Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont launched his workforce council on Thursday. It’s a public private partnership with a number of CEOs, state government officials and educators. Their task is to recommend a strategy that would improve education and skills training in the state.
“The workplace is changing a lot faster than education, and that’s what we are trying to do here today, to make sure our education institutions are aligned with what our major employers and our smaller employers need going forward.”
Lamont says that to be competitive, the Connecticut economy needs 70% of workers to have some kind of post-secondary education by 2025.
“We have thousands and thousands of advanced manufacturing jobs we are not filling right now. And one of the things that we are trying to do is make sure that our manufacturers are aligned with our colleges, aligned with our community colleges, aligned with our technical high schools, and we are training the people for the jobs that are going to be out there.”
About 55% of the state’s current workforce have a post-secondary education.
Lamont says closing the skills and credentials gap is a critical component to growing the state’s economy.