Alex Friedrich
Owner Darlene Miller of Permac Industries in Burnsville tells the Twin Cities Business Journal how the disappearance of vocational education has harmed students:
“I don’t think it’s coincidental that when our [high school] dropout rate increased by 30 percent was when all of our technical classes in our high schools ended.”
She helped start the Right Skills Now training program, a 16-week combination of training and internships designed to help students become entry-level operators in the area of computer numerical controlled (CNC) machining.
The Journal looks at the program, the so-called “jobs-skills gap,” and attempts by the state and Minnesota State Colleges and Universities (MnSCU) system to solve it.
Note: You can find my previous posts on vocational-technical education here and here. The most recent in-depth reporting was a series by MPR’s Tom Robertson. I’ve presented some questions and alternative thinking here.
