Harlingen Teachers Learn to Build a More Skilled Workforce
Friday, July 3, 2009

By Eileen Mattei, for "Harlingen Today"

The eight teachers and counselors from Harlingen high schools who are interning with local businesses this summer have an unusual objective. They are getting hands-on experience of the skills needed in the modern workplace with the expectation they will incorporate those skills into their lesson plans in the fall.

The educators are the first in Harlingen to participate in the Academic Learning Alliance (ALA) which is directed by Tech Prep of the Rio Grande Valley and being funded by the Harlingen Economic Development Corp. Tech Prep and its partners--the McAllen Economic Development Corporation and Region One Education Service Center--launched the ALA program in Hidalgo County in 2004 in response to employers who complained that high school graduates did not have the skills to become good employees and were unprepared to enter the job market. Supported by the business community, the highly successful program expanded to Brownsville last year.

“The workforce is the number one issue in our field, period,” said Bill Martin, Harlingen EDC Director, explaining why the EDC decided to fund the Tech Prep initiative. While Harlingen has a young and growing workforce, businesses that consider locating in Harlingen have expressed concern about the education level and skill levels of the young adults, he said.

In Harlingen, the benefits of ALA participation are already apparent and will continue to spread. The ALA, through immersion, gives teachers and counselors an updated understanding of the workplace while providing businesses with the educators’ technical skills and experiences. The educators’ input can improve a firm’s competitiveness. In the fall, students will be taught by teachers who can say, ‘I was there and I know you need to be able to do this to be a hired and to succeed.’ The EDC can point out the cooperation between the business community and the education system as well as the increasing quality of employable graduates.

The Harlingen Area Chamber of Commerce recruited the participating businesses: Burton Companies, Cardone Industries, Country Inn & Suites, Dish Network, Gulf Aviation, TSTC, United Launch Alliance, and Valley Baptist. Tech Prep staff and the ALA Coordinator matched the eduators’ fields and experience with the businesses.

The matches appear to have worked well. Both teachers and their summer employers were excited and enthusiastic about the intern program.

“This is a wonderful opportunity to have a real world experience so I can help my kids,” Harlingen High School counselor Melissa Kilgore said. She welcomed the opportunity to get out of her comfort zone, and in her first week working at Country Inn & Suites, she learned the right way to make beds, clean a room, and manage the front desk. “You define your objective and how you are going to accomplish it. There is an art and process to cleaning a room that is overlooked (by an outsider),” she said, proud that Housekeeper Alicia Ballesteros taught her how to clean a room in 30 minutes. Kilgore had wanted to start at the bottom and work her way through various positions to see how different parts of the hotel meshed into a cohesive unit.

Organizational, communication and problem-solving skills are among the issues Kilgore will focus on in the PowerPoint presentation she will create for students.

“Our industry is all about customer service,” said Country Inn & Suites manager Tony Silvestro. He hopes Kilgore’s experiences and observations will lead to applicants' being more prepared for entry-level jobs. Kilgore herself is interested in reviving the hospitality cluster in the career and technology program.

After one week with Burton Industries, Monica Ortiz, Harlingen High School BCIS (business computer information skills) teacher, was bubbling with lesson plans as a result of her internship. Her first-week duties included morning sales audits and cash analyses, assembling hydraulic hoses, sprucing up the store, doing deliveries to places she didn’t know existed, filing and talking one-on-one with her immediate boss Jessie Zuniga and Burton CEO Richard Vaughan. (Vaughan chairs the Tech Prep board of directors.)

Come the fall, her students will be using Excel to chart accurate hydraulic hose measurements, quotes on tire purchases, and to figure how much a company grosses and nets per day and per salesman. They might develop a standard Collection letter in Word and improve other communication and organizational skills.

“I really need to implement some of her good ideas. She’s been very helpful and trying to help the company do better. This is a win-win-win situation,”said Zuniga

The ALA lessons plans and presentations must be approved by the employers who expect to see real-world issues tackled in the classroom.

Brownsville Physics Teacher Studies Economic Development
Friday, July 3, 2009

Brownsville physics teacher Ulrich Weisse became an ALA (Academic Leadership Alliance) intern with the Brownsville Economic Development Corp. in June. The internship is a Tech Prep collaboration with the Brownsville Chamber and the Brownsville Business and Education Coalition (BBEC) that helps teachers and counselors understand what skills local businesses require in their employees. The educators are expected to present that information in structured lessons to their students.

Asked to research and compare border MSAs, (Metropolitan Statistical Areas), Weisse soon realized the lesson plans he could develop from that and other experiences during his immersion in the business world.

“Students should know how to work in Excel and how to make a graph,” Weisse said. As an ALA intern, he created graphs comparing MSAs’ employment, income, and population. That visual put differences between the cities in perspective. He has created lessons introducing students to Excel and linear regression analysis.

“Communications skills are everything,” Weisse discovered in the workplace. He plans to have each of his students make oral presentations of information they derived from articles on energy resources. “That is a difficult thing to do, for a student,” but necessary for workplace success.

The Rivera High School teacher traveled with BEDC consultants to regional manufacturers. “I was fortunate to be able to talk informally with community leaders, CEOs, the port director, and maquiladora managers. I had first-hand experience on how decisions are made,” Weisse said. He was surprised by the high levels of technology and productivity of the plants. The teacher thought the border had a reputation for cheap labor, but what he observed was anything but. Robotics, extensive automation and computerization indicated that advanced skills are required for employment.

During his internship, Weisse created brochures for the BEDC to present to prospects, businesses that are considering a Brownsville location. He also learned that people from elsewhere view the Valley as a whole, not separate cities. Now Weiss himself understands that perspective and has gained a new view of business and employment opportunities that he will present to his students.

The BBEC-ALA internship is a collaborative that the Brownsville Chamber and Tech Prep brought to Brownsville in 2008. ALA originated through a collaborative created by the McAllen Economic Development Corporation in collaboration with the Region One Education Service Center and Tech Prep of the Rio Grande Valley.

ATC Training to Be Held September 16
Wednesday, June 24, 2009

Tech Prep of the Rio Grande Valley will be hosting an Advanced Technical Credit (ATC) Training on September 16, 2009, at Texas State Technical College Harlingen. Part I of the ATC training will not be provided, but is available on the ATC Program website (www.atctexas.org) and should be completed prior to attending the local training. Proof of completion of Part I training online will be required as part of the documentation for the September 16 session.

This training is only for new teachers and teachers who will be teaching a new course. All teachers must meet the ATC teacher requirements which are posted on the ATC Program website.

The following courses will be provided at the training:
• Heating, Ventilation, Air-Conditioning and Refrigeration II
• Media Technology I
• Business Management
• Business Ownership
• Administrative Procedures
• Accounting I
• Accounting II
• Medical Terminology
• Introduction to Health Science Technology
• Health Science Technology I
• Health Science Technology II
• Culinary Arts I
• PL/Food Production, Management, and Services I
• Business Computer Information Systems I
• Business Computer Information Systems II
• Telecommunications and Networking
• Computer Applications
• Introduction to Computer Maintenance
• Computer Maintenance Technician I
• Computer Cabling and Design
• Networking Essentials Non-Cisco Curriculum
• Fundamentals of the Internet
• Machine Shop I
• Welding II
• Principles of Marketing
• Marketing Management
• Marketing Dynamics
• Architectural Graphics
• Engineering and Architectural Drafting
• Engineering Graphics
• PLTW pre-engineering program: Intro to Engineering Design
• Technical Introduction to Computer-Aided Drafting
• Engineering Computer-Aided Drafting I
• Automotive Technician II Non-NATEF Curriculum
• Automotive Tech II NATEF Curriculum-Suspension and Steering
• Automotive Technician II NATEF Curriculum-Brakes

The September 16 session is the only ATC training session that Tech Prep of the Rio Grande Valley will offer this year. Teachers whose course(s) is/are not listed above should make plans to participate in an alternative training. A list of the TEA conferences at which ATC training will be provided can be found at http://atctexas.org/calendar.asp

The deadline to complete both Part I and Part II training to be ATC-approved for the 2009-2010 school year is September 18, 2009.

Please check our Downloads section after July 1 for a registration form.

Harlingen Teachers Participate in ALA for the First Time
Tuesday, June 9, 2009

The Valley’s business community shares a common complaint: high school graduates are not ready for the workplace. To help resolve that problem, this summer eight Harlingen businesses are participating in a program that can improve the skills of students coming out of Harlingen schools for years to come.

Through a partnership of Tech Prep of the RGV and the Harlingen Economic Development Corp eight Harlingen high school teachers will intern with those employers—Gulf Aviation, Valley Baptist Health System, Dish Network, Cardone Industries, Country Inn & Suites, TSTC and Burton Industries.

In the Academic Leadership Alliance (ALA) program, the teachers work in the businesses, gaining firsthand knowledge of what skills are essential to join and succeed in today’s workforce. The teachers must create two lesson plans that incorporate and transmit that knowledge to their students.

While ALA has been placing teacher-interns in Valley workplaces since 2003, Harlingen is participating for the first time thanks to financial support from the Harlingen EDC.

“This project is making the biggest difference in how teachers teach and look at the world,” said Dr. Gloria Crum, ALA coordinator. The interns tell her that they start teaching differently after the intern experience. The teachers gain personal experience of the writing, math, computer, communication, and science skills that employers expect from new hires.

This summer 65 teachers and counselors from eight Valley school districts have been matched with business such as television stations and manufacturers. The ALA program strengthens the educator-employer connection, supplying names and experiences the teachers can refer to.

“Whatever we have our employees doing, we have the teachers doing the same. They go with MEDC staff people during recruitment and business expansion and retention calls,” said Joyce Dean, vice president of the McAllen Economic Development Corp. “We know these interns are going to take this experience back to school and use it in their lesson plans. From this, we’re going to see a workforce that has what is needed to go on to technical training and college.”

The teachers, who must have their workplace-related lesson plans approved by their summer employers, are required to teach the first lesson by October. Interns from previous years have created brochures, expanded computer skills, and prepared news reports for their employers. The workplace immersion, they said, allowed them to point out the relevance of their subject matter to students. It also gives them real life problems to present to students such as creation of a diabetic diet plan, analyzing port statistics, and determining placement of boxes on a shipping pallet.

Richard Vaughan, CEO of Burton Companies and Tech Prep Board Chair said ALA helps to teachers zero in on what is important. “The ALA program helps teachers prepare students for life in the real world.”

Tech Prep RGV Singled Out as Role Model
Sunday, May 24, 2009

Tech Prep of the RGV is a great role model for Texas Career and Technology Education programs, according to Jim Windham, chairman of the Texas Institute for Education Reform. “We’re very impressed with the way education-to-career plans and programs are done in the Valley. We really need to replicate this.”

TIER, which promotes revising Texas education policy to improve outcomes, wants every high school graduate–whether going to college or not-- to be fully prepared for higher education and the 21st century workplace. That can be achieved, Windham said, through accepting multiple educational pathways taught with equal rigor. Students must be held to the same academic standard whatever their career goals.

TIER advocates that all CT curriculum must follow meaningful pathways that lead to a target beyond high school. While the individual’s target can be an industry certification, a commercial license, or pursuing a college degree, TIER advocates that each graduate be primed and positioned to absorb further training and education.

Tech Prep of the RGV brings together the three elements that define TIER’s ideal standard, Windham explained. First, its CT programs are held to the same high standards as academic courses. Second, the courses are part of pathways leading to definite career goals. Third, Tech Prep has the hands-on support of community leaders and business people who are concerned about a skilled, vital workforce.

Texas has led the nation in education standards and accountability in years past, Windham said. “Much of what we have done has been to raise the minium threshold level. The greatest progress has been in elementary schools. But we haven’t raised the bar to get kids ready for post-secondary success.”

High schools are graduating about two-thirds of their students, but only 50 percent of those are ready for their next stage. Those young adults require remedial education to bring them up to a standard competence . “That’s why TIER was founded: to take (high school) standards and accountability to the next level which is proficiency.”

The current challenge that TIER has taken on is to get policies in place that open more pathways like Tech Prep’s CTE, simultaneously improving the curriculum and the graduates’ expectations.

“Not every kid is going to go to college. But for those who do not, don’t you agree that their pathway should be of equal rigor” so they are well-prepared for their future? Windham asked. It’s a disservice to the student and the community if every high school graduate is not held to a rigorous standard that prepares them for the technologically-driven economy.