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Michigan Chronicle
Vol. 81 – No. 32 | April 18-24, 2018
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WCCCD Chancellor Dr. Curtis Ivery calls for consortium between regional community colleges By Branden Hunter At forum two of the Pancakes and Politics speaker series, Wayne County Community College District Chancellor Curtis L. Ivery called for a collaborative, productive regional partnership that would expand and coordinate career, technical and workforce training across southeast Michigan. The Chancellor invited organizations including Macomb Community College, Oakland Community College, Schoolcraft College, Henry Ford College, and Wayne State University to discuss and coordinate efforts around the career, technical and Dr. Curtis L. Ivery w o r k f o r c e training needs of students, residents, and the region’s employers. “I am committed to deepening and expanding WCCCD’s community leadership and bringing together the leaders of the various public, non-profit, and private career and workforce education organizations in Detroit, Wayne County, and surrounding areas, around a unified and coordinated agenda for talent development,” said Ivery. Job talent in Detroit was one of the topics at the forum and arose when Vice-Chairman and Chief Administrative Officer at DTE Energy and panelist Dave Meador mentioned the lack of sufficient job talent in the city and the need to feel job openings in the near future. Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan has been working with area leaders to grow Detroit’s base of skilled workers with comprehensive workforce training efforts in Detroit. An estimated 40,000 skilled workers are needed throughout metro Detroit to fill positions in fields as diverse as advanced manufacturing, logistics, truck driving, information technology and cyber security, health sciences, and more. “We are convinced that a regional response is needed to effectively respond to the region’s need for a highly skilled workforce,” Ivery said. “Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan has worked tirelessly with leaders to put a comprehensive network of programs in place that establishes Detroit and the metro region as a national model for effective workforce training and development. We want to support those efforts in ways that help all of our students, residents, and employers thrive.” WCCCD is the largest urban community college in the state,
See WCCCD page A-4
WHAT’S INSIDE
Pancakes & Politics Forum II tackles Detroit’s education and job crisis By Branden Hunter
Through the Detroit Promise program, students of DPSCD who qualify can attend a two-year institution for free. And while the program can be beneficial for students in the district, Ivery believes there is more work the community colleges can do to help solve the education crisis in Detroit.
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ith news of the Detroit Public Schools Community District ranking last in the country in two key subjects according to a report by the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), all eyes were on education, jobs, and talent at forum two of the Pancakes and Politics speaking series at the Detroit Athletic Club. More than 20 school districts were included in the report, with Detroit ranking dead last for the second year in a row. Two areas that students here are struggling in the most are math and reading, specifically in the fourth and eighth grades. DPSCD Superintendent Dr. Nikolai Vitti was one of the five panelists and he believes the answers to fixing the school system does not start with the students. “I think it’s important to state clearly that where we are right now in DPSCD is not a true reflection of what our children can do in Detroit,” said Vitti. “Most of you woke up with the news that we were last in the NAEP test. We see those scores, the level of demoralization that goes with it, and the anger and frustration. But the reality is, this is, in many ways, one of the last indictments against the loss of local control in Detroit.” “The district has not been run by a local elected school board. It has not been run by educators that know this work, know education reform, and know urban school reform. It has been run as if the district has been running out of business and not building. Now we have an elected board, a superintendent with a track record of success in larger school districts, and now it’s time to rebuild this district to show the potential
“What I’m going to recommend we look at, is creating a consortium,” said Ivery. “We will bring in every community college in the region, whether it’s Schoolcraft, Macomb, Henry Ford, or Oakland, and address this issue together. We don’t have a minute to lose and we need to move quickly. I believe that we have to fill 800 jobs in the next five years and we have a lot of work to do.”
DPSCD Superintendent Dr. Nikolai Vitti children have.” Vitti says creating “pathways” for students in DPSCD is the key to assuring that they are prepared to go into the workforce or to college. And while those pathways are targeted toward high school students in the district, the preparation of basic skills, basic knowledge and information, and critical thinking should begin at the elementary level. If those skills are obtained at a higher and more consistent level, then students will be prepared to go into those pathways, which include advanced career courses and career academies. Dr. Curtis Ivery, the Chancellor at Wayne County Community College District and also a panelist addressed the hardships of running an urban educational institution in an area where 51 percent of the children are in poverty.
The unemployment rate in Detroit is currently at 9.5 percent. And although that number is low, compared to previous years, there is still more work to do to continue the decrease. One of the reasons the unemployment rate is so high, is because many believe the talent pool in Detroit is insufficient, which is why the city was not chosen as a finalist for Amazon’s second headquarters. The solution ties back to education as Dave Meador, Vice-Chairman and Chief Administrative Officer at DTE Energy and panelist stated. “The Mayor’s Workforce Development Board that I co-chair with Cindy Pasky started looking at this issue a couple of years ago and it is a sad reality,” said Meador. “At that time, we had half of the adult population in Detroit not participating in the workforce and you know the situation in the schools at that point and time. The career and technical options were not available and for many
See PANCAKES
& POLITICS page A2
Waiting While Black in Philadelphia Can Get You Arrested By Patreice A. Massey Video of two black men being arrested at a local Philadelphia Starbucks has gone viral. The woman that originally uploaded the video to social media attached the caption:
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“The police were called because these men hadn’t ordered anything. They were waiting for a friend to show up, who did as they were taken out in handcuffs for doing nothing,” said the poster who is a European American woman. “All the other white people are wondering why it’s never happened to us when we do the same thing.” Those in the black community are also wondering the same thing. Driving, walking and running have all proven hazardous to an African American’s health when dealing with law enforcement. Now we can’t even “wait” in peace? The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), issued the following statement following the disgraceful arrest of two African American men in a Philadelphia Starbucks:
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“The arrest of two Black men at a Philadelphia Starbucks represents another ominous signal on the increasingly dangerous environment for African Americans. Less than
Protesters demonstrate Monday outside the Philadelphia Starbucks where two black men were arrested last week. (Reuters/Mark Makela) two weeks after we honor the life and work of Dr. King and 50 years after the Kerner Commission found racism and police brutality at the root of public unrest in our communities; we still have a long way to go towards becoming a nation where a person is judged by the content of their character not the color of their skin.” “The Starbucks situation provides dan-
gerous insight regarding the failure of our nation to take implicit bias seriously.” Many have noted that having six officers handcuff and arrest two black men waiting to order coffee is indicative of the overzealous and reactionary use of excessive force that has too often proved fatal to black men,
See STARBUCKS page A-2