The Mid-Pacific Information and Communications Technology Center (M-PICT) builds upon a previous project that educated technicians to work on optical and networks systems. Expanded and deeper collaborations with industry and global ICT providers enhance and improve educational efforts in 51 community colleges in Northern California to meet the growing needs for an ICT workforce by employers, equipment manufacturers and service providers in the region. Articulated and comprehensive ICT educational pathways are developed and implemented throughout the region. Successful practices in each college are identified, disseminated and implemented throughout the region to work toward a common set of ICT competencies, skills and educational approaches. A region-wide ICT Career Pathway - from high school to community college to four-year college - is developed and implemented. The outreach to the K-12 system emphasizes the standardization of terms and curriculum names to solve the problem of confusion among participants, particularly high school students and counselors. Strategies are developed to expand and diversify the region's ICT workforce.
MPICT has two key "stories" that demonstrate the intellectual merit and the broader impact of its activities in the last 5 years: Research and advocacy for ICT as a strategic sector in the region’s education and workforce development systems Filling the void in the region’s professional development for ICT faculty Research and advocacy of ICT as a strategic sector in the region’s workforce development systems When MPICT started 5 years ago, the "Information and Communication Technologies (ICT)" term was not in active use in the MPICT region, and IT related topics were buried in various department categories, receiving little or no strategic attention. In perhaps the most important accomplishment to date, the California Community College (CCC) system has now adopted the ICT term and is providing significant strategic and funding support for the sector. A recent reorganization in early 2013 of California State CTE funding includes a strategic focus of attention, effort and resources on things that have the biggest impact on employment and economic growth in the state. As part of that process, ICT was a named strategic sector and received the 2nd highest overall votes in California, behind Healthcare. So, ICT has gone from essentially no strategic attention in California when MPICT began to the 2nd most important strategic sector in the state. MPICT collaborated with the California Department of Education to refresh and revitalize CTE standards relevant to ICT. That pathway was renamed ICT, and the curriculum was revised. This is a positive move in the direction of harmonization and pathway creation in the ICT sector between K-12 and CCCs. MPICT’s ICT Foundational Competencies Employment Demand in California report, published March 2013, validated that employers from across all regions, industry sectors and business sizes in California resoundingly approved (at ±90%) the eight foundational IT workforce technical competencies of the DOL IT Competency Model: Fundamental IT User Skills, Principles of Information Technology; Databases & Applications; Networks, Telecom, Wireless & Mobility; Software Development and Management; User & Customer Support; Digital Media & Visualization; Compliance and Risk Management, Security, & Information Assurance. Independent of specialization, we now know in a very detailed way, much better than current advisory models have produced, what the foundational competency expectations for all IT workers are. MPICT continues to advocate that California employers and education and workforce development efforts reference the existing DOL IT Competency model, in order to create the foundation for a functional IT workforce development and IT workforce market in California. Filling the void in the region’s professional development for ICT faculty From the beginning of MPICT’s initial grant, California public education has been subject to continuous year-to-year budget cuts. As a result, professional development for community college faculty has become almost nonexistent. Coupled with rapid changes in technology, ICT faculty has very limited opportunities to stay current. Participant feedback on MPICT’s Summer Faculty Development Week (FDW) consistently expresses appreciation for gaining new, high quality knowledge and material needed to update curriculum and prepare students for current workforce demands. The FDWs provide 4.5 days of intensive instruction, preparing teachers to adopt new materials and keep up with changes in technologies. 305 unique individuals have attended so far, many of them for multiple events. For the second year, MPICT expanded this impact by offering a Southern California event in addition to the one in Northern California. Evaluation results in SoCal are also overwhelmingly favorable. Evaluations also tell us one of the most consistently valuable aspects of these events is the great opportunity to make connections and build relationships with faculty peers across institutions. Estimations of student impact from these events are difficult, but it is easy to provide rational justification of more than 42,000 students impacted. Evaluation results for the Winter ICT Educator Conference are also overwhelmingly positive. Again, the feedback was similar to the FDWs, with making connections on a broader scale, adding industry, employers, and educational institutions nationwide. Fifty-seven videos of presentations and interviews from the 2013 Winter Conference have been posted on MPICT’s YouTube channel. To date, the five Winter Conferences have been attended by 683 unique participants, and many have attended multiple events. 546 of those represent education. Faculty participants represent 240 different educational institutions across the country. It is easy to justify estimations of 75,000 students impacted through faculty who have physically attended.
