Rural communities have historically struggled with inequality. Among the biggest challenges are weaker infrastructures, fewer workforce and educational opportunities, and inadequate funding.
A new nationwide economic development cohort that includes two Indiana entities is seeking to reverse the trend and address the divergence rural communities face.
A $2.6-million grant from the Ascendium Education Group and ECMC Foundation supports the initiative. Civic collaboration nonprofit CivicLab, the organization that is managing the grant funding, has selected 10 rural partnerships throughout the country to “rethink and revitalize their communities” through new strategies concerning higher education and workforce development. Indiana partners include the John Jay WorkReady Institute at the John Jay Center for Learning and the Community Education Coalition at the Columbus Learning Center Management Corporation. The two organizations join higher learning institutions, nonprofits, employers and public agencies from Arkansas, California, Florida, Montana, North Carolina, Ohio, and South Carolina. Through the grant, each partner will receive training, opportunities for collaboration and financial assistance to develop pathways for education and employment.
Eye-Opening Collaboration
Rusty Inman, executive director of the John Jay Center for Learning in Portland, said the partnership is a welcome initiative in Jay County, The organization that opened its doors in 2001 sought to bring flexible, accessible college opportunities to the small town through collaboration with Ivy Tech Community College of Indiana, Purdue Polytechnic, Vincennes University, Indiana Wesleyan University, and school corporations. But after the pandemic changed the educational landscape with online-based learning, the center struggled to find its place in creating the change needed.
“Little towns don’t have places like the John Jay Center. We were doing good work. So now we needed to find out what others like us were doing, and how they were accomplishing it. We weren’t looking to reinvent the wheel,” said Inman. He said when he attended the program’s three-day institute to engage with other partners and collaborate on system-building tools, he found some answers. “A lot of what we were doing and going through, others were, too. We didn’t feel in the dark or by ourselves anymore.”
Inman said the center has developed a strategy with four key focuses: More collaboration with manufacturing employers and training specific to needs, increased healthcare-related classes, and adult-based education with special emphasis on diversity needs and underemployment. The center will also take the center’s Virtual Career Academy from concept to fruition by partnering with local school corporations over the next four years.
Inman said he looks forward to additional opportunities to meet with partners. Six institutes are planned over the three-year grant cycle. Partners share ideas and resources during virtual meetings throughout the year.
Mission Focused Methodologies
More than a year before the partnership grant became available, leaders of the Community Education Coalition’s AirPark Columbus College Campus, which includes Ivy Tech Community College, Purdue Polytechnic Columbus, and Indiana University Purdue University Columbus, had been discussing ways to address the changes happening in the eight-county region of south-central Indiana. Veronica Franzese, director of strategy and development, said the partnership can help them better navigate those changes.
“We are seeing changes to the industry sector as alternative energy is playing a bigger role. We see changes with automation and artificial intelligence. On the education side, we are seeing rapid change as confidence in higher education is declining. And we are seeing the domino effect on all industries here because of it – and not just to our big companies, but all of our companies,” she said. “Our group got together for those reasons, and now we can apply this grant as a cross-section to the work we were doing in a movement to align our education systems with the regional workforce needs.”
To support the organizations in their collaboration and strategic development, the communities have access to new data sets, including diversity census information collected by CivicLab. The partners are trained on how to most effectively collect data, analyze it, and use it with available market projection data specific to each area.
Using the new data and methods developed for rural communities, the partners can then work together to create a strategic plan that blends unique and collaborative efforts.
“We are currently working through that process of gathering the correct data and interpreting that data,” said Jim Roberts, president of Community Education Coalition. “It has been really neat, from my standpoint, for the chance to work closely with nine other teams around the country and learn about the great things they are doing. It is crucial that we learn how they are solving their challenging systems and take some guidance from them.”
Inman said the opportunity to be part of the initiative is an invaluable experience that he is certain will spur economic development change in communities across the country.
“This has been such a great opportunity with CivicLab. It has been unbelievable the things we have already learned. And we have two more years of the program left to learn more,” he said. “We are incredibly fortunate to have subject matter experts this close to us, and this is a transforming thing for our county and surrounding counties. We are going to be better because of this.”
