Each year, graduates from Cascadia College and Lake Washington Institute of Technology land well-paying jobs or transfer to universities.
As two of the state’s 34 community and technical colleges, these colleges offer tuition savings and real-world training in northeast King County. Yet community and technical colleges receive the lowest level of state funding per full-time student in Washington.
Collectively, the state’s colleges are operating at 2007 funding levels. This is damaging to our students, our state economy, and our businesses that so desperately need qualified employees.
To meet the future needs of our students and communities, two-year colleges need an additional investment from the Washington Legislature.
Consider this: Of the 740,000 job openings in the next five years, more than half will require a college certificate or degree. Employers, meanwhile, are having a hard time finding skilled employees at the mid-level of education — more than a high school diploma, but less than a bachelor’s degree. Community and technical colleges meet both needs and industry demand.
A great example are the over 100 degrees offered by LWTech and Cascadia that lead directly to employment in fields like computer science, environmental sustainability, and health care.
Together, these two colleges, and the other community and technical colleges in our state, are poised to narrow a skills-gap in the aerospace industry, computer programming and other fields. We train computer science employees, welders, electricians, engineering technicians, commercial drivers, bookkeepers and nurses to meet industry needs.
We also help people who already have jobs stay up-to- date in their fields. In today’s typical manufacturing plant, for example, employees tend to work on a pristine shop floor surrounded by computers and robotic equipment. Where workers once used manual machines, today they use computerized equipment. Instead of pulling levers and pushing buttons, employees run machines from a screen. Current employees need to refresh and update their skills as much as college students need to learn them.
That’s why the community and technical college system is asking the Legislature for a 14 percent increase, $200 million, to its operating budget for all 34 colleges. The investment would help produce the diverse talent pool needed to fill thousands of jobs and grow Washington’s economy. These investments would ripple throughout King County’s economy. And, without these funds, these two local resources will not be able to as effectively serve our community, our students, and our local businesses.
Equally important, our colleges need to keep buildings and training facilities up-to- date.
Today’s budget for maintenance and construction projects at community and technical colleges is 48 percent lower than the recession-era budget.
The community and technical college system is also asking the Legislature to reinvest in capital construction projects so students learn in modern, well-maintained buildings.
The 25 projects on the request are listed in priority order. One of these projects is a classroom and lab building at Cascadia.
Investments like these pay off many times over for Washington State. A new economic impact study shows that Washington’s community and technical colleges — including current and former students — add $20.5 billion to the state’s economy each year.
The single most important factor in job creation in Washington is the quality of our workforce, and nobody else trains the workforce like community and technical colleges.
Additional investments by the Legislature would be money well spent.
Eric Murray is president of Cascadia College. Amy Morrison-Goings is president of Lake Washington Institute of Technology.
