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Marketing and University Communication UW-Green Bay, CL 815 2420 Nicolet Drive Green Bay, WI 54311-7001 (920) 465-2626 E-mail: hildebrs@uwgb.edu Last update: 10/3/06 |
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In
the News Archive - Year:
May 22, 2006 Where are the bachelor's? By Jim Lundstrom
Wake up, and welcome to the knowledge economy.
A recent report from the University of Wisconsin Oshkosh finds only 18.8 percent of area residents hold bachelor's degrees, behind the state's 22.4 percent and well below 26.2 percent nationally.
Yet the area has been widely touted for its highly educated workforce.
What gives? Do we or do we not have a highly educated workforce?
"Yes and no," says Chancellor Richard Wells of UW Oshkosh.
"We have a large portion of citizens who stop at the associate's degree, in large part because in our part of the state, as well as southeastern Wisconsin, it wasn't necessary to continue," Wells says. "People could get good jobs and it didn't require more than an associate's degree. That made sense for our region."
But to continue in that pattern is to educate people for a past economy, he says.
"We can no longer have the claim we have a highly educated workforce if we don't significantly increase the number of people who have baccalaureate degrees, if we don't build into our culture in this region a commitment to lifelong formal education."
Wells, along with the heads of every other campus in the UW system, recently outlined strategies for "growth agendas" and submitted them to UW System President Kevin Reilly and the University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents. They call for increased enrollment, more state funding and expand offerings in high-demand programs.
University of Wisconsin-Green Bay Chancellor Bruce Shepard says Northeastern Wisconsin's Growth Agenda would enable UW-Green Bay to meet the demands and needs of a rapidly growing and changing region. The proposal would increase UW-Green Bay's state-supported enrollment by 50 percent.
"This is not an agenda for UW-Green Bay," Shepard says. "It is UW-Green Bay's best effort to strategically support the region's agenda."
The Growth Agenda for UW-Green Bay will help drive regional growth in high-tech, high-knowledge sectors of the economy, says Green Bay Area Chamber of Commerce President Paul Jadin. It fits in well with the New North, an initiative for economic development throughout the 18-county region of Northeast Wisconsin, he adds.
"There is a sense of urgency here," Jadin says. "We, and you, and the governor and everyone else in Madison have to recognize the need to grow this institution and grow the New North."
Wells saw the growth agenda as an opportunity to step up to the plate as a regional institution that can help the area move into the new knowledge-based economy, "to grow in a thoughtful, strategic way that helps ensure a high-quality future for our region," he says. "We are a regional university, and we need to think of the needs of this region's future."
John Casper, president and CEO of the Oshkosh Chamber of Commerce, says the chamber supports Wells' growth agenda.
"The reality of it is, for this economy to grow, we need to look towards higher education and advanced degrees," he says. "The jobs of the future, the jobs of now, demand a higher education degree. The university is positioned to advance those sorts of things and it needs our support."
Those in the business of education in Northeast Wisconsin recognize they might have a leg up over other regions.
Not only have the leaders at separate institutions been consorting and collaborating with businessmen, but they also talk among themselves, through the Northeastern Wisconsin Educational Resource Alliance (NEW ERA) of which Wells is the founding chairman, and now a member of the education attainment committee of New North.
"Fox Valley Technical College, UW-Fox and the universities work really well together," says Jim Perry, dean and chief executive officer of UW-Fox Valley. "We have this understanding and respect for one another, and we start to seek out ways in which we can work together as opposed to duplicating efforts. I can't say that's true for all in the state, but I can say that's true for us."
Perry says he and Wells continue discussing collaborations, such as the recently announced program to address the shortage of science and math teachers in area schools. Perry suggested the two schools could team up to speed the teaching licensure process for those holding a bachelor's degree in either math or science, or for those with at least five year's life experience in the fields.
"It really comes as a collaboration with Oshkosh. Their education department will confer the certificate," Perry says. "We have a lot of interest in that program."
It has since branched out to the other two-year campuses in the area: Fond du Lac, Manitowoc, Marinette and Sheboygan.
"Really through NEW ERA, we have made great strides in working together," says Jeff Rafn, president of Northeast Wisconsin Technical College in Green Bay,chairman of NEW ERA and chair of the New North education attainment committee.
"One of the things we identified in NEW ERA and as part of the New North initiative, is we need more science- and technology-based baccalaureate degrees in the area," Rafn says. "The technical colleges in the New North region frankly have the technical content to constitute a major, but don't have the higher level liberal arts parts that would normally go with a baccalaureate."
A fall of 2007 target date is set for a new bachelor of applied science that would allow students to use their technical degree as a content major and attend a university to complete the rest of the requirements.
"That is significant," Rafn says.
NWTC is also following the lead of UW-Fox Valley and UW-Platteville, which have agreements for electrical and mechanical engineering degrees.
"We're working with UWGB and Stout to bring manufacturing engineering here," he says. "Rick at UWO is working on similar initiatives. Frankly, we're able to do this because we're bringing our resources together. No one of us is having to develop a completely new program. That's not something that happened very easily in the past. I don't say it's not a lot of work now, but certainly the environment is much different. We tend to see this as a regional problem and regional issue that we as higher educational institutions can work on together."
NORTHEASTERN WISCONSIN'S GROWTH AGENDA
The proposal at UW Oshkosh would:
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