UW-Parkside News: Grant to impact water, health-related careers

Grant to impact water, health-related careers

You could call the Workforce Innovation and Regional Economic Development (WIRED) grant recently received by the University of Wisconsin-Parkside a "seed." It's one of many seeds planted by the Regional Workforce Alliance and the Milwaukee 7 (M7) through the Southeastern Wisconsin Innovation Fund, made possible by the U.S. Dept. of Labor. This seed has the potential to have a major impact on the talent pool available to a pair of industries in which the region wants to excel: water and health care.

UW-Parkside Biological Sciences Professor Dr. Carmel Ruffolo, who is on assignment as the university's Special Assistant to the Provost for Articulation Agreements, has been working with the M7 Water Council, the region's technical and junior colleges and other four-year and graduate universities to educate what's called the "Water Generation."

"We wanted to bring together the two-year and four-year colleges and create what we would call 'seamless education,' a seamless transfer of credits," Dr. Ruffolo explained. "Plus, for students who are studying at a two-year college who want to go on to get a baccalaureate degree and, maybe, continue on to graduate school, we're working on these articulation agreements which would make that progression easier."

Ruffolo's Articulation Task Force (ATF) includes Gateway and Moraine Park technical colleges, Waukesha Co. and Milwaukee Area technical colleges, Illinois' College of Lake County, UW-Milwaukee, and UW-Whitewater. The task force also counts the Racine Health Dept. and the workforce development boards of Southeast Wisconsin and Waukesha, Ozaukee, Washington counties as members. ATF's ultimate goal is to create a talent pipeline for the water industry and for graduate schools like UW-Milwaukee's School of Freshwater Science.

The United Nations has designated Milwaukee as a "Water Technology City." Well over 100 companies in the M7 region, which includes Kenosha and Racine, earn part of their revenue from water and Milwaukee wants to be a World Water Hub. That will require a workforce knowledgeable in issues presented by the water industry.

Along with water, Dr. Ruffolo said there is strong interest in coordinating health care education.

"When we looked at health programs, many of the institutions involved were interested in how we can develop articulation agreements," Dr. Ruffolo stated.

As an example, she cites an agreement now under development between UW-Parkside and Gateway. It would link Gateway's associate degree for Physical Therapy Assistants with UW-Parkside's baccalaureate degree in Applied Health Science.

"One of our strengths is healthour pre-med program, the Applied Health Science program. Health is very important as are water and the environment."

UW-Parkside faculty members are working with the Racine Health Department's Dr. Julie Kinzelman to develop water/health related courses for Geosciences and Biological Sciences majors. These courses will provide hands-on internships allowing students to develop the skills needed to enter water and health-related fields.

For students, articulation agreements are advantageous because they reduce the amount of time it takes for degree completion, smooth the transfer of credits, reduce the number of credits that don't transfer between schools, and reduce the cost of education. For institutions, articulations create a steady flow of transfer students. At UW-Parkside, between 35 and 40 percent of graduates come to the university as transfer students, a number that is expected to increase as the university increases its collaboration with two-year schools.

For taxpayers, this increase in the number of talented people holding degrees that lead to careers does not come at an increased cost.

"There's no real cost in this. We're not employing extra people to do this," Dr. Ruffolo said. "We're putting together existing courses (for these articulation agreements), so the courses are already there."

There is some urgency to get these collaborations completed. Four new water-related articulation agreements covered by the grant need to be developed by the spring of 2010.

"We have seven months to do this," Dr. Ruffolo said.

If the agreements are finalized in time, they could start benefiting students by the start of classes in fall 2010.
For more information on how WIRED is growing talent innovation across the region, visit: http://www.milwaukee7-rwa.com/wiki on the web. More information on UW-Parkside's water and health care-related majors is available at www.uwp.edu keyword Biological Sciences or by calling 262-595-2266.

ABOUT THIS STORY:

Story Status: Archived
Publish date: 11/10/2009