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filling the role that companies are
looking for now, but also thinking
ahead to what jobs are going to be
needed in two years, or five or ten.
“My background is in economic
development. I have a unique lens
into understanding the needs of
industry and connecting it with
the technical college, whether it be
through incumbent worker training
or individuals who want to seek a
career, especially in our high demand industry sectors,” said Clark.
“This fall we are going to open
up our RAM center, a state-of-art
advanced manufacturing training
facility that will house our robotics, our mechatronics, our CNC
(Computer Numerical Control), our
precision manufacturing,” notes
Clark. “That’s important because
advanced manufacturing in our
service area is booming. There is
a strong need for mechatronics
trained individuals, either for incumbent worker training to upskill
those employees or for new hires.
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Currently we don’t have the facilities with both the technology and
the space to be able to align with
the current industry needs. And because of robotics and automation
and mechatronics, we have been
proactive and responsive in having
this center come to fruition.”
Clark’s move to SCTC from
Georgia Piedmont was not such a
far trek— they share a border of their
territory— so he was familiar with
some of the issues when he started
his time. Many of the workforce development issues are similar across
the state and for the Atlanta metro
region, they are even more so.
“Our industries in our region
are evolving faster and it has
pushed us to be even more agile,
more innovative, and even more
collaborative,” said Clark. “It’s been
energizing to see how our faculty
and staff have risen to the challenge. But the pace of change has
just been moving so quickly. I think
that is really indicative of what the
technical colleges are so good at,
which is being nimble, we can just
move when industry moves.”
That is certainly an area that
technical colleges excel at, and have
some advantage on over larger state
universities. Not that the big state
universities can’t do that, but turning those giant ships in a different
direction takes a little time.
“You can come in as an industry and we can help them on our
technical education side with our
degree certificate and diploma programs. Or we can help them on the
economic development side, which
is customized training,” underscores
Clark. “We have direct connections
with the workforce boards, as well
as close partnerships with the
regional commissions.” For Southern
Crescent, on the edge of the Atlanta
metro, it has three different commissions they can work with: Three Rivers, Atlanta Regional Commission,
and Northeast Georgia Regional
Commission.
