Dive Brief:
- The Strayer Skills Index reveals a striking picture of industries with significant deficits in key positions like information technology and programming.
- Sectors like financial services and healthcare are growing at a rapid pace, with more than 129,000 jobs added in the last nine months. But tech professionals remain at a premium in these industries.
- Healthcare is the next industry to expect a boom in workforce needs, as many experts project a 19% expansion increase over the next eight years.
Dive Insight:
How do colleges and universities adjust to the sudden, swift changes of the employment marketplace? The short answer is to raise more money, hire more faculty and offer more degree programs in these areas. But growth in one or two sectors may not dictate what is best for a school, depending on its geographic, financial and industrial priorities.
College leaders are well-suited in understanding the changing demographics of the American workforce, but more importantly, analyzing the future of the community and cities around them to serve as domestic or global models of productivity. While the world may need more tech professionals, if a city requires more agricultural or secondary education development, then a school is better off meeting that need than saving the world.