Education
Quality education is essential to a skilled and competitive workforce. Access to education, coupled with reliable, quality childcare is key for improving economic opportunities for all Americans.
Our education system is failing many students as shown by data that reveals two-thirds of our fourth and eighth graders are unable to read or do math at their grade level. And the United States ranks below a number of other countries in reading and math proficiency. Recognizing the importance of childcare as a key component of the education system is crucial to addressing the current challenges and ensuring that every child has the support they need to thrive.
- 6th in ReadingGlobal Ranking for U.S. Students
- 10th in ScienceGlobal Ranking for U.S. Students
- 26th in MathGlobal Ranking for U.S. Students
Introducing Commerce Meets Classroom, a new series from our K-12 education Senior Manager, Kyle Butler, featuring the business perspective on pressing education issues.
Stories of Education and Workforce in Action
Across our nation’s talent pipeline, we explore the stories of employers investing in the workforce of today and tomorrow to close the skills gap.
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Programs and Initiatives
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In both prosperous and challenging times, there is an ongoing gap that stands in the way of opportunity for many. Maybe we need to stop calling it the skills gap, or we need to collectively redefine what the gap is. No matter what we call it, we can all agree that the time for solving it is now.
Although many businesses recognize the economic and human development impacts of investment in early childhood education, there are many that don’t. And those that have chosen to take action can find it difficult to navigate their options and choose a path forward with confidence. The truth is that there are multiple options and you can let your workforce help you narrow down the choices.
To close the opportunity divide, cities like Boston are looking to strategic partnerships between employers and workforce and talent development programs to connect underserved youth with the work-based learning experiences that exist in their own community and help equip them with the skills and real-world experience they need to succeed in them.
Keeping up with the pace of change in today’s economy is getting harder and harder to do. So instead of trying desperately to keep up, we’re helping change the face of the landscape in which we work entirely. We are partnering with the Chamber Foundation to build demand-driven talent supply chains and design the future of real-time labor market data.
Is the U.S. workforce ready for the 4th industrial revolution? Experts predict this workforce movement will create game-changing technologies in automation, computer science, advanced robotics, drones, and others that will rapidly change how we live and work. This coming revolution will create STEM jobs that don’t yet exist and new challenges for STEM education.
It has been one month since participants were announced for the U.S. Chamber Foundation Career Readiness Lab and the Tempe Chamber of Commerce has been moving quickly to respond to the call for innovative, Chamber of Commerce-led programming to better connect classroom to career. This summer, the Tempe Chamber of Commerce will launch Career Ready Tempe, a youth workforce pilot program intended to tackle barriers to employability for income-eligible youth and help employers create a robust youth talent pipeline.
Anyone who thinks this is an easy time for someone to navigate early adulthood is sorely mistaken. Young people face an unclear future. In the coming years AI systems will destroy and create entire industries and an end to scarcity will erode the basic working model. Is this cause for major concern?
As President Donald Trump moves forward with his pledge to rebuild America’s infrastructure, we’re going to need more workers. And as the nation looks to rebuild the American middle class, we’re going to need more people who are workforce-ready to support it. But we find ourselves in a difficult holding pattern.
Now more than ever, the success of American business and the effectiveness of our education systems are inextricably linked. Business leaders must be even more engaged in ensuring that our education and workforce systems are preparing learners beginning at an early age for the increasing demands of the globally competitive 21st century knowledge economy.
