Executive Director & CEO's Message
March 2020
NCATC Friends and Colleagues,
Most of the world has been affected by the unprecedented COVID-19 pandemic. Community & Technical Colleges are in a unique position and face unique challenges as resource providers to their local communities and providers of high-quality higher education, workforce development programs and work-based learning apprentices for our students and workers.
We are proud to announce the formation of the CTE Coalition of world-class industry partners and CTE organizations. NCATC long-time Strategic Partners – NC3, Tooling U-SME, Haas CNC, Lincoln Electric, Festo and others have partnered to provide the resources necessary to keep your ATC and CTE programs moving forward in these unprecedented times with many schools temporarily closed to students. As you review the remote learning resources offered at the CTE Coalition’s website, we recognize that this is an evolving challenge for schools and instructors. Please check the NCATC, NC3, and CTE Coalition websites periodically for additional guidance and resources that will continue to evolve in coming days, weeks, and months ahead.
Finding the workforce with the right skills and knowledge is a challenge that businesses in America face every day. As technology progresses ever faster the workforce challenge will continue to grow with it. And, the human professionals in design, technician and engineering roles in organizations will see changes to their job duties, will be challenged to acquire new skills and flexibility, and learn new ways of collaborating with machines and technology.
NCATC will continue to expand, explore, and exploit all of the important, emerging technology trends in advanced technology related and industry-driven workforce development needs for the 21st century together with all of our education, workforce and strategic industry partners and members.
We are committed to minimizing the spread of COVID-19 while maintaining quality membership value and benefits. We appreciate your ongoing connections, memberships and partnerships with NCATC during this difficult time in our Nation’s history.
While the 2020 NCATC Summer Workshop hosted by Gateway Technical College (GTC) in Racine, WI – originally scheduled for June 10-13, 2020 has been postponed until mid-2021due to the threats of COVID-19 – we will be offering several virtual Future of Work and Industry 4.0 related sessions in the coming weeks and months for all NCATC members.
And, please don’t forget to save the date for the 2020 NCATC Fall Conferencehosted by Metropolitan Community College (MCC) in Omaha, NE – September 29 – October 02, 2020.
As always, we encourage you to stay regularly connected, via the regularly updated NCATC website, social media (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, etc.), and quarterly e-newsletters like this one.
J. Craig McAtee, NCATC Executive Director & CEO
