Todd Hurst was careful to frame the Regional Opportunity Initiatives’ newest undertakings as systems, not programs.
Hurst, the director of education and workforce for ROI, said southwestern central Indiana communities are program-rich and system-poor. Regional Opportunity Initiatives Inc. launched four new initiatives during its first annual report Wednesday at the French Lick Resort Event Center. The initiatives are to serve as a focusing lens, Hurst said, to create a system leading to a career and not just a collection of programs.
“We have an exceptional story to tell in southwest central Indiana,” said Tina Peterson, interim CEO of ROI. “But we can accomplish nothing if our kids do not graduate high school.”
The newly announced Ready Schools Initiative, STEM fellowships, a speakers bureau and advancing an out-of-school STEM learning grant are all aimed at aligning regional education systems with workforce demands. Those initiatives join several existing ROI systems, including an educator bootcamp, graduation and career coaches, an I-69 interchange analysis and the Skill-Up! grant-funded work and learn information technology internship program.
ROI’s initiatives and assessments were seeded by Lilly Endowment through a nearly $26 million grant given in 2016.
Nearly a year ago, Thomas P. Miller and Associates and the ROI staff collected data and testimonies from the organization’s targeted 11 counties to inform those systems. The more than 400,000 residents, 48 cities and towns, 4,500 square miles, 1.3 million acres of farmland and much more contributed to three occupational needs assessments for Brown, Crawford, Daviess, Dubois, Greene, Lawrence, Martin, Monroe, Orange, Owen and Washington counties.
Detailing the most prevalent sectors — national security and defense, life sciences and advanced manufacturing sectors — those analyses showed 32 percent of the region’s adult workforce has completed a post-secondary education. Hurst said the statewide goal is to reach around 60 percent by 2025.
“We are a STEM region,” Peterson said, referring to science, technology, engineering and math. “All kinds of skills are valued here, but we really need STEM, STEM, STEM.”