A stat recited a couple of years back by Battelle exec Rich Rosen was an eye opener. Nationally, 80% of parents discourage their children from science and technology careers.
Even if that number is only half true in Ohio, that’s a scary stat for the Port Authority and our customers who so heavily rely on a skilled workforce possessing backgrounds in science, technology, engineering, and math.
That's why the Port Authority has devoted considerable effort to helping be a part of the solution.
I chair the STEM Industry Committee at The Works which is Licking County's science, history, and arts museum. The committee includes a who's who of representatives from science and technology companies and institutions. It's a sounding board for the team at The Works to help ensure the programming is making a difference for families, education, and business.
Last June, aided by a $50,000 commitment from the Port Authority’s Community Projects Fund and a major county-wide fundraising effort, The Works hired a STEM education coordinator, Lisa Sharpe. Her job is to bring local relevance to kids and families by providing area schools with STEM resources and injecting a business-in-Licking-County face into all of The Works’ STEM programming.
I'm encouraged. We are less than one year into this effort but its already easy to see Licking County is going to whittle away at those parents who might resemble that stat and discourage science and technology careers for their children.
And here's hoping the community will turn out for the Aerospace Center Industry Day at The Works on February 21 where Boeing, Kaiser, Bionetics, and the Port Authority, in a fun environment, show the science, technology, engineering, and math of what we do every day.
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Here's a video about The Works:
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