs in key growth-oriented sectors of state and regional economies. "Employers need to be engaged with curriculum, pedagogy and access to both work-integrated learning and ultimate employment," notes the Commission. "Higher education institutions must deeply understand industry-specific skills gaps and offer opportunities for students to improve work readiness."
 
The pertinent recommendations (as numbered in the Learning for Life and W ork report):
 
4. The New England states should collaborate to launch multistate, industry-specific talent pipeline partnerships focused on top growth-oriented sectors in the state and region (including healthcare, life and biosciences, information technology, advanced manufacturing and financial services), and driven by key stakeholders from higher education, industry and government.
 
5. New England higher education institutions, employers and policymakers should create sustained structures to better inform key aspects of institutions' work including: academic program design; course content; work-integrated learning opportunities; planning, advising and career services; and creating better and more frequent interfaces between the institutions and the changing world of work.
 
6. New England higher education institutions should work closely with employers and industry partners (including key human resources staff) to better equip students with the ability to understand and articulate the knowledge, skills and competencies they acquire through postsecondary study--enabling them to speak the language of employment and employers.

Among stakeholder actions, the Commission calls on higher ed institutions to create single points of contact to simplify and increase the effectiveness of partnerships, and to regularly assess the employer landscape to identify potential opportunities for collaboration and gain insight on labor market needs and the language employers use to describe skills. Employers, at the same time, should designate organizational liaisons to engage closely with institutions, policymakers and other employers to provide insight into the labor market, the workplace preparation of interns and recent graduates, and on program responsiveness. 
 
Watch NEJHE NewsBlast and www.nebhe.org for more ways to help lead in learning for life and work. 
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NEJHE   

Check out our newest commentary and analysis from New England's higher education leaders
Tweets, despite their limited characters, can offer some pretty telling narratives, notes NEJHE Executive Editor John O. Harney. The narrative this time, for better or worse, centers on austerity: the tension over efforts to make higher ed more relevant and also cheaper. Austerity can come too late for institutions such as Mount Ida College, which announced this spring with hardly any warning that it will close for good at the end of the semester. Immediate concerns ran to: why didn't Mount Ida let its students, faculty and staff know earlier about the college's vulnerabilities ... especially since it was laying on the positive marketing right till the end? Also, why would UMass Amherst emerge as the savior of the jilted students, rather than the closer-by, but perennially neglected, UMass Boston? And do the recent travails of Wheelock College, Atlantic Union College and perhaps the College of St. Joseph in Vermont make the case for a re-envisioned NEBHE look at ways to help institutions adapt models to rein in costs, pass savings onto students and--given projections of lagging enrollment--avoid closure?

 A New Way to Rank Colleges: What Percentage of Students Vote?

F ormer Southern Vermont College President Karen Gross,  now a consultant, saw two big problems in higher education. Problem #1 was that college students, despite their impressive activism, especially around the issue of guns, were too apolitical, especially when it came to voting: less than 50% voted in the 2016 election. Problem #2 was that the ubiquitous college rankings that guide prospective students' views of colleges and universities carry a range of perverse incentives such as rewarding institutions that look more selective because they reject as many students as possible and those that reap advantages on measures of retention and alumni giving by avoiding nontraditional students. For Gross, who is also the author of Breakaway Learners: Strategies for Post-Secondary Success with At-Risk Students, the two problems begged for one solution: Why not rank colleges and universities based on the percentage of their students who vote? That would send a message about how activism and political activity will be received and supported, writes Gross. "In today's world, that's a pretty good reflection of citizenship and the role of educational institutions in preparing the leaders of tomorrow."
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See what our other programs are up to at nebhe.org
  
NEBHE has joined the Midwestern Higher Education Commission's MHECTECH program, allowing significant savings on tech purchasing by public and nonprofit colleges, K-12 districts and schools, cities, counties, towns and state governments in New England. For more, please view MHEC's contract listing here or contact NEBHE CFO Genevieve Davis at [email protected].   

Reports & Analysis from NEBHE's Policy & Research Team

NEBHE has published an annual directory of New England colleges and universities for a half-century as a special issue of its New England Journal of Higher Education. In 2011, NEBHE formed a partnership with Boston magazine to jointly publish the Guide based on a NEBHE survey of campuses.

NEBHE's 2018 Guide to New England Colleges & Universities lists key data for public and independent, degree-granting colleges and universities based in New England, such as: admissions application deadlines and acceptance rates; faculty-student ratio; enrollment totals and breakdowns for part-time, commuting, female, international and minority students; cost of attendance; and degrees offered.
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View constantly updated higher education job listings at Joblink, NEBHE's collaboration with New England HERC.
NEJHE NewsBlast  is a summary of NEJHE  content and other news around NEBHE prepared weekly by NEJHE  Executive Editor John O. Harney  and emailed every Wednesday to opinion leaders and practitioners. When responding to NEJHE content, please make sure that your remarks are relevant, courteous and engaging. Individuals are responsible for their comments, which do not represent the opinions of the New England Board of Higher Education. We urge commenters to briefly note their occupational or other interest in the topic at hand. Please refrain from offensive language, personal attacks and distasteful comments or they may be deleted. Comments may not appear immediately. Thank you for staying engaged. Join Our Mailing List!