Berkshire Compact for Education Tries to Dovetail Student Aspirations with County's Economic

Berkshire Compact for Education tries to dovetail student aspirations with county's economic goals

Berkshire Compact for Education, a local think tank, met this past Friday to highlight work done this past year to reach out to local students about college and career readiness opportunities available in the Berkshires. This subgroup is in the process of brainstorming new ideas to further the cause and figuring out how these ideas might be funded and implemented.

JENN SMITH — THE BERKSHIRE EAGLE

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PostedMonday,December 5, 201610:30 pm

By Jenn Smith,

NORTH ADAMS - Colorful display boards were propped up on the stage of the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts Church Street Center, a sort of backdrop on either side of a projection screen. Glued onto the boards were illustrated visions of Northern Berkshire third-graders, what they hoped and dreamed for their futures, from, "I want to be a teacher and a writer," and "I hope to be a math tutor" to "I want to be a garbage man" and "I want to work at Burger King."

Seated at tables filling the center floor before the display boards were the more than 50 men and women who comprise the Berkshire Compact for Education, a think tank which include not only educators and school administrators, but business people, legislators and artists, community organizers and retirees. For more than a decade now, the group has met regularly to try and figure out how they can help raise and/or support community members' aspirations, like the children's goals above, and how different sectors in the county can collaborate and do their parts to help residents achieve their goals and find the training and the necessary credentials they need to get the jobs that are here in Berkshire County.

It's been an ambitious volunteer effort that's taken years of developing events and programs and activities to get kids and teachers onto college campuses; getting them to career fairs before high school and college; letting the public know about new programs and degrees and other pathways of advancement.

And on Friday, during the Compact's semiannual full network meeting, Jake Eberwein, Ph.D., who now oversees the group, called for members to be all the more resolute in driving the collective's mission and purpose. He encouraged members to have "burning patience, unwavering commitment, tenacity and unrelenting persistence."

The meeting included a full hour devoted to hearing about and discussing the findings of a study commissioned by the Berkshire County Education Task Force, another effort supported by the Berkshire Compact. The task force is involved in looking at strategies to specifically address issues of declining enrollment, revenues and expenditures and sustaining quality of education in local public schools.

Prior to that presentation, the Compact's subcommittees brought forth their projects, actions and "asks." The bottom line: The county has some great ideas and plans to improve schools and students' experiences, but they need more money, resources and collaborators to help get them there.

The early childhood group, chaired by Doug McNally of the Berkshire Readiness Center, is focused on two areas of advocacy: making sure that all families in Berkshire County can access affordable, high-quality early childhood education and care, and that to assure that level of quality, make sure early childhood educators are earning a fair wage. While new state requirements and recommendations are pushing early childhood employees to obtain and maintain more than an associate's level degree, McNally said the compensation needs to be commensurate. "We have early childhood educators working every week for 12 months a year only to earn under $25,000," he said.

Members of the early childhood subcommittee have been leading local delegates and Compact members on tours at various early childhood education sites in the county.

"We would like every member of the Compact to join us in this advocacy for highly qualified early educators," McNally said.

Representing grades 3 to 12 was Molly Meczywor, assistant principal for Drury High School. This group is focused on raising students' college and career aspirations through establishing and expanding the number of mentorships in Berkshire County. Currently Drury High School is putting together a pilot program, but is seeking funds to support a mentoring program supervisor to help match students with mentors and track their progress.

Meczywor said the idea is to create a two-year funding plan for the program to manage data, train mentors, provide support to students and a space in school to meet.

Barbara Chaput, MCLA's director of human resources, represents the workforce development committee, which is focusing on building more internship opportunities locally for college-aged students. She said that she hopes participating businesses will see it as a chance to bring up "students they want to bring on full-time at some point."

This, of course, requires both student and employer participation, as well as at least technical assistance to create and maintain a website that students can use to search and apply for internships.

Heather Shogry-Williams, youth director for the Berkshire County Regional Employment Board Inc., emphasized the need for career and college readiness programs to reach elementary and middle school students, so they can build an awareness of the importance of doing well in school early on. A professional development workshop on the matter was held on Nov. 8, and a career awareness curriculum pilot is underway in Northern Berkshire schools, she said.

The latter is being coordinated through Berkshire Compact activities coordinator, Susetta "Sue" Doucette. She went into local schools to ask the third-graders to create the drawings and write out the career aspirations Compact members saw before them on stage.

"A lot of them want to be teachers, doctors, police, but there are a lot of careers they do not yet know about. I need people to help," she said. "Come speak at a fourth-grade class at C.T. Plunkett School in January. Tell them about your work, but we also need to tell them how it's important to come to school every day, and tell them not that they can be anything they want but how, with hard work, you can do anything."

Outcomes of the Berkshire Compact this year

- Berkshire County Goes to College (Grade 6 visits): Some 1,200 public school sixth-graders representing 19 schools visited one of

the county's four colleges. This program is sponsored by the Berkshire United Way.

- Berkshire County Grade 3 campus visits: 450 third-graders representing nine schools visited either Berkshire Community College (200 students) or Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (250 students).

- Career fairs: 900 Grade 8 students representing seven schools participated in the MCLA Career Fair. This program is sponsored by Guardian Life.

- "Reach Out for Education": Episodes on education awareness topics are filmed and aired on Pittsfield Community Television (PCTV Channel 17) and throughout the county.

- STEM activities (science, technology, engineering and mathematics fairs; programming, STEM library activities, etc.)

- Passport for Education checklist has been distributed and used by students and educators across the Berkshires.

- Dual enrollment program: Almost 200 students are participating in programs where they can earn college credit while in high school, as coordinated through MCLA and BCC.

- Degree completion: Highlighting to the community new programs and degrees, certificate programs, and new industry-to-education connections here.