OPINION: Education is city's future building block
Economic development is no longer about chasing smokestacks or building skyscrapers.
Recession, the evaporation of investment sources and the risk involved in forming a new business, are all taking their toll.
Hubbard County’s Regional Economic Development has been thinking out of the box the past two years and an interesting metamorphosis has been taking place for local businesses.
REDC Director David Collins has come in for his share of criticism. It’s hard to measure progress if you don’t see new businesses sprouting up all over. People tend to get impatient.
But Collins has charted a steady course of providing a multitude of business trainings to employers and employees, holding regular seminars.
He’s gotten allows for downtown businesses to refurbish their exteriors. It may not sound like much, but it’s slow progress. Park Rapids isn’t standing still.
If our downtown business owners can get some outside help face-lifting their facades, the community as a whole benefits.
Businesses look better, deteriorate at a slower rate and a transformation happens inside, too.
Park Rapids residents have always taken pride in the quaint downtown area. Funds to help business owners give them added confidence and support we’re there for them.
Collins has really hit his stride in pushing for the M State on-line college program to come to town.
Park Rapids has always taken pride in education.
It is a community that values and supports its schools even in hard times.
An accredited college with on-line courses is a perfect fit for the city.
It reinforces that we value continuing education. We can keep children around who are still undecided about their futures, educating them and letting them mature.
In the process, parents can save money.
But M State also emphasizes computer literacy, something we can all benefit from.
Learning will enhance both employees and employers, the Progress Park Rapids committee stressed.
Promising employees could take advantage of management training or course work that will grant them, and their companies, to grow.
During the summers we have a wealth of educated seasonal residents. You could come back for summer school. Learning is a good thing.
We see from the Headwaters Center for Lifelong Learning that Park Rapids is receptive to just that. The programs are packed, they’re interesting and people leave flushed with a sense of accomplishment and newfound knowledge.
The community needs to rally around this college concept. M State needs our support, our dollars, our action.
We let higher education slip through our grasp 50 years ago.
We can’t let it happen again. Collins should be applauded for getting us on the right track.
The rest will fall into place. After all, what employer in his or her right mind would bypass the smartest tiny city in Minnesota? Because as building blocks go, you can’t get a better foundation than education.
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Submited at Saturday, March 19th, 2011 at 8:00 pm on Uncategorized by sofia
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