On June 5, 2008, Prima Civitas Foundation President and CEO, David Hollister, gave testimony before the New Economy and Quality of Life Committee of the State of Michigan House of Representatives on the initiatives and activities that PCF and the Mid-Michigan Innovation Team (MMIT) accomplished through the WIRED grant. This testimony included a history of PCF, the MMIT Initiative, MMIT Subcontractor Partners, and additional PCF Region Building Activities.
Recap of April 21st Conference: Moving Ideas to Market
The MMIT and PCF, in conjunction with its partners, Michigan State University, Corporation for a Skilled Workforce and the Michigan Entrepreneurship Education Network, hosted a conference entitled “Moving Ideas to Market, Engaging Education in the Global Marketplace”, at the Henry Center for Executive Development in Lansing on April 21st. Funding for this event was made possible through the C.S. Mott Foundation.
The goal of the conference was to enhance regional prosperity and development by stimulating more entrepreneurial activity, institutional collaboration and leveraging, and commercialization tied to our robust education assets. This event was part of an overall commercialization initiative, meant to create an entrepreneurial culture that fosters innovation, encourages collaboration and facilitates all aspects of commercialization.
Leaders from K-12, community colleges, Universities, and other stakeholders within the entrepreneurship and commercialization process from our 13 county region came together to begin the process of creating a regional strategic plan for the development of this network with the goal of becoming one of the most commercialization friendly regions in the United States. Currently this process / system is fragmented and not particularly user friendly. We intend to create a networked system, characterized by transparency, connectivity, and responsiveness to entrepreneurs’ changing needs.
The conference was attended by 100 stakeholders and included presentations from national and regional presenters on exemplary regional entrepreneurship and commercialization collaborations.
The comments from participants of the conference were very positive. According to participants, the day provided enthusiastic networking opportunities and garnered valuable suggestions for next steps in this network development process. A large number of the participants agreed to participate in ongoing action groups to develop a strategic plan for “Moving Ideas to Market and Engaging Education in the Global Marketplace”.
June 2008
Careers After Cars : Learning the Skills of Tomorrow
Steve Carmody (sgcarmod@umich.edu)
ANN ARBOR (2008-05-27)
Michigan's children will need new skills for the changing jobs in the state's future.
A program in Lansing aims to teach these skills to children in elementary school.
Its been 6 years since students last walked the halls of Lansing's Holmes Street school. However, the old building will soon become a center of learning once again.
Kirk Riley is shooting hoops in the school's old gymnasium. He's the executive director of the I-Tec project. I-Tec stands for 'Information Technology Empowerment Center.'
"The next sound we hope to have heard in this gymnasium is the sound of students working together, in this particular room, learning digital media," says Riley.
The I-Tec project will eventually convert the old school building into a high tech learning hub for Lansing's school children. Organizers hope 3 thousand Lansing school children a year will get training through I-Tec. The center will have computer labs and classes on the first floor, and an operating I-T company upstairs. It's goal is to get more children into careers in the computer field.
Andy Kotarba is the president and CEO of Dewpoint. The Lansing-based company provides tech support for businesses in several states, including Michigan. Business is good. But, there's one problem. He can't find local people with the computer skills his company needs.
"The talent pool is a bit light. And as we go out and look for the type of skills we need they're not easy to locate, number one. Number two, not usually do we find them in Michigan. And number three a lot of times we got to go into the overseas market," says Kotarba.
Lansing I-T company officials say Michigan needs to start building a computer literate workforce that wants to stay and grow the industry here. To do that, they say the entire community must be involved in developing tech skills among the young. I-Tec has support from Lansing city leaders, school district officials, Michigan State University researchers and local I-T companies.
Teresa Vandersloot is I-Tec's board president. She admits each of I-Tec's stakeholders bring unique, seemingly conflicting interests to the table.
"There has to be vested interests. Everyone must have a role. At this point everyone does have a role, whether its working with the mayor's office to the various I-T companies who make us aware of what's going on, to the I-T council, to the faculty who continue to write grants. Everyone has had a specific role," says Vandersloot.
I-Tec is not only helping save the Holmes Street school, but also the neighborhood around it. Adam Pitcher is the president of the Holmes Street Neighborhood association. He says the neighborhood is made up of poor families. He says I-Tec is offering children from the neighborhood a chance to redirect their future. Pitcher says the key to that is developing their math and science skills.
"We're starting with middle school initially. That's where the research shows their math is good up til that point then it starts declining. Math is needed in a lot of the sciences. We found that, when you finish high school and you don't have a strong math and you're 're afraid of science, you'll never go into an engineering field," says Pitcher.
The only problem now is money. When I-Tec was announced in January with much fanfare, the plan was to open this summer. Now, that timetable has slipped to this fall. That's partly because of the pace of renovating the building. However, they still have to raise nearly 400 thousand dollars.
Still, those behind I-Tec remain hopeful they will raise the money and open their doors to Lansing school children this fall.
February 14, 2008
Leaders from MSU, Lansing and the corporate world have announced a new high-tech learning center for youth – a public-private partnership spearheaded by employees in MSU’s Department of Computer Science and Engineering.
The Information Technology Empowerment Center, or ITEC, will open in summer 2008 and offer low-cost programs such as math, science, engineering and digital media. The nonprofit center, located in the former Holmes Street School on Lansing’s east side, also will provide access to computers and high-speed Internet in a low-income area where many families do not own computers.
Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero trumpeted the initiative at a Jan. 28 news conference. “This unique partnership will create incredible educational opportunities for our children and spark new job creation in a fast-growing sector of our economy,” he said.The Prima Civitas Foundation played a key role in the development and organization of ITEC.
For more information about ITEC's ground breaking, see "MSU spearheads ITEC, a new high-tech learning center," and view the ITEC press conference.
January 21, 2008
PCF has received 14 proposals in response to the RFP it sent out in early December. The proposals are vying for grant opportunities to develop and sponsor Entrepreneur and Investor days. The proposals are being considered by a panel at PCF, with the winners to be announced soon.
January 2, 2008
PCF and the Mid-Michigan Innovative Team are happy to announce that Cassie Alley has joined the team as the new Learning Communities Coordinator.
