education_interview
Interview by Carolyn Mitchell
In the fall of 2001 the Carnegie Corporation of New York announced that Chattanooga was one of seven sites nationwide to receive an $8 million Schools for a New Society grant. Implemented by the Public Education Foundation (PEF) in partnership with Hamilton County schools, the grant project will transform teaching and learning in Hamilton County’s 17 high schools over the next four years. In the following interview, PEF President Dan Challener discusses business involvement in public education with specific attention to the opportunities the Carnegie project presents for business to deepen its support for Hamilton County schools.
Chattanooga Chamber: Does the business community have an obligation to support public education?
Dan Challener: Business has a huge interest in seeing our public schools become powerful engines of economic development and improvement in the quality of life of our citizens. Everyone you talk to tells you that the most important element to an improved economic climate is public education. Seventy-five percent of the children in this community attend public schools. Our future workforce is in public schools right now, and without the strongest possible public schools, we will lose ground to other communities. More than an obligation, what business has is a wonderful opportunity to join with our public schools to create the community that we all want.
CC: How has the role of business in education evolved over the last few decades?
DC: Business support for public schools is not new in Hamilton County. In fact, during the past 30 years, we’ve seen a growing and deepening involvement of business in education. The Adopt-a-School programs of the late ‘70s and ‘80s--with businesses providing money and supplies to schools for the most part--had a positive impact. But today business and public education are developing long-term, in-depth partnerships in which businesses work with schools to help with human resource needs, public relations needs, and strategic planning needs. It’s equally important to point out that in these arrangements businesses have made clear what they need in the workforce so schools can do a better job of equipping students for careers. These reciprocal partnerships bring even greater improvement in schools than earlier alliances.
CC: What caused this change?
DC: We’ve gone from an economy that could thrive on the top 20 percent of students acquiring a very strong education to a ‘knowledge’ economy in which all our students need to be able to read, write persuasively, compute, and think critically. To succeed in this economic environment, all children need a top-level education. Jobs for people without reading, writing, and math skills are few and far-between. The greater involvement of business in education today comes in part from the reality of the greater demands on the workforce.
CC: What opportunities does the Carnegie grant present to local businesses?
DC: One thing we heard from students and teachers as we developed our Carnegie grant proposal is that students feel much of what they learn isn’t relevant beyond the walls of the school. So in a number of high schools we’re in the process of creating learning opportunities in businesses, non-profit programs, and government offices, where young people under the guidance of a teacher can go to a place of work and learn during their junior and senior years. These special projects or internships will allow the students to see that what they’re learning in school is useful in the work environment and will offer a huge benefit to the community as the students see how many job opportunities are available to them in Chattanooga. Besides allowing students to serve internships in their firms or plants, businesses can also support public education by helping schools understand the skills students need for careers and by consulting on curriculum development. That’s not to say businesses have all the answers, but they do have experience, a perspective, and a knowledge base that, if shared with the school district, could be very helpful.We expect that a number of our high schools will create academies focused on careers. East Ridge High School already has a construction business academy. Academies could be created in health careers, risk management and insurance, culinary arts, computers and technology, transportation and trucking, and travel and tourism. In these academies students would learn the skills necessary for careers in those fields while at the same time studying the basic academic core of reading, writing, math, language arts, and science. The dual track that required students to make a choice between a curriculum for college or a curriculum for work is in many ways an outmoded notion. The idea today is to create one track that prepares all students for both college and work.There’s another way businesses can help transform our high schools through the Carnegie initiative. As a condition of the grant, the PEF must raise an additional $6 million in matching funds. In the first year of the grant we raised $3 million. We know that the second $3 million is going to be harder to come by. Another way businesses can support this project is to support the matching fund.
CC: What other roles can business play in improving education?
DC: I think the business community could be enormously helpful in taking an even stronger role in advocacy. Right now Tennessee is near the bottom in funding education. That puts a great burden on the county. The state needs to do a far better job of supporting public schools if Tennessee is going to be a leader in the South economically. So there’s an important place for business leaders to advocate for adequate funding on both the state and local level, as they continue to call for greater results from our schools.
