By BETH L. JOKINEN of The Lima News (OH)
LIMA - When Rick Gross came to Bath schools five years ago, he was surprised that the school didn't have more partnerships with local businesses, especially Ford's Lima Engine Plant down the road.
Coming from Fostoria, Gross had seen how these partnerships can work both for students and local businesses.
"We had that connection with business," the high school principal said. "We worked side by side developing classes to get kids trained in skills business and industry needed."
Gross is now getting his wish. Bath and Ford have entered into a partnership to provide an industry and technology experience-based curriculum to students. The Ford Partnership for Advanced Studies (Ford PAS) program will be offered to sophomores starting next January.
The program is one example of how business and education are coming together. There are other positive examples, but both educators and business leaders say there needs to be more.
"We have to look at how we can resolve issues to better improve education and business opportunities, and how to improve the skilled workforce," said Jed Metzger, executive director of the Lima-Allen County Chamber of Commerce.
The obstacles
Metzger said there are possibilities for business and education to work together, but that getting the two sides together can be difficult. One of the biggest problems is time. Metzger said businesses are so fast-paced, it can be difficult for officials to get in the mindset that they have to make time.
"Businesses need to invest more time with education if they want to achieve the talent and skills they are looking for," he said.
Schools also deal with time constraints. Metzger said proficiency tests and state mandates make it hard for schools to let students out of the classroom for field trips to businesses or to do internships. The mandates also don't leave time for skills other than those tested on, Metzger said.
"We hear from business that students are missing out on soft skills like professionalism, manners and respect," he said, adding that money constraints and state funding issues also are problems. He said it can be tough for schools to bus students places because of finances.
Teachers should be able to spend time at businesses so they can see firsthand what skills their students need and relate lessons to real-life situations, Metzger added.
Virgil Mann, curriculum director with Lima schools, agrees that testing can sometimes take away from other things. In the smaller schools that will start at Lima Senior High School this fall, one emphasis will be to get students out in the workplace through internships and service learning opportunities. Mann knows that first the students will have to pass the new Ohio Graduation Test needed to graduate.
"What happened was that the outside world from education said we weren't preparing kids very well, so the state reacted by testing," he said. "Then suddenly, we were spending so much time teaching to the test, and we are still not always teaching the skills they need."
Mann admits that educators have for many years been isolated in their classrooms, teaching curriculum, but not "necessarily knowing if the curriculum is meeting the needs of the business community."
The chamber has an education-business committee, which promotes business and education collaborations. The problem, Metzger said, is that membership is about 75 percent education and only 25 percent business people. Committee co-chair Lynn Sametz, who is OSU-Lima's education outreach director and service learning coordinator, still thinks the group is helping.
"We provide a neutral forum for business and education to come together. A place where we can bring speakers and programs to the group," she said. "It's a nice opportunity to share information."
Carin Doseck, co-chair of the committee and director of career and technical education at Lima schools, said businesses need to listen to educators and understand the problems they face.
"I don't think a lot of businesses understand all the time we take for testing or that we often have to deal with kids who don't come from a lot of support," she said. "We are more than just educators at times and I don't know if business always understands that."
Doseck does believe that business and education are getting better at coming together. Allen Economic Development Group President Marcel Wagner said he has seen a "much broader attempt" by the two to work together, especially in technology and industry-based programs.
Yet, Wagner still thinks getting the two together will continue to be an issue. Kristi Clouse, development coordinator with the development group, agrees that time is a major factor.
"It's a problem on both ends, and then there is no one facilitating," she said. "There is no one getting the two together."
Good for business
Business people agree that partnering with education will ultimately be good for them. Hank Chawansky, human resources manager at Ford, said companies have trouble finding employees because students are less interested in math, science and engineering, and the knowledge in those areas is sometimes limited.
"This (Ford PASS) is an investment bolstering those skills," he said. "Just having exposure of Ford people at the school and in the community will be positive."
Premcor Lima Refinery Environmental Health and Safety Manager Paul Logsdon volunteers for Science Enhancement for Science Advancement (SESA), a program that brings science into the classroom. He said he tries to get students interested in math and science so that they might one day want to work at Premcor.
"A place like this (Premcor) survives by people who understand math and science and can come in and be a productive employee and help benefit the company," he said.
Some businesses partner with education simply because they are a part of the community. Logsdon said that is a big part of why he and others are involved with SESA.
"We just want to give back to the community," he said. "We like science and we like to see students energized about science."
Time Warner Cable offers assistance to schools in a number of ways. It provides educational cable programming for classrooms, and a curriculum with Court TV that teaches students to make good decisions. The company also started a new program that takes sixth- through ninth-grade students to visit Bowling Green State University.
Pat McCauley of Time Warner said the company does these things because it's the right thing to do.
"We are strongly committed to the community, education and to students," he said. "We believe it is our corperate duty to give back to the community. We've chosen to focus on kids because they are our future."
Good for schools and students
When Gross was in Fostoria, local businesses asked the school to start a manufacturing engineering program, and in return helped with the program. Gross said it was a good way to not only make students more competitive, but also to introduce them to the business world.
"Kids got to network with local industry and business people, and I think kids then had a leg up on other kids. The business people really supported those kids," he said.
Doseck believes educators can learn much from the business community.
"They can help us look at real expectations for our kids," she said, adding that just having a mentor can make a difference for a student. "Some kids would be fine if they just had someone in the business world who would take them under their wing. We have to be more supportive of our kids."
Mary Elmquist, a retired Ford employee who is working with the Ford PASS program, believes such programs give students a better view of what the workplace is really like, along with showing them the skills they need to find work.
"It links classroom learning with the challenges students will face in post-secondary education and what the workplace will expect of them," she said. "It helps students make decisions about their future education and career choices."
At the Apollo Career Center, business and education have a long-standing relationship. Superintendent Chris Pfister said it has been easy for the school to partner with business. He said building relationships with businesses and getting internships and opportunities for students to see certain businesses is vital at the school.
"It is big," Pfister said. "We have every student do a field experience. It benefits students in that they learn skills so they can make a living, be independent and have good quality of life."
Pfister added that a lot of students may be able to say they want to enter a certain profession, but really have no idea what that profession really is all about. Being able to learn more about the work and even work in the field helps.
LaDoyt Martz, who handles job placement for Apollo high school graduates, said 87 percent of last year's graduates were employed after graduation. Seventy percent were employed or in education in higher education in Allen, Auglaize, Putnam or Hardin counties. He attributes that partly to the relationships Apollo has with area businesses.
"We build partnerships with a lot of different companies," he said. "Every year, I get calls back from companies wanting to have our students come out for internships and work experience."
It's never to early
Business people and educators recognize that building bonds between the two can start far earlier than high school or when students are old enough for internships. Wagner said that while visiting a trade show in South Korea two years ago, he saw fifth- and sixth-grade students coming through the show.
"They were with teachers who were explaining to them different types of businesses," he said. "The place to start is to get kids interested."
Logsdon believes the younger students get interested the better.
"The sooner you get a love for something and can get some exposure to it, the better," he said.
Area colleges and universities also partner with schools, bringing in programs for students of all ages. Sametz, from OSU-Lima, said a science program for fifth- and sixth-grade students done by the school not only gets students interested, but also sends a message to parents.
"All of our outreach programs have a collaboration with business," she said. "Parents are aware of who the sponsors are and that's good. It shows that local businesses are engaged and helping kids."
Long-term impact
Bringing education and business together will reap benefits long into the future. Chawansky said Ford knows it won't see a direct benefit from the program with Bath right away, but it will come.
"We won't see it for a few years, but hopefully when they go to advance their education, maybe they will look back and say, ‘There are opportunities here,'" he said.
When a company looks to expand or move into the area, education is near the top of its list of questions, Wagner said.
"From the workforce perspective, the key issue for companies expanding or looking to come to the area is what skills the workforce has," he said. "The connection between business telling education what they need is a linkage that needs to be constant."
Saying the long-term impact of more partnerships would be tremendous, Metzger said hopefully it will help to keep students and a workforce in the area, ultimately having a mushroom effect on the entire economy.
"If students stay here, they spend money here, and buy houses here. It can totally impact the community," he said. "Then hopefully after they work here for awhile, they will see an opportunity to start their own businesses."
Mann hopes that the smaller schools, with help from the business community, will also reap benefits for the community in the future.
"If you have really, really good schools, it certainly helps the whole community," he said. "And if kids get excited about what they see in Lima, why not come back?"
"From the workforce perspective, the key issue for companies expanding or looking to come to the area is what skills the workforce has. The connection between business telling education what they need is a linkage that needs to be constant." -- Allen Economic Development Group President Marcel Wagner