Central Maine Morning Sentinel, April 13, 2000

Technical college capacity merits further expansion

Editorial

In the last legislative session, Rep. Charles Mitchell, D-Vassalboro, sponsored a bill that led to expanding the enrollment capacity in the state's technical college system by nearly 10 percent.

Mitchell's bill was aimed at addressing a contention that businesses and education leaders had been making for several years.

Specifically, it is difficult – if not impossible – to persuade companies to expand or relocate in Maine if the people needed to work the resulting jobs either are not available or, if available, do not possess adequate training.

Knowing that the technical colleges have better than 90 percent placement rates for their graduates, and that more than 90 percent of those placements are for jobs in Maine, it took little persuasion to sell the need to increase the system's capacity to handle more students. Voters approved a bond issue in November intended to do just that.

This legislative session, the responsibility is shifting a little. Senate President Mark Lawrence is seeking to add at least 250 more students to Mitchell's initial goal and to put the Legislature and administration on track to continue growing the technical colleges to meet present and projected needs of employers and to stay current with the skills those employers are most likely to value.

If additional incentive is needed , policy makers need only consider that the incomes of technical college graduates are already 25 percent higher than that of students whose formal education ends with the receipt of a high-school diploma.

Faced with a gap of approximately 2,000 available in-state jobs that need better-educated workers, the Legislature would do well to keep the momentum going with the technical colleges.