by Karen Brune Mathis
Managing Editor
Florida State College at Jacksonville President Steve Wallace told a community study group last week that 70 percent of the recent high-school graduates entering FSCJ are not ready to compete in reading, writing or math.
“That’s a crisis in a knowledge economy,” Wallace told the more than 30 participants at the weekly session of the “Recession Recovery and Beyond” study committee.
Jacksonville Community Council Inc. is leading the study to determine which industries would be most likely to carry the area through recessionary times and develop long-term jobs.
Wallace joined Charles Hall, president of Florida Gateway College in Lake City, and Brent Lemond, vice president of instructional services at First Coast Technical College in St. Augustine, to talk about the technical careers that are available to people, especially young adults, in the seven-county region.
Their assigned topic was “regional job growth and the roles of postsecondary education,” but the conversation turned to the need for students to graduate from high school with the skills and knowledge to attend college, to seek certification or licensure or to start a job.
Such skills and knowledge carry similar weight in each instance, said the educators.
Wallace said the former way of thinking was that there were two paths in high school, one leading to college and the other to technical career preparation.
Now there is just one, he said. “Employers look for the same stuff college admissions looks for,” he said.
The educators viewed the trades as steady sources of jobs. Wallace said there are some that will continue to need skilled workers and that aren’t at the same level of risk as knowledge-based jobs.
“When you need your plumbing fixed, it won’t be outsourced and the Internet won’t do it,” he said.
The educators talked about the difficulties that face high-school dropouts and the remedial education their schools offer.
They also talked about the obstacles such students face in attending college, ranging from the remedial courses that might continue to frustrate them to the need to work, rather than attend school, to make money to survive.
Asked how to deal with low high-school graduation rates in the area, Wallace said that the rates are “a crisis.”
“Our high schools are in crisis, particularly in the Southeast and particularly in some societies,” he said.
Wallace said the best predictor of educational success was fourth-grade reading proficiency. The JCCI “Quality of Life Progress Report” for 2010 showed that 69 percent of third-grade students in Duval County public schools were reading at grade level, and just 33 percent of 10th grade students were reading at their level.
Lemond referenced discipline in schools, saying that a school “might look better” with a low suspension rate, but that keeping unruly students in the classroom “might mean disruptions in classes.”
Hall said there is a challenge for schools to find math teachers with strong teaching skills.
“Basic skills are the ones hurting us the most,” said Hall. “There is a real problem out there.”
Wallace said that FSCJ enrolls 85,000 students and that it operates as four divisions: The four-year Florida State College offering nine bachelor’s degrees with eight more in development; the Florida Coast Career Tech, offering industry certification or state licensure; a Military, Public Safety and Security Division; and a collection of programs including high-school completion, corporate and customized training and other classes.
He said the four-year college has open admission to freshmen, although admission to the junior and senior level is performance-based.
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