Vocational-technical schools working with business

The local business community has always been heavily involved in our public institutions, through voluntary associations, of course, but also ensuring the good functioning and affordability of a once very robust network of community hospitals as well as our public schools. Throughout the robust education reform debates of the 1990s, figures like William S. Edgerly of State Street Corporation and Ray Stata of Analog Devices brought to bear the view of employers who were wedded to their communities, to a strong liberal arts foundation, and to the idea of preparing students for the workforce.

The state’s vocational-technical (VTE) schools have clearly put an emphasis on building relationships with the business community, for resource needs, connections for employment, and for input on how to make their programs more responsive. In the third segment of this series on the successes of regional VTE technical schools, I’d like to share what VTE administrators have done to make those relationships rock-solid and beneficial both to businesses and to the schools themselves.

This video features David Ferreira, executive director of the Massachusetts Association of Vocational Administrators; Fred Savoie, retired superintendent of the Blue Hills Regional Vocational-Technical High School; and Alison Fraser, Blackstone Valley Regional Vocational-Technical High School.

Working with Businesses from Mike Dean on Vimeo.

You can access videos other videos on vocational-technical schools here, on MCAS and academic gains and Vocational-technical schools as models of choice.