ABEC Hosts “Creating Conditions for Global Competitiveness” Conference

The world has caught up and surpassed us in the supply of graduates

Phoenix, AZ – The Arizona Business & Education Coalition hosted its “Creating Conditions for Global Competitiveness” conference this week with more than 150 education and business leaders throughout Arizona convening at the East Valley Institute of Technology to discuss K-12 international benchmarking and school finance.

Andreas Schleicher, directorate for education of the international Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development told the group that since the 1960’s, the global talent pool has changed with the United States falling from 1^st to 13^th in the number of high school graduates compared to other industrialized nations.  Korea has the most high school graduates.

What’s worse is that had the United States closed the achievement gap to better-performing nations like Korea and Finland, our gross domestic product (GDP) could have been $1.3 trillion to $2.3 trillion higher in 2008 (the year the data was collected). Similarly, had the gap between Black and Latino and white student performance been narrowed, the GDP in 2008 would have been between $310 billion and $525 billion higher, according to Schleicher.

Schleicher said, “Great systems attract great teachers and provide access to best practices and quality professional development.” He noted that that Finland, which has the best-performing education system in the world, is successful because it sets standards to universal levels, embraces diversity, focuses on outcomes, embraces data and maintains an informed teaching profession.

The conference also featured the national perspective on school finance delivered by Jacob Adams, founding director of the School Finance Redesign Project which was funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Adams told the business and education leaders that the conversation has shifted from how many dollars need to be put on the table to achieve results to how can we get the best results for the resources we have?  He said, “If we are really looking for fundamental change, it will mean new roles for everyone in the system. The partnerships between the public and private sector will become instrumental to success.”

The key to successful school finance redesign is innovation, according to Adams. He said the basic conditions include: Agreement on simple, credible and meaningful goals, delivery of resources transparently and flexibly, use of incentives to focus and enable work of educators, experimentation with new knowledge resources, honest and continuous engagement with local stakeholders and creation of new monitoring and evaluation tools aligned with goals.

Susan Carlson, ABEC executive director said, “ABEC is in the process of its own school finance reform project implementing many of these conditions and expects to present a proposal to revamp the 30-year-old school funding process to the policy makers and the public in the fall.”

The conference also featured ABEC’s second annual Best Practices-Business Education Partnership Awards.  Winners included:

Career Exploration Category-AAA Cares Program: Deer Valley Unified School District and AAA
The AAA Cares program provides an interactive educational environment where at-risk students learn and obtain skills to become a workforce professional through a volunteer mentor approach. The 20-week long program matches aspiring students with workforce professional to demonstrate how to participate effectively in a working environment. Course lessons include: collaboration and team building, business dress, oral and written communication, and computer training. All students are given laptops and are trained in standard Microsoft Office programs.

Science Technology Engineering Math Category-E.X.I.T.E. Summer Camp: Flowing Wells Schools and IBM Tucson
E.X.I.T.E (EXploring Interest in Technology and Engineering) is a worldwide IBM program which encourages junior high aged girls to pursue careers in science and engineering so as to reach groups that are underrepresented in the technical workforce. At Flowing Wells Schools, the E.X.I.T.E. program provides approximately 20-30 7th and 8th grade girls each year with the opportunity to attend a week- long summer camp located on the IBM Tucson campus and to be mentored by an IBM volunteer throughout the year. During camp, the girls are provided a wide variety of STEM-related workshops and activities taught by IBM engineers. They are also partnered with an IBM female role model/mentor that they communicate with throughout the year via a secure IBM ‘Mentor Place’ website.

Professional Development Category and Overall Best Practice in Business-Education Partnership for 2009-Intel Teach: Arizona Department of Education and Intel Corporation
The Intel Teach Program helps K-12 teachers learn how to integrate technology into lessons to promote problem-solving, critical thinking, and collaboration skills among their students. The goal of the program is to improve teaching and learning through effective professional development for teachers. The project uses a “train the trainer” model to provide 24 to 40-hour face-to-face and online courses that help teachers integrate technology into instruction. District leaders select teachers who are trained as Master Instructors, who, in turn, are responsible for sharing their new skills with teachers in their district or region. Participating teachers create units of instruction aligned to Arizona standards that can be immediately implemented in the classroom.

Submitted on behalf of ABEC
The Arizona Business & Education Coalition (ABEC) is a statewide 501(c)3 organization providing a balanced forum for business and education leaders to collaborate and improve K-12 education policy, with linkages to pre-kindergarten and postsecondary education. Guiding principles include: increasing public awareness about the relationship between Arizona’s future workforce and the quality of the K-12 system; actively and effectively influencing education policy; and sharing responsibility for the growth of student achievement in Arizona. For more information, visit www.azbec.org.

Technorati Tags: Arizona, Arizona Business & Education Coalition, East Valley Institute of Technology, Mesa, Phoenix