Ensuring a future better than the past
Alabama Community College System’s Director of Adult Education Nick Moore had some interesting comments for the 90 students who completed requirements for citizenship, GEDs or their High School Diploma Option last week at Northwest Shoals Community College.
Moore urged each of those 90 individuals not to make the mistake of comparing themselves, their timelines or their accomplishments to others whose educational pursuits followed different paths.
“You are not behind, you are right on time,” Moore said to the group of graduates. “Earning an adult education diploma is not just about passing an exam, it’s about making a decision that your future will be bigger than your past.”
Moore’s comments nailed the importance of NWSCC’s Adult Education Graduation ceremony for every person who put forth the initiative required to seek a better life for themselves and their families.
Individuals like Laprasia Smith, who refused to miss a class assignment despite having to juggle the daily challenges of raising five children while working fulltime.
“Completing my education through adult education has been one of the most rewarding accomplishments of my life,” Smith said after getting her high school diploma. “I wanted to build a better future not only for myself but also to show my children that it’s never too late to pursue your dreams.” Making it possible for those adults to pursue their dreams is the very heart of Alabama’s adult education program. And Moore is excited about a new strategy of the state’s community college system that aims to more closely align adult education, workforce development and employer engagement. Moore in a presentation just a week before NWSCC’s graduation ceremony called the plan “Alabama’s Workforce Academy.”
As the state’s employers continue to struggle to fill jobs, Moore emphasized the challenge is no longer high unemployment. Instead, the emphasis shifts to labor force participation.
“We’re at nearly full employment. We’ve got a very strong economy,” he said. Now, the state needs to concentrate on pulling “people off the sidelines,” or those individuals who are not actively involved in the labor pool.
The state’s community colleges, like Northwest Shoals, are the state’s primary providers of workforce training. But Moore noted in his presentation that while helping adults earn a GED or other workplace credentials will continue to be important, the system must do more to ensure students are connected to employment while still in training.
“We’re not just train and pray, we’re going to truly connect them to an employment opportunity while they’re in training,” Moore said. “We’ve got a good foundation to build from, but there’s always more to do.”
