Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, February 15, 1992 TAG: 9202150090
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER
DATELINE: WYTHEVILLE LENGTH: Medium
STATE OFFICIAL ENCOURAGES SCHOOL-BUSINESS LINKS
The state superintendent of public instruction said Friday that educators and business people are natural allies but, unfortunately, do not speak the same language."Sometimes I think we talk to one another, but we don't hear one another," Joseph Spagnolo told a 9th District Business-Education Partnerships Conference.
The problem is business people and teachers do not know enough about each other, he said, but they must get acquainted.
He echoed what Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Abingdon, who co-sponsored the conference with Forward Southwest Virginia, had said earlier in the day: Businesses need workers prepared to handle increasingly sophisticated jobs, and education needs businesses for help turning out those workers.
Forward Southwest Virginia is an outgrowth of the Lacy Commission, which made a two-year study of the regional needs several years ago. It listed education as the top priority.
A common comment from businesses, Spagnolo said, is, "We can teach them how to weld, but we can't teach them to read, write and how to solve problems."
However, an increasing number of school divisions are getting together with businesses. Spagnolo said 85 percent of the state's school divisions have partnerships of some kind.
The more than 300 people at the conference heard or read reports from some of them.
Giles County School Superintendent Robert McCracken said a Hoechst-Celanese representative had approached him shortly after he came to Giles about having the company take part in the adopt-a-school program. That has grown to an educational foundation with participation from all kinds of businesses, he said, and with a full-time director.
"For a school division our size, that's a pretty big deal," McCracken said.
Montgomery County Superintendent Harold Dodge said his system's approach to business had not been to seek money but to form a committee representing business, teachers and administrators to survey school needs. Brainstorming sessions followed to establish goals and activities, he said.
One example of an exchange has been Poly-Scientific Corp. and the school system.
"We teach adult basic education at their facility, at their request," Dodge said, while it provides up-to-date training for vocational teachers.
Butch Irvine, Central Fidelity Bank senior vice president in Montgomery, said the bank had adopted Christiansburg Primary School. Bank employees read to children and donate the books to school libraries, enter into recycling projects to raise money for school projects, and have the children in the bank to decorate for holidays or do artwork.
There are a variety of ways of achieving business-educational partnerships, he said, but "it has to come from the top down."
Pulaski County is developing its partnership program. It has organized a council of 36 business people to look at school needs covering the next two years.
The need being considered for the first two years is how to improve science and math education.
The school system will offer business partners use of its facilities, joint leadership institutes, flexibly scheduled GED programs for workers, and help in setting up new computer systems and software.
Businesses will offer student mentorships as well as volunteers for assisted reading and other needs.
Floyd County schools are working with Hollingsworth & Vose Co. and Crenshaw Lighting on an apprenticeship.
The county Chamber of Commerce has started an effort to create school-business partnerships.