Episode 5: Technical Colleges and the Workforce

In Episode 5, Executive Director and Chair of the Coordinating Council for Workforce Development (CCWD), William Floyd, talks with Dr. Tim Hardee, President and Executive Director of the South Carolina Technical College System and Vice Chair of the CCWD, about how partnerships with employers, apprenticeship programs, and training pathways are helping connect South Carolinians to opportunity.

The episode also highlights how the Technical College System serves approximately 160,000 students each year and works with communities and industries across South Carolina to prepare individuals for careers that support the state’s growing workforce needs.

Watch now on YouTube at bit.ly/3QqxhYh and find all episodes and resources at www.findyourfuture.sc.gov/theworks. 

Learn more about workforce training programs and career opportunities in South Carolina:

Coordinating Council for Workforce Development

https://dew.sc.gov/CCWD

South Carolina Technical College System

Learn more about technical college programs, readySC, and Apprenticeship Carolina.

https://www.sctechsystem.edu

SC Works

Explore job openings and career opportunities across South Carolina, including positions connected to major employers like Scout Motors.

https://scworks.org

For additional information about career pathways, workforce programs, and employment resources across South Carolina, please visit https://findyourfuture.sc.gov

Connect with Find Your Future SC on social media for updates, resources, and workforce initiatives:

Instagram: @fyf_sc
Twitter: @FYFSC
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FindYourFutureSC/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/find-your-future-sc/
YouTube: @findyourfuturesc

Follow along to stay informed about opportunities supporting South Carolina’s current and future workforce.

Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

Welcome to the Works Podcast, where we introduce South Carolina's workforce and its leaders. My name is William Floyd. I'm the Executive Director of the Department of Employment and Workforce and the chairperson of the Coordinating Council for Workforce Development. Today we are speaking with Dr. Tim Hardy. He's president and executive director of South Carolina's Technical College System. He's also vice chair of the Coordinating Council for Workforce Development. Dr. Hardy has been part of the CCWD for many years. And today we talk about one of my favorite CCWD projects that's increasing the skills of South Carolinians. And Dr. Hardy and his team do that so well. Join me in welcoming Dr. Tim Hardy to the show. Dr. Hardy, welcome to the Works Podcast. Thank you so much for being here today. Glad to be here. Thanks for the invitation. Well, we've heard a lot about you already, uh, both on the CCWD as well as out in the community helping through the technical college system. Tell us about how you got connected with the technical college system.

SPEAKER_02 1:11

Sure. Um interesting enough, uh, unlike most folks today, I'm actually a South Carolina native. So there's not many of us left, but uh I actually worked for several years on the K-12 side of the house, uh, moved to the Technical College system, served as president at the college over in Sumter, Central Carolina Technical College. About 10 years ago, became the system president for the technical college system, have been enjoying the work, uh, working with the 16 colleges across the state during that time, and then had an opportunity once the legislature decided to uh bring into being the CCWD, was asked to serve as uh the vice chair.

SPEAKER_03 1:53

Well, you're you're definitely a great addition to the coordinated council for workforce development, and even more than that, I very much appreciate your leadership as the vice chair. Now, one thing that we've done through the CCWD is one of the first major accomplishments was developing and launching the Unified State Plan for Educational Workforce Development. And one of the key goals of the three goals is increasing the skills of South Carolinians. So I know from what the governor says often that we have the best technical college system in the nation, and I very much agree with that. Tell us how you and your schools are increasing the skills of South Carolinians.

SPEAKER_02 2:34

We have about 160,000 students that we serve each year that are South Carolinians. Uh, we're very pleased that about 95% of those are South Carolina residents. And our really end goal for those people is to get a good job in the state of South Carolina. And we try to do that, whether that's healthcare, welding, mechatronics, whatever the career field that they're interested in, is really just to partner with business and industry on what their needs are and provide that highly skilled employee that uh is going to be paying taxes here in the state of South Carolina.

SPEAKER_03 3:12

That's a win-win for South Carolina and its and its uh citizens for sure. You know, sometimes we hear about Ready SC, that's part of your s the technical college system. Can you tell us about what it is and how it helps?

SPEAKER_02 3:26

Sure. Uh Red S C is an important part of what we deliver through the technical college system. Most people in South Carolina are aware of their local technical college, whether that's Greenville or Ori Georgetown or Florence Darlington, but not as many people are aware of Ready SC. When the Department of Commerce attracts an industry to come to the state of South Carolina, there's always uh an incentive package to get them to come. And part of that is water, sewer, land. But uh increasingly an important part is how do we have a skilled workforce? So part of that incentive package for them to come to South Carolina, I'll use for an example a current project here in the Columbia area is Scout Motors. Uh, scout is going to be employing 4,000 people to build the scout vehicles. Well, those 4,000 people will all be trained as a part of the Red ESC commitment to Scout Motors. And our responsibility through the technical college system, and we deliver that through Red ESC, is to actually provide them with 4,000 skilled South Carolinians to build those Scout vehicles.

SPEAKER_03 4:34

One success story after another, for sure. One of our um last podcast um uh participants, uh, the Lieutenant Governor, we talked about the importance of internships with regard to workforce development so that students of any age could really get plugged in as an intern and an employer and learn by doing. One thing that's very similar, but even um more well known are apprenticeships. And I believe that you know a lot about apprenticeships through the technical college system. Can you tell us about that and their importance to workforce development?

SPEAKER_02 5:14

Sure, William. Uh I I think a part of that is the governor was pushing young people going to work, is is sort of one of the things that she's very much a proponent of. And while we certainly are supportive of that, our Apprenticeship Carolina program is uh one facet of the technical college system. Uh there are actually now about 7,000 active apprentices in the state of South Carolina. So we um work with companies throughout, large and small, throughout the state, to have these apprenticeship efforts to where there's three components to apprenticeships. One is you receive on-the-job training with a mentor that has been, for instance, say in the BMW, you would have someone that's uh a technician there and has maybe worked for 20 years as a technician. They take someone under their wing as an apprentice, work with them, but it's also an education component. They're enrolled, let's say for BMW, they're enrolled at Greenville Technical College in a mechatronics program. They're also working there at BMW. And the third component is the pay aspect of it, that once they compete, complete that apprenticeship program, then they see an increased wage for them once they complete that maybe one-year, two-year apprenticeship program. So it's a really uh a program that allows people to get on the job, skill training, uh a little more advanced than say like your internship or co-op programs.

SPEAKER_03 6:48

Very good. So in terms of its availability, uh could you be a brand new company come to South Carolina, or could you have been here for a hundred years and still take advantage of that?

SPEAKER_02 6:59

Both. Uh both of those. We we have the companies, like I mentioned, uh, I think Michelin came here 75 years ago, and they've been an active participant in the state of South Carolina since the uh 50s uh from that standpoint. And while a lot of times we talk about apprentices in terms of uh what I would call your trade skills, we've actually moved into doing a lot of apprenticeships in the healthcare arena as well. About a third of our students in the technical college system are in some form of health care type program.

SPEAKER_03 7:33

That's outstanding resource for sure. You know, in South Carolina uh and through the CCWD, we have uh conducted a supply gap analysis, and uh that we'll renew every uh year. And one the one of the biggest gaps is in the healthcare industry. So you talked uh pointed out that you have apprenticeships also in the healthcare industry is definitely a help to help narrow that gap. Right. Um thinking back about the coordinated council for workforce development or uh what I call the CCWD, uh you and I started about the same time on the council a little bit more than two years ago. Do you have a a favorite initiative or achievement uh that the CCWD has done since you've joined it?

SPEAKER_02 8:20

Well, uh I'll mention two. Uh I think one of the things you and I have been able to work uh closely on is being able to show the legislature that there's a return on investment for training. I would say the other piece that I've been uh very supportive of with uh CCWD has been not only those of us that are members of the organization, but I like the fact that we've been able to bring in both some community members, business owners, business operators, as well as students, to be able to give the coordinating council for workforce development a message from business owners and students to say this is what it's like for us. This is what we need to have an opportunity.

SPEAKER_03 9:05

Absolutely. You know, that employer communication telling us what they really need and what they would really want to have in in the future really helps shape tomorrow's workforce.

SPEAKER_02 9:18

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 9:19

You know, data is an important part of that, and you were mentioning uh with uh with regard to some of the CCWD projects, it's really enlightening the day what the data shows. For example, one of the first projects that we did at CCWD was the so-called welding certificate program, and taking a look at what a difference just one certificate makes in the life of a job seeker or a young student or an adult student. And what we found was that it more than tripled their wages.

SPEAKER_02 9:52

Some ways it's it's like that with the data that we're producing through the CCWD to be able to really take that data and determine what are those high-skilled jobs, high-wage jobs that are in demand, where we have shortages out of the state, and then encourage people to go into those training fields to where we know we're going to have a shortage and we need to get people trained to be able to do those particular jobs. It's uh whether an individual wants to go into healthcare or manufacturing or IT, that's an individual choice, but we also want to make sure that we're providing them for the training for a job that actually exists. And I think that's the where the CCWD is going to be able to determine here's where we have shortages in the state, here's how we're going to provide a training opportunity, and here's how you get your foot at the door. We're going to be in the next few years focusing on the nuclear industry because there's such a need for that to progress here in the state of South Carolina. It's going to require a lot of welders and electrician to build that nuclear site with VC Sumner, and I think we will be ready to do that and when the time comes, but I think it's also being forward-looking enough to know what are the jobs that are coming in the future and thus having the curriculum in place, the faculty in place to be able to provide that training.

SPEAKER_03 11:21

Well, like the governor says, we have the best technical college system in the entire nation, and we're so privileged to have you here, not only on the CCWD as the vice chair, but here in the podcast. Thank you for sharing your time and your insights with us. And we're so much better with the technical college system helping us to increase the skills of tomorrow's workforce. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 11:44

Thank you so much. Glad to be with you today.

SPEAKER_01 11:48

To leave you with some helpful labor market information. Here's your LMI.

SPEAKER_00 11:59

Hi, I'm Dr. Brian Greedy, Assistant Executive Director for Labor Market Information at DU. Welcome to Hell of My Minute, where I share some parting data from today's discussion to help you better understand our workforce. One of the big in-demand careers you've heard about today is mechatronics. Workers in this field have skills across mechanical, electrical, and computer systems that are essential for the advanced manufacturing industries that help power the state's economy. But when you look at data collected by the federal government, there are very few workers reported as being in the mechatronics field, only 270 in the entire state. And it turns out that's just a matter of vocabulary. A lot of jobs in the industry classifies under the broader umbrella of mechatronics are coded as being other types of careers. When we look at the broader definition, we see there are almost 7,000 jobs in this day. And they pay well. On average, that's over $70,000 per year if you're working at $340-hour week. You can prepare for occupations like these at your local technical college because it works with employers in your area to make sure that you have the skills you need to electron activity for you. Stop by your local ST Work Center to see how we can help you find a lineup in your career. Thanks for listening.