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We do a lot of surveys, we ask employers' time in and time out to what their needs are,
and a lot of times these things come back, soft skills and things that are needed. And
it's encouraging to see Community Colleges actually taking that and using that in their
curriculum and how they develop training.
We've been teaching soft skills, we have been trying to integrate soft skills
into the curriculum. So it's good to hear from the other side, to say, to understand the importance
of it. And also for the data that were provided to show that soft skills are something that's important.
To hear the IT person talk about what they do with their mentoring and on the job training
and how the soft skills are so important, I go away with that letting the people know
that how you raise your children and teach them about integrity and responsibility and all
of those good things are lifetime lessons that will help them do better in their jobs
now and in the future.
I think as I recruit for candidates, pressing those soft skills and entry level jobs
and the value of it, might be something that our company could look at doing a little bit differently.
Growth in the middle skill industries and jobs are things that Community Colleges can respond to
directly. That's something I want to take back to the campus and see how we can best serve the needs of our region.
It was nice hearing validation from other companies, such as Rebecca from Gallus and such,
that were on the right track and were doing very similar things. So from my perspective
it was great to hear validation, and were just going to continue to go back and do more.
Well I think next year if we can increase, and continue to increase the audience participation,
having them involved with the panelist I think is great.
This year we asked Community Colleges participants' information. Last year it was dislocated workers.
Every year we kind of change up the audience of who we are asking. So I think adding a new element
of who were surveying, maybe it's college grads, maybe its people who are a specific set of people
that are going back to get retrained.
I think for next year I would like to see possibly bring in some K-12 and higher education
to the table to talk about the discussion where business can partner with those entities
and those entities can help business out develop the pipeline they need for a stainable workforce.
I think the people in the audience who represent the various companies who are not sitting up there
when they ask their questions I think it tells us who is in the audience, what their interest are,
and then for St. Louis Community College how can we then provide the training for them.
Please download this year's report at www.stlcc.edu/workforce.
We would also invite all of you to join us later this fall for intensive conversation.
For more information or to register for these events call 314-984-7777.