Education and Jobs are the Key to Reducing Poverty

A recent New York Times Op-Ed made a plea for policy makers to implement policies and programs that we know work to reduce poverty. “‘To make a difference, we have to do things that actually work,’ said Gordon Berlin, the president of MDRC, a research organization that pioneered the use of randomized trials to evaluate poverty-fighting strategies.” “The two most important interventions seem to be education and jobs. Schooling programs pay off from early childhood all the way through community college. And jobs programs lift entire families.” http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/25/opinion/25kristof.html?th&emc;=th This seems so simple, but despite reams of good data that support investments in education, starting with early childhood education and care and going up through workforce development and jobs programs, we fail to make needed commitments in these areas. MACED did some work to try to determine key problems and potential solutions to challenges around Child Care in Appalchian Kentucky, particularly the difficulty providers face in making ends meet in a low-income market. The potential payoffs to investments in child care are substantial, but in already distressed areas, the resources will have to come from improved policies and increased public investment. We are beginning to unpack the workforce development basket and offer some thoughts in our recent report Investing in Kentucky’s Working Families: A Path to Shared Prosperity in the Commonwealth. Plans to strengthen education and workforce development systems will be essential to building new economic opportunities in Central Appalachia. We look forward to hearing more from folks in the...

AITES Prepares Young Women for IT Careers

An article in Staunton Virginia’s Daily News Leader highlights the accomplishments from the first year of the Appalachian Information Technology Extension Service (AITES). The AITES works to promote young women’s interest in jobs requiring information technology skills. The overarching goal is to develop community capacity through a sustainable program of change in Central Appalachia. AITES is a comprehensive, research-based program of training and consulting services that links efforts in workforce development, educational outreach, and economic development. It uses a train-the-trainer model and targets those community groups with whom girls rely upon for support, such as middle and high school counselors and teachers, Family and Consumer Science agents, and 4-H Cooperative Extension agents. In the first year, 365 individuals were impacted by the project. According to the AITES website, Since 1986, women in the IT workforce have dropped from 40% to 14%. Studies show that even when young girls show an aptitude for IT jobs and careers they usually disregard it as an option and tend to doubt the extent of their IT talents and skills. Lack of encouragement from influential adults or ‘stokers,’ preconceived notions, attitudes and stereotypes regarding IT are some of the most difficult barriers for girls to overcome when interested in pursuing an IT job. Gender stereotypes greatly impact girls’ job choices within their community. These trends, which show a national talent shortage of IT-enabled workers in the U.S., occur simultaneously with the creation of public policies meant to implement domestic in-sourcing strategies and the relocation...