James Sept-Oct 2021 web - Flipbook - Page 70
addresses the academic and economic inequities that
now plague a majority of Georgians nor does it address
the economic skills gap that Georgia faced pre-pandemic.
We must also address historical structures and remove
barriers that have kept many Georgians from fully participating in the state’s economic prosperity and implement
true educational reform.
The Georgia Partnership for Excellence in Education outlines a path toward achieving this goal in their
Top Ten Issues to Watch 2021 report. In it, they examine
the entire birth-to-work pipeline to highlight where the
pandemic revealed strong foundations upon which to
build, cracks that were revealed or exacerbated, and
systemic barriers to access and achievement that need
to be addressed. They contend that to address the full
spectrum of educational and economic disparities, the
birth -to-work pipeline must be insulated through the
coordination of community partners, philanthropy and
business leaders, and state and national government
leaders across a multitude of agencies and departments
from education, public health, economic development
and more. They advocate for a collective embrace of a
statewide policy agenda that lifts-up children and families while reducing educational inequities.
Reinventing education while aligning it with regional and state economic development needs also involves
rethinking funding formulas, redesigning teacher training and professional development models, addressing
statewide broadband access, strengthening alignments
between early learning, K-12, and post-secondary, and
local, regional, and state workforce pathways, These
broad policy plans need a commensurate funding strategy and focused leadership from state and local leaders
as well as business, education, and community leaders
to fully support the implementation of the necessary
changes. There certainly continues to be a vital role for
local control and decisions that coordinate through the
schools and the community to identify local needs and
set local priorities. Local control still needs to flourish
around issues related to innovative teaching delivery
models, out of school time structures, teacher incentives and recruitment strategies, workforce pathway
priorities, etc.
Ultimately, however, to solve Georgia’s short term
skills gap problem and long-term economic development
crisis, a strong state policy framework around these
systems-level issues, along with adequate and equitable
resources ,must be in place to truly empower local leaders
to make decisions that best support their students and
Georgia’s long-term prosperity.
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JAMES
Chris Clark is president and CEO of the Georgia Chamber of Commerce
and Shan Cooper is executive director of the Atlanta Committee for
progress. Both are board members of the Georgia Partnership for
Excellence in Education.
SEPTEMBER/ OCTOB E R 2021
