Business partnerships with community colleges help funnel workers into better jobs

Photo caption: Before the pandemic, Boeing offered jobs to about 87 percent of the Mesa Community College boot camp graduates who applied. Since March 2020, the company has halted hiring indefinitely for full-time jobs, but is hiring some students as contractors. Credit: Brandon Sullivan for The Hechinger Report. Article by Olivia Sanchez. The Hechinger Report – July 2, 2021.

When Roma Ouk moved from Southern California to Scottsdale, Arizona, to get a fresh start, he decided to go back to school. The first thing he had to do was scrape together $270 and fill out an eight-question assessment online.

When he passed with a perfect score, he got into a three-credit boot camp at Mesa Community College run in partnership with Boeing, the aerospace giant.

The nine-day, 36-hour course,taught by Boeing employees, teaches students how to assemble, modify, repair and test the cables and other equipment that create the “central nervous system” of Boeing’s airplanes, helicopters and drones.

Ouk, 33, emerged with an industry-recognized credential known as acable and wire harness assembly certification and an earning potential about 15 percent above what he was making as nurse’s assistant in his hometown of Long Beach, California. […]

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