The $1 Trillion Workforce Opportunity for Rural Education - Duwain Pinder, Partner at McKinsey & Company

Rural America is on the brink of an economic transformation. With more than $1 trillion in advanced manufacturing investments (and nearly two-thirds of that flowing into rural regions) this moment represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to revitalize local economies, strengthen school-industry partnerships, and empower students with career pathways in advanced manufacturing.

Matt Kirchner sits down with Duwain Pinder, Partner at McKinsey & Company and a leader of the McKinsey Institute for Economic Mobility to explore the institute’s new report: Manufacturing in rural America: A plan for K–12–industry partnerships

This conversation examines the gap between the career-connected learning students want access to, and the opportunities afforded them in rural districts. Matt and Duwain discuss how manufacturers and school districts can work together to close this gap and prepare the next generation for the influx of jobs coming to rural America.

Listen to learn:

• Why 63% of $1 trillion in new U.S. manufacturing investment happening within 15 miles of rural communities means for K-12 education
• How we solve the problem of 8 in 10 students wanting access to career-connected learning, but only 3 in 10 having it
• The $34 billion annual wage impact advanced manufacturing could create for rural Americans, and what must happen to realize it
• Why employers should think about school districts like they do about their suppliers
• What success could look like in 2035 if schools and industry build long-term, evidence-based partnerships that sustain economic mobility

3 Big Takeaways from this Episode:

1. Rural America is the new frontier for advanced manufacturing. McKinsey’s analysis found that 63 % of $1 trillion in announced U.S. manufacturing investments are being built within 15 miles of rural communities. Pinder explains that these projects will define America’s manufacturing future and bring high-quality jobs to places that have long been left behind.

2. The skills gap solution isn’t either-or...students need basic academic and technical skills. McKinsey’s research shows that foundational reading and math scores are eroding across the U.S., especially in rural communities, even as demand grows for advanced manufacturing talent. Duwain and Matt agree that employers shouldn’t accept this trade-off. Students must graduate ready to read, calculate, and communicate and understand robotics, PLCs, and other manufacturing tech, which requires schools and employers to work together on both fronts.

3. Using existing successful models (not always reinventing the wheel) will help rural K-12 accelerate and scale career-connected learning. Nearly 8 in 10 rural students want apprenticeships and hands-on learning, yet only 3 in 10 can access them, a gap that represents a massive opportunity. Evidence-based models like youth apprenticeships, dual-enrollment, and early-college high schools already exist. If districts embrace these, plus partner with employers and workforce associations, they can create career-connected learning more quickly.

Visit the show notes page for more

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Transcript

Matt Kirchner: 0:00

Welcome into the TechEd podcast. I am your host, Matt Kirkner, where this week, and every every week, we do the serious work of securing the American Dream for the next generation of STEM and workforce talent. And when we talk about that American dream, we mean all Americans. You know, I spent 30 years of my career, give or take in the world of manufacturing. I think a lot of times when we think of manufacturing plants, we think about those plants and facilities in or around big cities who can't think of a manufacturing company and then tie that specific company to the city in which they are headquartered, the city in which they manufacture products. The truth of the matter is, yes, manufacturing is alive and well in our big cities and in our urban areas, but it is equally, if not more, alive all over rural America. All those years I spent going and visiting with customers and prospects and partners and suppliers. And a lot of times you drive into these small towns, towns of in some cases, a couple 1000 people or less, and they had a major employer there, manufacturing, doing contract manufacturing, doing OE manufacturing. The truth of the matter is that our manufacturing sector would be next to nothing without the participation of these rural companies and the amazing people that work in them every single day. That is going to be the topic of our discussion today, my guest is a gentleman from McKinsey and Company. Many of us know McKinsey. We've had several guests from McKinsey on over the years, huge, huge, global consulting company doing major, major work in a whole variety of sectors and industries. And our guest this week is a partner at McKinsey. His name is Dwayne Pinder. He is the leader with McKinsey's Institute for Economic Mobility. Dwayne, thanks so much for coming on. Thank you for having me. So you're a leader in McKinsey's Institute for Economic Mobility. I'm going to be honest with you, Dwayne, I didn't even know that was a thing until we landed you on the podcast and I started doing a little bit of research. Tell us a little bit about your work the institute, what its mission is. What are you up to?

Duwain Pinder: 2:03

Yeah, so we founded the Institute in 2020, at the time, it was the Institute for black economic mobility. It was a part of McKinsey's a series of McKinsey actions, both inside of McKinsey and outside of McKinsey, really, to accelerate racial equity and figuring out, how could McKinsey help to accelerate socio and economic mobility. And they came to some of the leaders inside of McKinsey, and one of the things we told them is, we have a McKinsey Global Institute. We should have an institute that's really focused on accelerating economic mobility for underserved populations. And that was, I would say, wildly successful, so much so that we have expanded it over the past year to be focused on rural populations, Latino, Hispanic populations and black populations as well. So that's why we are the McKinsey Institute for Economic Mobility under that broader umbrella, really focused on accelerating economic mobility for those populations to start through a mix of public, private and social actions,

Matt Kirchner: 3:01

you mentioned huge success early on. Give us a little bit of a sense for what you would refer to as huge success. Why you define it that way? Yeah.

Duwain Pinder: 3:09

So we do three things at the institute. One is research. We published over 70 reports 2 million readers and folks who have engaged with those insights from everything from maternal mortality to higher education to financial services to retail and food consumption. So really, across the gamut of, how do you accelerate economic mobility, with an acute focus on how do you do that via the private sector, in addition to the public sector and social sector. So the research has been really well received, really well read, and we've been able to see the impact of that research from folks coming up to us at conferences or nonprofits that have said that they have been started based on some of the research that we've done. So a significant impact relative to that. But we don't just do research. The second thing we do is we do convenings, convene leaders from across the sector and participate in convenings. We just finished our eighth annual Black Economic Forum on Martha's Vineyard, where we have about 300 public, private and social CEOs who are really focused on accelerating economic mobility. Incredibly successful, and that has continued to be a staple event that leaders from across the country come to to really talk about how to accelerate economic mobility. And the third is what we call real world impact. We're not trying to just write research reports or have conversations. We're really trying to work in collaboration with organizations that are trying to accelerate economic mobility. So we've partnered with large philanthropic organizations. We've partnered with large private sector organizations, really to try to accelerate economic mobility via their business model or via their strategies. And that has been successful as well. And so we've seen the impact across all of those pieces, and we're. We're excited about the potential impact that we can have going forward with this more expanded mandate. So

Matt Kirchner: 5:05

partnering and convening and performing research, lots of things to like in that last response. Dwayne, first of all, never been to Martha's Vineyard. Love Nantucket. I got to believe they're very similar. Being islands, they're off of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, very, very similar. But what a great, great place to get a bunch of thought leaders together to do this important work. I also like the idea in your in your focus on the private sector, and certainly I would see it similarly. Lots of great things that we can do in the public sector in terms of advancing ideas and pushing for whatever, whatever endeavor we think is important. And certainly the work you're doing really important here in the United States. So I like that, but also engaging the private sector and understanding that in so many ways, in really almost every way, that's the economic engine of our entire economy. And so being able to leverage folks in the private sector and make sure that they're they're super engaged with the work that you're doing. I love that. On the research side, publishing reports over 2 million readers. That's that's impressive. One such report is the McKinsey Rural Education report, which is the topic of our discussion today. So let's, let's move into that, you know, in that report, and some of the other research that I've done in terms of the work that you're doing, Dwayne, you know, one of the things that we found, and I agree with you, is that we think about advanced manufacturing happening in and around our cities and our populous areas. Certainly that's happening. But when we think about advanced manufacturing, lots of great things going on in rural America as well. Why do you believe rural America is so important and maybe even at the center of this new wave of advanced manufacturing? Yeah,

Duwain Pinder: 6:36

the short answer is, that's what the facts tell us. You know, we analyzed a little over a trillion dollars of manufacturing investment that is coming into the United States. And we asked the question, where is that investment going to? And what we found is nearly two thirds of that investment is going to places in and around rural areas. You know, 63% of that a trillion dollar investment is going to areas within 15 miles of a rural region. And so as we think about what the future of manufacturing is going to be in the United States, it really is going to be defined by rural America's response to this investment. And so we think it's a significant opportunity, a once in a generation opportunity, not just for rural America in terms of the regions across the country, but really for the country in and of itself.

Matt Kirchner: 7:24

So you think about a trillion dollars. I mean, that is almost a mind boggling number. Even a billion dollars is a ton of money. You think about $100,000,000,000.10 100 times more than that, and then 10 times more, again, a trillion dollars of investment. That is certainly not a not a number that we should that we shouldn't take seriously, right? I mean, that is just tremendous investment. 63% as you say, of that investment is taking place in and around rural America. I guess one question, why? Why do you think that is, is that? Is there a reason why all this, all this investment, is finding its way to the rural parts of our country? Yeah, it's a

Duwain Pinder: 7:55

good question. I mean, one is, there's just a general reshoring trend that we saw that really predates any conversations around tariffs or some of the trade dynamics that we've seen in the past few months, but coming out of the covid 19 crisis, there really was a move to make supply chains a lot more resilient and a lot more diffuse across different geographies. So that has led many companies to say, how do we increase our manufacturing pipelines and supply chains in the United States? So that's thought, one thought, two is, there has been a significant amount of competition from different states and local governments to be able to attract some of these investments in Ohio, where I'm from, you know, Intel, for instance, is building a $20 billion plant to make the next generation of semiconductors. And that was a competition that the state of Ohio won via, you know, incentives, but also via affordability, via availability of education, via availability of water. And so my sense is that, you know, the answer probably is bespoke for every single investment, but the combination of affordability and availability of land and or resources is likely why a lot of this investment is going to more rural regions across the country.

Matt Kirchner: 9:13

Got it? Yeah, I certainly agree with the premise we talk about often on this podcast, the whole idea that, you know, before covid and into covid when we could get what we wanted, when we wanted, at a price that seemed reasonable to us. Nobody really thought about supply chain. And then all of a sudden, when that isn't available, you know, we start to have an appreciation for the importance of domestic manufacturing, bringing manufacturing closer and closer to the point of consumption. I think that's a trend that's going to continue. And then you think about some of the geopolitical aspects of it, certainly in some cases, moving semiconductor manufacturing from places like Taiwan to the United States, so that we know that we've got a free flow of technology that we need here in our in our country to be able to support the growing technology industry and so many great things happening in tech. So 100% aligned on that premise and interesting that you know manufacturing is going to find. Mind, once it gets here, the lowest, most convenient cost of production, it's going to find, find the most efficient cost of production, proximity to suppliers, proximity to consumers, proximity to transportation, all of these things playing in more and more proximity to water. I live here on the east side of Lake Michigan. West side of Lake Michigan, I should say, you know things that are happening in the data center space here because, because we have access to water, and we use water to cool a data center in your case, in Ohio, and I've watched closely the things that are happening with the Intel investment, huge investment, the way that the entire state of Ohio, and particularly your education sector, is rallied around preparing the next generation of technology talent for those types of jobs, I think probably fits pretty squarely into this conversation that we're having, because really, all of this translates into meaningful economics and potentially social change as well. For rural communities, talk about that a little bit. I'm sure you agree with that. And what does this mean for a rural community? Yeah.

Duwain Pinder: 10:57

I mean, it's significant, right? Not just in the, you know, the one time or short term, and a media hit that happens when you're saying there's an investment that's going to come to x community, but we really saw the opportunity for a long term, durable economic change, you know, to the tune of about $34 billion a year in terms of wage increases from the jobs that are created, both directly and indirectly. That's, you know, almost 10% of rural America's manufacturing GDP, in and of itself, right? So a significant increase, if you just think about, how does that $34 billion break down? The first is, if you think about K to 12 graduates that potentially would fill those advanced manufacturing jobs. They could earn an additional 40% in incremental income, right? So the additional incremental income that comes from getting a better, higher paid, more sustainable job. You know, that's one aspect. The second aspect is, if you think about, okay, what happens in terms of those additional wages, and where are those additional wages going to be spent? You know, those could create some indirect and induced wages in the rural areas, because you have a population that now has additional flexible income that therefore could be spent and, you know, the third is, one of the things that we were seeing is there's not just opportunity for new, you know, K to 12 graduates to come into advanced manufacturing positions, but also, what does it mean for the existing manufacturing workforce? And what we were seeing was that there are benefits for the existing manufacturing workforce, if you imagine that existing manufacturing workers who are able to stay in their jobs over the long term could also see an additional set of wages. So you have two to three major impacts that could really transform rural America's economy, where these investments happen, as we'll talk about more the the potential outcomes are not certain, right? There has to be additional investment in preparing the workforce of the future such that these opportunities are realized. So there is, like, a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but we have to do some work in order to get there,

Matt Kirchner: 13:16

tremendous amount of work to get to that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. You know, you talk about a couple things that I was reflecting on as you were, as you were going through that Dwayne, you know, the first one is, I just read an article in the Wall Street Journal where they talk about the idea that, you know, for like, new college graduates and the the advent of artificial intelligence, or increasing implementation of artificial intelligence, and creating some real challenges in terms of, in terms of those individuals finding jobs right out of college, right? I mean, the numbers are just telling us that. And I think there's a combination of things, some of them economic, some of it technological, but a lot of these, you know, a lot of these workflows that are more automatable are going to be automated in in business, because we can, you know, we can do things with AI agents that in the past would require people and there again, you know business is going to find the lowest and most efficient way to lost, lowest cost and most efficient way to do any process. So I think that's a reality of the workforce. But then you think about students graduating from high school, students graduating from technical or community colleges, and in some cases, getting a 30 to 40% premium in wages, according to the National Association of Manufacturers, for every dollar we spend in manufacturing, for instance, that reverberates through the economy somewhere between two and a half and three times in all the ways that that you're talking about, not just the wage for that individual, but they're buying insurance, they're buying cars, they're buying houses, they're consuming entertainment, they're shopping for groceries, I mean, and that just creates more and more economic vitality. So super, super important. I think, you know, there's a risk here too, right? I mean, you to your point, we've got to upskill a generation of whether it's the existing workforce and great opportunities there, as we change technology, as we get closer and closer to advanced manufacturing jobs, the wages tend to go up if you've got the skills. To be able to engage with advanced manufacturing tech. And same thing for people that are new to manufacturing and maybe just coming into the workforce. But at the same time, there's a huge risk of not getting this right, right. We have to prepare that next generation to be able to be workforce ready when these jobs are coming to their communities. So talk about that. What are some of the risks if we screw

Duwain Pinder: 15:19

this up? Yeah, well, you know, the first thing is this investment is happening, and so that is creating a certain amount of demand. We, in our analysis, found that the demand for workers is outstripping the supply, such that there could be a potential shortfall of a little over 2 million workers by 2030 right? So you have a significant opportunity, but our education and workforce systems are not creating the workers relative to that opportunity. And then you can imagine that if the workforce shortage continues to manifest, then that could slow investment, right? You know, we're already seeing, for instance, in some places that you know have announced some of these manufacturing investments, that the timelines for the actual implementation are slowing because they can't find the relevant construction workers, or they can't find the skilled workers that are needed in order to finish the project on time and on budget. So that's the risk that I know folks in Ohio are thinking about, but other folks are thinking about is, how do we make sure that we not just have the investment, but the investment stays durable, and that actually leads to the opportunity for the individual communities that you know, we all think is possible,

Matt Kirchner: 16:39

you know, it can become a flywheel, if we're if we think about this the right way, and you're exactly right. So many times we see major grants, major investments, major initiatives, and the money comes into a community or comes into a project once, and that's great, right? I mean, you're depending on what that looks like, construction jobs, maybe consulting jobs, maybe a new set of jobs for a group of people for a period of time. Maybe the money's being spent in the public sector, and it creates employment. Nothing wrong with that. The real question, and I think it's the one that you're answering, is, how do we how do we create that flywheel? How do we create an environment where we make the investment, we create the jobs? You know, the jobs are advancing technology, bringing more opportunities to a community, maybe more investment on the part of employers, and then that flywheel continues, and we've seen that work as well. Really, really important. But I think in order for us to be able to experience that, I think you're right, we've got to have a super focus on creating this next generation, these 2.1 million individuals, as many as 2.1 million individuals by the year 2030, coming into advanced manufacturing, making sure that we have the workforce, so that people in companies, organizations, when they're ready to make those investments, are recognizing that there's a Work Ready group of individuals who are trained, who are skilled, that can fill the positions that we're going to create. That's really, really important, I can tell you, as someone who spends a lot of time in rural America, and a lot of time, particularly in education, a fair amount of that being in K 12. You know, you see some districts that are leading. We've had some of them on the podcast in the past that are really making progressive investments in what the future of work is going to look like. And we have other ones that are just for one reason or another. Just have no idea the freight train that's coming down the tracks and how we have to transform education. So talk about that. I think one of the things that we saw in the report is it something like eight in 10 young people would be interested in, for instance, an apprenticeship, but yet it's only available to about three in 10 individuals. Now that's a huge gap, right? So in other words, we have more than double, almost triple, the number of students or individuals who would love to have access to apprenticeships, hands on learning is a huge, huge thing for me, and we're only getting to maybe three and 10. Talk about that gap and what we do about it.

Duwain Pinder: 18:44

Yeah, it's interesting, because that gap between desire motivation, but then access is something that we see across the gamut in rural, urban settings. In education, you often find that students and parents have a significant amount of desire, motivation will to advance and to learn, but they are not always met with the access that is commensurate to that desire and will. And that's what we see here, right? We see that, you know, to your point, eight in 10 students are desiring some sort of career connected learning when it comes to, you know, apprenticeships or CTE, or, you know, just some hands on training, but yet, three in 10 students, you know, feel like they have the access to those things. So this really highlights the the gap, but it also highlights the opportunity. If you said, Okay, what is, what is the role of some of these advanced manufacturing industry investments in creating the workforce of the future. You know, there's a real opportunity to partner with K to 12 schools. You can imagine that, you know, as an advanced manufacturer expands their footprints in and around rural America, they would have a role to play in forming partnerships with their nearby school. School district or the nearby school system to say, how can we create more opportunities for career connected learning? How can we partner, you know, either individually or through an Industry Association, to, you know, expand access to apprenticeship and other workplace learning opportunities. So, you know, I think there's a significant opportunity relative to the investments that are coming into these locations, if it's taken advantage of and that's where, really what we were trying to shine a light on is there's a significant opportunity, both for the school districts to potentially reach out to the advanced manufacturers, but also for the advanced manufacturers to partner with school districts. No

Matt Kirchner: 20:37

question, that's a huge opportunity. I like the way that you look at that. I mean, it is a risk, but with any risk comes opportunity. And if we've got, we think about any business or any any problem you try to solve at all. In the economic side, if you've got eight out of 10 people are demanding something, and three out of 10 people are getting it. That means there's this huge opportunity for us to offer that to the other the other five and 10, which is literally versus literally, half. So huge opportunity there. And so the next question, of course, is, how should we be thinking about this, in terms of how we take advantage of these opportunities? You mentioned employers reaching out to to educators. For instance, educators reaching out to employers, building partnerships. Once they're having the conversation, what should they be thinking about in terms of new ways to implement and provide access to those, especially in underserved communities, be they rural or otherwise, in terms of making those opportunities available to everybody?

Duwain Pinder: 21:32

Yeah, well, the first thing I'll say is, and we wrestled a lot with this when we were writing the report, is if you were to say the first and most foundational thing that needs to happen in schools and school systems to prepare for advanced manufacturing jobs of the future. It is foundational reading and math like that. Is what we heard from many industry associations and manufacturing employees where the actual skills that are needed are not the, you know, kind of more future for technological skills, but it's more can you read and do you know basic math? And you know, the challenge is, when we look at the ability to read and do basic math across the country, the scores are continuing to erode, and so our ability to actually provide those foundational math and reading skills is not as strong as it was five to 10 years ago, and this is coming at exactly the wrong time when we actually need those skills even more. And so, you know, step number one, I would say, is for any advanced manufacturing employer, you know, how can you support your local school system to be able to provide the basics, right? You know, one of the things we say in the report is it does not do any good to have investments in significant career connected learning if you're not doing those basics. So that would be, you know, step number one. Step number two, though, is there's a lot of evidence in terms of things that have worked from across the country, that you know can be implemented. This is not a case where we have to reinvent the wheel. There are a lot of examples from across the country of different partnerships that have taken place, that you know, different schools and school systems can learn from to say, Can we do that here? Versus, you know, how do we create something from scratch? That would be the two things I would say. But I cannot emphasize the math and reading point hard enough, because it is something especially it's not eroding just across the country, but when we look at different types of rural communities. Because, as you know, rural communities are not a monolith, but in some rural communities, the access to high quality instruction and the ability to show the fundamental math and reading skills is starting to significantly erode, even faster than the United States averages. So, you know, all hands on deck moment to say, how do we increase the math and reading in those communities to prepare for the investment that's going to happen?

Matt Kirchner: 23:59

You know, I like the two step approach that you mentioned. And starting with the basic math and basic reading abilities. And I would add to that, in some cases written in oral communication as well, we hear from employers quite a bit, and then talking about step two, which is kind of the actual technology or advanced manufacturing skills. The way I like to characterize the question to employers, because I hear it a lot the same time. They're like, you know, give me somebody who has basic skills comes to work every day and can take some modicum of direction. And they're like, give me that person. And I say, Okay, let's say we have two people, and the first one has no basic math skills and no basic reading skills and no basic workplace skills, and the other person has all three of those. Which one are you going to pick? And they say, Well, it's the second person. Of course, I want the person that can read and write and can work in a workplace. I said, Okay, of course, of course, that's a choice. Now let me give you three people. The first one is has no skills. Second one has reading and math and workplace skills, and the third person also has that, but also understands basic ACDC. Electrical and electric relay control and motor control and motion control and PLCs and machine operation. All right, robotic programming and operation. Which one of those are you going to pick? It's always the third one. So I like the way that you stack that we need those basic math and reading skills. And in truth, it's almost impossible to teach those other skills unless they have the basic skills. So that's that's exactly right. I have number of questions that kind of flow out of that last little conversation. But what are we not getting right in terms of teaching reading and math? I mean, that seems like that's the basics. Did your report go in or your research go into anything along the lines of what we need to change there?

Duwain Pinder: 25:33

We actually referenced a report that we had done previously, which is basically looking at how the world's most kind of improved school systems are continuing to advance. It's called spark and sustain, and we can send that over to you and your readers. Yeah, we'll link it up in the show notes. That'd be great. Yeah. You know, one of the things that we found in terms of the specifics to, like, the foundational math and reading, is quality, standards aligned curriculum, and then, like, supporting teachers and using that high quality curriculum. So those are, like, the two things that we lifted up from the spark and sustain report. But you could imagine there are other interventions. But if that was a place to start, it would be, you know, like, oh yeah, like in the state of Ohio, for instance, in other states they're doing, like, science of reading curriculum. You know, those are, like, high quality evidence based curriculum that we know teaches kids how to read, same thing, high quality evidence based curriculum we know teaches kids how to do basic math. Let's use those that high quality curriculum, and then let's also give teachers the relevant supports in using that curriculum. Think those would be the two things that you know to your point, it's not as if we are not doing it right. There are definite pockets where it's happening. It's just not happening at scale and consistently the way that we would like to so every child having access to curriculum, every child having access to a teacher who is skilled and using that curriculum, like that's where we need to go to effectively,

Matt Kirchner: 27:03

couldn't agree more, you know. And I'm glad you know there's you mentioned Ohio. There's a lot of really great things happening in your state around technical education. I think even going back 10 years with the advent of the of the M TechEd. So you have all over your state and full of FANUC robots. Mike Chico, of course, the President and CEO of FANUC America, it's been on the podcast four or five times now. So really, really cool things going on there. I would point also to the stuff that Buckeye educational is doing with programs like Ignite and industry 4.0 in terms of getting K 12 students and even in some cases middle, middle school students excited about these kind of careers. And I think it's an example of how, if you focus on the basics, and you learn basic math, basic reading, basic writing, basic communication skills. And then you pile on top, or layer, I should say, on top of that, some of these hands on skills that make students career ready when they get to advanced manufacturing. Lots of great, great things happening in your in your home state and certainly across the country that we could point to. Are there other examples of, you know, career connected learning, as you put it, that you think you'd like to highlight for the audience. How can we get this right in terms of connecting students to careers? Yeah?

Duwain Pinder: 28:06

Yeah. I mean, to your point, there's a lot of examples, and we highlighted a few in the article, just to give some inspiration for folks who've started to think about it. We highlighted one example, like the Greene County Career Center that's in the state of Ohio. But to your point, there's a lot of great things that happening in the state of Ohio. Another example that's outside of Ohio that I was really excited about is this modern apprenticeship program by an organization called employee indie. And it's basically a three year initiative to prepare Indiana high school students for in demand careers. And what I like about it was it, you know, it's paid hands on work starting in junior year. Students are, you know, earn a living wage relative to the geography. They gain more than two years of job experience. They earn college credits in the process and things like it, health care, and then they're also partnered with local employers, you know, like the Indianapolis Airport Authority, for instance, and you know, like that combination of training, employer connection, paid work and college credit felt, you know, really significant from kind of a preparation for any potential pathway. If you're a student that wants to go to college, you're going to college, you're going to get college credit. You're a student who's excited about one of the potential employers. There's a pathway directly into those potential employers. And you know, it's not something where you have to sacrifice, from an economic perspective, to be able to learn. There's an economic incentive as well. So that's one example, but there are other examples that are being tried across the country, as we talked about before, and really, how can we be inspired by these examples so that they not they turn from examples to just the everyday of how K to 12 education is happening, especially in some of these areas where there's significant investment, absolutely,

Matt Kirchner: 29:54

and I think that's where we're going. In a lot of cases, we're starting to recognize the fact that, yeah, you could solve it for a year or two. To or we could create generational change by solving it for many years, across many communities, for millions and millions of students. And I think that's where, where we need to go. And certainly your report indicates the, you know, not just the risks, as we talk about, but as you suggest, doing the huge, huge opportunities we have if we get this right. You know, we have listeners from across economic sectors that join us every week for this podcast, certainly lots of students and educators, but also a lot of industrial employers, particularly in the space of advanced manufacturing, because we talk about that topic so so frequently, if I'm an industrial employer, especially if I'm in a rural community, or considering investing in a rural community, you know, what do you think I can play as an industrial employer in terms of, you know, creating consistent engagement with students and not, like the one off stuff that you know, we've already criticized a little bit of get it right once and then forget about it. But how do we, how do we do this consistently? Yeah,

Duwain Pinder: 30:52

I think there a little bit is a mindset of, a mindset shift that I think needs to happen, where your K to 12 school district becomes a workforce and a supply of workforce partner, many employers, and this is not just in rural settings, are not just limited to advanced manufacturing. I think many employers, their engagement with the local school district is from a corporate social responsibility perspective, or like a volunteering perspective, not from a this is a partner in terms of my future workforce, and how am I going to partner deeply to create the workforce of the future? Because I'm really not just committed to this community from a social impact perspective, but I'm committed to this community from, you know, an overall economic vitality perspective. And so I do think there's a mindset shift to say, okay, my conversations with the superintendent or with the local principal or with a set of local teachers is a lot more about here are the skills that I'm that I need and and what are the ways that we can partner together in order to build those skills? I think those conversations are not yet happening as consistently and as readily as possible. The second thing I would say is, you know, this doesn't have to be done like one employer to one school district, but how do we have more scale across so you could imagine that, like industry associations are having conversations with a group of school districts, and there's a collaborative conversation that is happening, versus the kind of One off conversation, manufacturing employer to K 12 School District. I don't yet think that our industry associations, chambers of commerce, etc, are being utilized to their fullest extent when it comes to this potential use case. And I think there's a lot of opportunity relative to those things. So I think the mindset you're the thing is the first thing. But I think there's also, you know, industry associations and other organizations that can provide scale for employers that we're not yet utilizing to our fullest extent.

Matt Kirchner: 32:46

You just gave me an idea for an article, and I'll and I'll credit you and I when I write it, but, but this is it, you know, and I this is coming from a guy that spent all those years running manufacturing companies, and you think about what we called supplier development, right? So if I'm a, you know, an OEM, so an original equipment manufacturer manufacturing a product for an end use market. And I've got all my suppliers, right? It might be an equipment supplier. It might be the people that I'm that are helping me with my staffing. It might be somebody that's that's building components. Because most, almost every manufacturer is not completely vertically integrated. They all rely on subcontract manufacturers to build parts of their assembly or to handle parts of their supply chain, and we obsess over supplier development, right? We do audits, we do quality audits, we do qualification audits. We spend all this time checking on the quality of the product coming in, understanding, are we getting what we pay for, staying on top of changes in technology that might affect our suppliers, helping them with continuous improvement events to drive waste out of their system so they could be more successful, you know. And so the whole concept of the of the article, Dwayne, is going to be, what if we treated our school districts as a supplier and not that necessary, and we're certainly not commoditizing our students or treating them as a product? Obviously, they're human beings. But if we put the same level of care into building relationships with our educators that we did into building relationships with key suppliers, imagine what could flow out of that. And I think that's kind of what I'm hearing you say, is that, look, if you're an industrial employer, there's all of these things that you could be doing in terms of partnering with your with your local school district that maybe you're not and if we, if we start thinking about, you know, plant tours and visiting the school and mentoring the students and supporting financially, in some cases, their technical education or their STEM programs, really checking the agendas at the door, because a lot of times we get, you know, some of the political friction you might see between somebody that works in education someone that works in manufacturing, forgetting about all that and Just saying, How can we do what's right for STEM for students, for our employers and for our communities? We should be doing more of that and then doing it at scale to your point. So you think about a chamber of commerce, either a statewide one or a local one. You think about industry trade associations. I was involved in numerous ones in the coatings industry, actually president of one of them for several years. Dollars, all the opportunities that we can have to be reaching out and building those relationships, and it's for the benefit of students. And then we create this kind of evergreen model, as you suggest, where we're not just spending money that's coming from one grant or from, you know, from one investment, but we're figuring out how to do this over and over and over again. If I'm a so you talked about, you know, the industrial employer. What if I'm an educator and I want to do the same thing? What recommendations do you have for us, especially in a world? And I think about all the money that flowed out of the out of the Cares Act, the EDA funding that we saw, all this, all this money that came into education, rightfully so, in out of covid, and now we're several years out from that. How do I create that evergreen model, if I'm if I'm an educator?

Duwain Pinder: 35:45

The first thing to note is, to your point is the environment has significantly changed relative to the amount of resources that are coming into school districts. You know, we've written multiple reports on the past on, okay, school districts are getting a significant amount from cares, act and covid 19 funds, here's what they should do with it. We just published a report basically saying all that money is gone. So, so what should school districts be thinking about? You know, the title is from surplus to scarcity, and we just published it, actually last week, and talks about just the priorities of district leaders. I mean, in actuality, you know, the conversation is very much, how do district leaders and school leaders do more with less? How do they become more efficient so that they can, you know, invest in the priorities like career, connected learning, etc. You know, I think it's a recognition that there's a significant amount of of competing demands that are happening with educators today, and the complexity of being an educator today is a lot more difficult relative to, you know, what it was like before. And I just finished Jonathan heights book, you know, the anxious generation, which talks about, you know, phones in schools, and the increasing anxiety and mental health challenges of students. So, you know, I think it's just a recognition that being an educator is incredibly important and even more so important today, but then b that it's also becoming increasingly complex, you know, let alone when you think about the funding environment that being said, you know, I think there are a significant amount of opportunities. One is thinking about, okay, how do I, as a school leader, you know, really focus on the sets of priorities? So if there are organizations that are coming in to potentially to support my school with, you know, different opportunities to help, you know, how would I? How do I then communicate that our biggest priority right now is improving our reading and math, and here's the support that I need so like just kind of clarifying and communicating those priorities, I think would be, you know, thing number one, that it actually is really beneficial for the overall workforce if I as a school district really focus on reading and math versus doing some of these other things that may feel a lot more interesting and exciting to the outside world, but may, may not be as linked to, you know, the overall end goal. So that's, you know, thought one, thought two is, if you are doing a set of career connected learning the question, I would say, is, how evidence based and tied are your career connected learning models? I think what we see often is there's a lot of activity that's happening, but it may or may not be linked to the overall evidence. And so how do you say, you know, we're doing career connected learning, but could we do that better? We're spending a certain amount of dollars on career connected learning, but is there a way we can have more scale and potentially have better outcomes? So it's less about saying we need to spend more, but it could say, is there opportunity for us to spend differently, potentially learning the lessons from other places? So those are two things, at least, I would say, is like communicating the priorities of math and reading, but then also saying for the career connected learning that you are doing, how are you learning the lessons from other organizations and entities that have done that in the past?

Matt Kirchner: 38:58

So it sounds like certainly sharing best practices and understanding what's working elsewhere, so we're not starting from scratch. I'm a huge advocate of that, especially as someone who spends as much time as I do in education, and everybody wants to come up with the next best thing. And it's like, okay, maybe we don't need to leapfrog all the way to something, you know, 10 years in the future and do the next best thing 10 years out, but maybe looking at the community next door, or going to an education conference and educating ourselves about some of the changes that are happening in education, whether it's for reading and math or in other disciplines, and then duplicating those and maybe you put your own spin on it. Maybe you do it a little bit more interesting. You know, every community is different, every student is different, every employer is different, every institution of education is different. So you can do it in your own way, in terms of applying that to your particular community or your particular institution. But why start from scratch? Let's leverage some of these other best practices. And then it also comes back to, you know, measuring outcomes. Any thoughts on how we actually would measure those outcomes from an education standpoint, if I'm a K 12. Educator, for example, there's

Duwain Pinder: 40:02

a certain set of things, which are your end outcomes, which are like, you know, are the students actually getting access to the relevant jobs that are being sourced and hired for in your local community. Now, what is the overall median wage relative to what it was before? And transparently, the education system just doesn't do this kind of outcome reporting. Well, if you look at, like many post secondary educational institutions, and you said, you know, like, tell me where your students go, how much do they make, you know, they rely on, you know, surveys. But it's not as specific and detailed as it could be to say, you know, the jobs of our, you know, new graduates, and also graduates of 10 years are a really important outcome for us in terms of measuring the quality of education. Therefore, we're going to have specific data. So I think there's, there's an opportunity for the education system to invest more in that data collection to be able to make, you know, some of these things that I'm outlining a lot easier. But then I also think that there are a certain set of more near term things, which is, you know, asking students, what are the types of experiences that you want to have inside and outside of school, and do you feel like you're accessing those skills? So that gap that we talked about of eight to 10 versus three and 10 having access, you know, it. Do you see that gap actually closing? You know? Do we actually see that people are getting the access to the apprenticeships and the career connected learning opportunities? But then you also have to then make sure that those career connected learning opportunities are actually leading to the outcomes that doesn't do anybody any good, if anybody's if everybody's participating in career connected learning, everyone's happy. But then you ask the question of, like, Well, did you actually get a job, or did your wage increase? And then, you know, there isn't any outcomes to show for that. So I think those are the two things, at least, I would start with. And then the third, I guess in more immediate term, is, would say, frequently is there communication between, you know, a school system leader and a manufacturing employer? Like, what is the frequency? One of the things I'm thinking about is like, your your analogy of supplier development. I mean, when that's done, well, you're talking to your suppliers on a regular basis, because you are very tied together. And there's two way communication. I think an immediate question would say, can we increase the quantity of communication between manufacturing employers or employer associations and schools and school systems. You know, one person said, when we were interviewing, they said that they're effectively two ships passing in the night. And, you know, how do we just, like, start the communication to actually have them say, okay, here are the things that we're seeing in the classroom. Here are the skills that we're trying to build. How does that align with the things that you're seeing in the workplace and the skills that you're trying to hire for. I think that would be at least an initial start. I

Matt Kirchner: 42:47

like all three of them outcomes in terms of access to employment, access to work based learning and career connected learning. And to do that, I like the way that you said, let's ask the students, are they getting what they think they need? From that standpoint, think that's a really good way. And couldn't agree more on the whole idea of communication between employers and educators, and we've seen great examples, by the way, when they open up communication of getting away from the two ships passing in the night. But I would agree that in far too many communities still looks a lot more like that than it does like, you know, complete partnership and working toward the same end goals. So, so 100% agree with you just a handful of questions in the few minutes we have remaining. Dwayne, one of them is, you know, in as much as measuring all this is important, let's turn the clock ahead 10 years. All right, so it's 2035 and we're sitting here in the fall of 2035 having a conversation. How will we know if we got this right?

Duwain Pinder: 43:38

Well, it's a great question. So in addition to having flying cars and, like, you know, robots that can we will buy all our chores exactly, you know. So I'd say a couple things. One is that you would probably see GDP that becomes less concentrated in urban versus rural areas. Like, if you could imagine that, if you know, this is done right, and some of the economic benefits happen that you would start to see more economic vitality in some of these kind of rural places that would grow over time. It's not going to, you know, be at the same level as some of the urban centers, but I do think you would see a much more diverse geographic mix in terms of, you know, our economic profile. So that would be, you know, thought number one. Thought number two is that you would probably see the amount of manufacturing investment and potentially other investment that is coming to rural areas increase. Because, you know, if people are seeing the significant benefit, they would say, wow, you know, there's a significant opportunity. And, you know, like the private sector is the private sector and trying to find market opportunities. And so if you know this market opportunity is proven out to be profitable, then that would continue to increase and attract more investment from other potential sources. So those would be the two things I would be looking at. Is, you know, kind of the GDP profile in terms of concentration. And the second is, how. Has the investment in these rural economies, has it continued to increase, or was it a one time blip that went away, and you would hope that, if we're successful, that it was a more sustainable set of investment that continues over the long term?

Matt Kirchner: 45:14

I love how quantitative that is, right? I mean, so much of what we what we measure in education, is qualitative, and here it's like, all right, what is the, you know, what is the distribution of GDP, rural versus urban? You can measure that, right? That's not hard to measure that. Data is available. And same thing for investment, you know, in terms of new manufacturing, advanced manufacturing investment, whether that's public and private investment, which is certainly my preference, and then and then the public investment that goes alongside to support the private investment important as well. But are we investing in those rural communities? I think I love the way that we can measure that. We'll have you back in 2035 to talk about that. Two quick questions, we'll have to do a rapid fire in the time we have left here. Dwayne Question number one, everybody has their own personal experience through education based on yours. What's something that would surprise other people. I

Duwain Pinder: 46:01

think many folks who look at education, who are not deep in it, underestimate the desire and will of students and their individual parents, and think that the reason why many people are not successful is because, you know, they're not motivated, or because they they need, like, some additional, you know, like fire in their belly, but what you actually see in the data is that students and their parents have all of the desire, will motivation, but what they lack is access to opportunities. And once you close that gap in terms of access to opportunities, you know, then the sky's the limit. And so, you know, if we could have more of our you know, public discourse and interventions really focused on increasing access and decreasing obstacles versus like, trying to shift motivation, I think we'd be better served.

Matt Kirchner: 46:52

I agree with you, by the way, by and large, students and their parents want great outcomes. Want great educations for their students. How do we make sure we get them access to that takes tons and tons of forms. We could take do a whole episode just on those but 100% agree with that premise, Dwayne and one final question, if we could go back in time, we asked this question, by the way, of every guest here on the TechEd podcast, go back in time to that 15 year old Dwayne Pinder. You're a sophomore in high school, give or take, and you could give that young man one piece of advice. What would you tell him? It's

Duwain Pinder: 47:21

a really good question. I'm thinking about who I was as a sophomore. I would say, you know, thinking about this, I would say, like, your definition of success and happiness needs to be broadened, right? Like, I thought a lot about, hey, I'm gonna get a great job. I'm gonna make a lot of money, and then, you know, why would I ever want to have a family and like, I have two two girls now, one is five and one is one, and they give me, like, more happiness than I get from any professional pursuit. So I just think that that wasn't anywhere in my purview when I was a sophomore, but it has been, what a it's been a really pleasant surprise.

Matt Kirchner: 47:57

I had my eyes, my eyes open to what you just said when I was in my early 30s there again, we could, we could go through a whole episode on that one as well. But you're exactly right. Obviously, partner at McKinsey, you've been incredibly successful from, you know, professional standpoint. And people can look up a role like that, you know, you do just fine economically, and then some as well. But you're right. I mean, those things are really, really important, and in many cases, not taking anything away from having those professional dreams. But the real value of life comes from everything that you can wrap around that and and having two little girls like that, I'm so envious my kids are all grown up and and what a great stage of life, what a great conversation we've had today. Many thanks to Dwayne Pinder of McKinsey for joining us on this episode of The TechEd podcast. I am so excited for what is coming to rural America, all of the manufacturing jobs, all of the opportunities, If only, if only we upskill the next generation of the workforce to fill all these awesome careers that are going to be available to our young people and to people of all ages. Hope you enjoyed this episode as much as I did. Love the report from Dwayne. We will link that up in the show notes. Be sure to check that out. Read it. You will find those at TechEd podcast.com/pinder that is TechEd podcast.com/p i n, d, e r, of course, when you're all done there, check us out on social media. You will find us everywhere, on Instagram, on Facebook, on LinkedIn, on Tiktok, wherever you go to consume your social media, you will find the TechEd podcast, and you will find us right here next week for our next episode. Until then, I'm your host. Matt Kirkner, thanks for joining us. You.