A Leg Up: Students aim to get career-ready following the pandemic’s hurdles

Heather Mosley | SBJ

Max Mosley-Young attends OTC's Middle College.

Don Harkey: Winning businesses will create great places to work, not blame the next generation.

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Three years ago, students were not meeting in school classrooms. Instead, their spring break continued while a global pandemic raged on, and they either stopped going to school altogether or experienced a new normal in a virtual classroom.

Now, studies are emerging showing the impact that this gap in traditional learning has had on students nationwide and what that means for the future labor market.

Nationally, math and reading skills decreased from 2019 for fourth graders and eighth graders. For example, 25% of fourth grade students were below basic math skills, a difference of six percentage points from 2019, according to the 2022 National Assessment of Educational Progress.

In Missouri, fourth and eighth grade students’ performance in reading and math slipped in 2022 compared to 2019, according to the NAEP. For example, 61% of eighth graders were performing at or above basic levels in math in 2022, nine percentage points lower than in 2019. Fourth graders saw a similar decrease, with 72% of students performing with basic or above math skills. Basic and above reading skills dropped seven percentage points for eighth graders and four percentage points for fourth graders.

“The results serve as another indicator that high-quality instruction matters,” said Missouri Education Commissioner Margie Vandeven in an October 2022 news release. “It’s clear that the pandemic had an impact on student learning and that there is work to do. We must use this information, alongside state and local metrics, to continue accelerating post-pandemic learning with improved systems and processes to meet the needs of each student.”

Springfield Public Schools has felt the weight of these scores, but Dana Hubbard, education director for Greater Ozarks Centers for Advanced Professional Studies, feels optimistic.

“Academics play a large part in student success,” Hubbard said, “but with GO CAPS, we are going to help students find a niche that they can connect with, so by the time they leave high school, they have a foothold on a career they want to go into.”

GO CAPS, established by SPS in 2015, is a profession-based learning curriculum for juniors and seniors in area school districts. The program, which has spots for 150 students each year, helps bridge the gap between academics and professional readiness for those interested in pursuing a career right out of high school, Hubbard said.

SPS, the largest school district in the state, has over 23,500 students in grades K-12. Currently, there is no plan to increase seat offerings for GO CAPS.

“It’s a chance to get out of the classroom and solve real-world problems in a real-world setting alongside industry professionals,” Hubbard said.

Currently, GO CAPS has curricula focused on medical/health care, engineering and manufacturing, and business and entrepreneurship. Students spend half of their school day focused on their area of interest, working directly with local businesses and hospitals.

“We are very connected with our chamber of commerce to build a talent pipeline for our community,” Hubbard said.

Hubbard knows that students have expectations of what a high-paying job with a dream-worthy lifestyle looks like and that they think they need to leave the area to obtain that.

“We are trying to get students and parents to see what opportunities exist in the area.”

Don Harkey, CEO of People Centric Consulting Group LLC, sees firsthand the need that area businesses have for staffing, particularly post-pandemic.

“Employers are incredibly short-handed and feeling the labor shortage and feeling it right now,” he said. “They need people to come in and hit the ground running and be ready to work.”

But because of the pandemic’s impact on students’ learning and grades, a recent study from Stanford University’s Hoover Education Success Initiative, written by Eric A. Hanushek, predicts it will have a negative economic impact on students’ lifelong salaries.

“Much of the discussion of the educational impact of the pandemic has been phrased in terms such as test score points or standard deviations that have little meaning to most people,” the study said. “Without action, not only will individuals in the COVID cohort of students suffer long-term income losses, but also the individual states will see shrunken economic activity.”

Using the NAEP report card, Hanushek concluded that looking abstractly at the data, individual students are “not necessarily worse off” but have simply achieved less than expectations set by the 2019 data. However, he noted in the United States, the labor markets value those with higher achievements and cognitive skills, and those without those will see a larger gap in earnings.

The study estimates that Missouri students will expect a 6% “loss in lifetime income from learning losses by state of schooling.” The calculations, though, are based on whether the NAEP data remains at its current level. He concluded that “if the schools are not made better, there will be continuing economic impacts as individuals and the nation will suffer.”

In addition to the NAEP data, districts statewide, including SPS, use annual performance reports to help monitor academic performance and continuous improvement effort. Using data collected from MAP testing, graduation rate improvement plans and surveys, SPS Superintendent Grenita Lathan said in a release the district received a total score of 73.7%, adding that in the continuous improvement portion, SPS scored 92.3%.

“SPS is committed to the well-being of each student by providing high-quality academic opportunities,” she said in the release, noting the progress reflected in the report comes from the implementation of multiple strategies, including using Galileo, a universal K-12 academics tool, increasing staff support in schools, expanding choice programs, and increasing support for college and career options.

“We are optimistic that the results monitored during the 2022-23 school year indicate that our students are growing academically with support from extraordinary educators and support staff,” Lathan said.

Higher education institutions also are investing in SPS and regional students. In addition to GO CAPS, Ozarks Technical Community College offers Middle College as a way for students to graduate high school with not only a jump on specific professional skills but also an associate degree, making them career-ready.

Max Mosley-Young, a junior in high school who holds one of the 175 seats in OTC’s Middle College, has his eyes set on a career in information technology. He was in eighth grade when the pandemic hit and began his freshman year completely online.

“My grades were standard for my expectations, but it was hard to get myself there,” Mosley-Young said. [Editor’s note: Mosley-Young is the son of a Springfield Business Journal employee.]

He said attending school completely online could get boring, and he had to learn to develop a process to be fully engaged. Now, he spends his full school week on OTC’s campus, doing a hybrid of high school and college-level courses. Aside from potential cost savings, he sees this as a jumpstart in a competitive field.

“I’m hoping to make it into a bigger industry, working my way to a big corporation like Apple,” Mosley-Young said. “I want to design software. Anything that can help a human feel more connected to their devices.”

Attending classes with students from multiple generations, he has learned the importance of good communication.

Harkey agreed, identifying the generational communication styles as a potential perceived gap.

“These kids are growing up not knowing what a noninternet world looks like,” he said. “Where a baby boomer might expect a face-to-face or phone call with someone, a new worker will expect to send a quick text message or handle it very differently.”

However, Harkey said an error for employers is to view those younger styles as “not wanting to work.”

“There’s nothing new about blaming the upcoming generation. We’re always blaming the kids for what they do. And vice versa,” he added.

To break the communication skills and gaps cycle, Harkey suggested that as businesses hire new employees, it’s crucial to create strong onboarding training reflective of the business’ policies and culture.

“Bring people in the right way. Spend the time to train them, and hold people accountable internally,” Harkey said, noting a potential worsening of the labor shortage as baby boomers retire over the next seven years, resulting in heightened competition for limited resources.

“The winners will be the ones that have the best places to work,” he said. “It’s not helpful to say this generation isn’t ready.”