In the now oft-quoted and talked about David Leonhardt interview of President Barack Obama in this weekend's edition of the New York Times Sunday Magazine, Obama made an argument about worker skills that we here at NDN quite enjoyed:
I think everybody needs enough post-high-school training that they are competent in fields that require technical expertise, because it’s very hard to imagine getting a job that pays a living wage without that — or it’s very hard at least to envision a steady job in the absence of that.
And so to the extent that we can upgrade not only our high schools but also our community colleges to provide a sound technical basis for being able to perform complicated tasks in a 21st-century economy, then I think that not only is that good for the individuals, but that’s going to be critical for the economy as a whole.
President Obama has a long track record of supporting such proposals. During the presidential campaign, then-Senator Obama endorsed the idea as part of his platform, and we're pleased to see that the idea of community colleges as a crucial resource for improving worker skills is in his agenda for creating economic prosperity.
This proposal is part of a broader argument that NDN has been making for some time, that in the globalized, interconnected, technology-dense 21st century economy, facility with and connectivity to the global communications network is central to the life success of any worker or child. The 21st century economy is idea-based, in that most of the value of the large companies at the center of U.S. economy is now determined not by their physical assets, but by their intellectual property. Thriving in such an economy requires 21st century skills.
This argument is expounded upon in a paper written by NDN President Simon Rosenberg and Alec Ross, then with the One Economy and now a Senior Advisor on Innovation to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, that would put A Laptop in Every Backpack of American sixth graders. Additionally, Tom Kalil, now Associate Director for Policy of the White House Office of Science and Technology, continued this narrative, authoring a paper entitled, Harnessing the Mobile Revolution, for NDN’s affiliate, the New Policy Institute. This paper argued that the explosive growth of mobile communications can be a powerful tool for addressing some of the most critical economic, political, and social challenges of the 21st century.
Stay tuned to NDN's Globalization Initiative for additional work on 21st century skills and technology. We believe, just as President Obama started to spell out in his recent interview, that tapping the resources of America's community colleges, putting a laptop in every backpack, and ultimately connecting all Americans and the rest of the world to the global communications network can and must be a hallmark of the economic agenda going forward.
This week was an important week for NDN in the policy and legislative arenas as a top Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives introduced legislation based on one of NDN's key initiatives, a proposal by NDN Globalization Initiative Chair Rob Shapiro to use the nation's infrastructure of community colleges to provide free computer training to all comers wishing to improve their IT skills. The proposal is targeted toward improving the computer skillls of U.S. workers in the increasingly globalized economy.
U.S. Rep. John Larson (CT-01), Chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, today introduced the legislation, H.R. 2060, on Thursday at a news conference with Shapiro.
National Journal's Tech Daily Dose previewed the news conference and a good write-up in Community College Times.
On Wednesday, Nelson Cunningham, newly named Chair of NDN's Latin American Policy Initiative, made a splash in the Chicago Tribune with a major essay focused on President Obama's recent trip to the Summit of the Americas. Look for more commentary for Nelson, widely seen as one of the foremost experts on U.S.-Latin American relations in the United States.
Earlier in the week, President Barack Obama signed into law the Edward M. Kennedy Serve America Act, which dramatically expands the national service corps. NDN Fellows and Millennial Makover co-authors, Morley Winograd and Mike Hais, wrote a special essay to mark the occasion and did several interviews. Check out this fantastic piece by Susan Milligan in the Boston Globe, Kennedy's hometown paper, which quotes Morley and Mike, who finished the East Coast leg of their book tour last week.
Their essay -- which also was cross posted by FutureMajority -- focused on the Millennials Generation's desire to serve and its identity as a "civic" generation. Morley and Mike also received a prominent mentioned on pollster.com.
NDN is always the place to go to talk new tools and media. When San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom announced his gubernatorial run last week via all new media, Carla Marinucci from the San Franciso Chronicle asked Simon to weigh in:
"The way that Gavin Newsom announced will become standard practice in the post-Obama era of politics," said Simon Rosenberg, who heads NDN, which studies Democratic policy issues. "We're seeing a reinventing of politics ... and in a state as wired as California, and a campaign as expensive as this one will be, the candidates who can figure out how to tap into the power and passion of their supporters will have an advantage."
And Morley and Mike talked to the Providence (RI) Phoenix about the Internet and new media. The take-away: while Rhode Island still has many older, non-Internet users, Ocean State politicians who ignore new tools and media do so at their own peril.
House Democratic Caucus Chair John Larson Offers Legislation Based on NDN Proposal to Increase Workers' Competitiveness Through Universal Access to Computer Training
Washington, DC -- U.S. Rep. John Larson (CT-01), Chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, today introduced legislation that taps the resources of the nation's more than 1,200 community colleges and offers free computer training to workers and others seeking to improve their IT skills.
The typical community college computer lab is open and used by students 66.5 hours per week. These hours are highly concentrated in the daytime of weekdays, when most working people are on their jobs. Under our proposal, the federal government would provide grants to defray the costs of keeping these labs open and staffed by community college instructors an additional 30 hours each week, on evenings and weekends when these labs are generally closed or little-used. During those hours, any person would be able to walk in and receive instruction in computer-related skills, at no cost. We estimate that if two-thirds of community colleges participate, and each provides three instructors for 30 hours a week, 48 weeks a year, Congress could provide every worker in America access to IT training for about $125 million a year.
"By broadening their mission, community colleges have the potential to be a hub to train our workforce for the jobs of the future. With this legislation, we are helping them fulfill potential and boost local economies around the country," Larson said.
"Chairman Larson has again shown that he understands the need to provide America’s workers with the skills to succeed in the competitive global economy, particularly during these tough economic times," Shapiro said. "The Community College Technology Access Act is a cost-effective investment that will help workers get ahead. Tens of millions of Americans graduated high school or even attended college in the years before computers and the Internet became ubiquitous. Many of them are now entering, or are already in, what should be their most productive and highest-earning years. But without basic information technology skills, many workers are trapped in dead-end jobs, and as non-wired employment becomes obsolete, they face being locked out of the mainstream workforce entirely."
"In the globalized, interconnected, technology-dense 21st century, facility with and connectivity to the global communications network is central to the life success of any worker or child," said NDN President Simon Rosenberg. "NDN congratulates Chairman Larson for his bold leadership in making the American workforce more competitive, and looks forward to continued work on building a 21st century economic strategy that makes globalization work for all Americans."
The Shapiro proposal is a companion to a paper written by Rosenberg and Alec Ross, then with the One Economy and now a Senior Advisor on Innovation to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, that would put A Laptop in Every Backpack of American sixth graders. Additionally, Tom Kalil, now Associate Director for Policy of the White House Office of Science and Technology, continued this narrative, authoring a paper entitled, "Harnessing the Mobile Revolution," for NDN’s affiliate, the New Policy Institute. This paper argued that the explosive growth of mobile communications can be a powerful tool for addressing some of the most critical economic, political, and social challenges of the 21st century.
Check out the video of the bill's introduction here:
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