Giving kids skills to succeed
Learning a trade or skill can be the gateway to a fruitful career for many young people and we should encourage growth and development at our vocational schools to make it happen.
In Boston, in particular, young people should have the opportunity to attend a preeminent institution, given our city’s richness in education and innovation. Madison Park Technical Vocational High School in Roxbury is the natural setting for such opportunity but it has been beset by challenges over the years.
As the Herald’s Kathleen McKiernan reports, a Boston City Council committee is taking the lead in trying to help Madison Park reach its potential. “Through good vocational-technical education, we’re creating the workforce of tomorrow,” Councilor Annissa Essaibi George told the Herald. “It better prepares kids for additional education. It is the most direct way we can connect kids in Boston to economic opportunity in the city.”
Essaibi George, along with councilors Kim Janey and Michelle Wu, held a public forum at the school last night to discuss the issue. Madison Park has been plagued by low test scores, a high dropout rate, leadership turnover, the absence of any mission and limited opportunities for staff collaboration.
“We just have a whole lot of work to do when it comes to supporting what’s happening there,” Essaibi George told Herald Radio yesterday. “It really needs to be the premiere facility for school-to-career, to workforce development, for training our young people to really take advantage of the economic opportunity in the city of Boston.”
Essaibi George said the school could always use more money but emphasized that partnerships with businesses and other organizations are indispensable. “The partnerships can create some of that money because they want a trained workforce … they create those employment opportunities,” she said.
Essaibi George, Janey and Wu have been visiting other vocational schools such as Worcester Technical High School and the Minuteman Career and Technical High School in Lexington to find out how those schools create cohesion between the classroom and industry.
“We have a facility that could be state of the art. We have industry in the city. We have employment. We need the kids to have access to those opportunities. Madison can do that for us,” Essaibi George said.
Madison Park Technical Vocational High School is a worthy cause and at its peak potential will provide an on-ramp to rewarding careers in ever-changing industries. Fundamental computer science and engineering knowledge will be ever more crucial as we evolve into a high-tech economy.
The traditional trades will always be hotbeds of employment as we’re not at all close to moving away from running water and electricity.
The elected leaders of the city of Boston should bolster their efforts in transforming Madison Park by bringing every single tech powerhouse making its home here into the fold. There are great partnerships that we already have but greater ones just around the corner.