CONCLUSIONS

An implicit assumption behind the arguments of those advocating school to work reforms has been the importance of strengthening the linkages between educational institutions and the labor market as a way of improving the nation's education and training system. Labor market connectivity has been, and continues to be, a key ingredient in state and federal efforts to reform vocational education. Although this idea seems to make intuitive sense, there has been little attempt to develop a conceptual foundation for it. In this study, we did not attempt to provide any evidence on the effectiveness or otherwise of labor market linkages to community colleges. Rather, our purpose was to examine systematically for the first time whether in fact such linkages were prevalent at the individual faculty level. Focusing on the role of instructors at public two-year colleges, we sought to determine the nature and extent of the different connections that exist between faculty and local business, government, and community organizations. We found that while there are many examples of linking activities, particularly among vocational faculty in community colleges, these are often ad hoc and informal in nature, and that institutions do relatively little to encourage or reward the building of connections through incentives.

Using a national survey of 1,725 community college faculty and additional evidence from four case studies, we reached six main conclusions:

1. Faculty and administrators agree that community college linkages to local labor markets are beneficial and important. However, although community college faculty are connected with local labor markets in a variety of ways, these linkages are generally ad hoc and informal in nature. Few institutions have developed systematic plans or strategies for developing and maintaining faculty linkages to local labor markets, or for using existing linkages to improve the quality of education.
2. Linkages that are relatively easy to establish and sustain are most common; those that require relatively more effort or time from faculty are less common. Thus, a large percentage of faculty report using business examples in the classroom; far fewer offer students experiential learning opportunities in work environments.
3. Among community college faculty, those who teach in academic disciplines perceive little need for linking with communities and invest little to no time in such activities. Part-time faculty, many of whom have strong community connections, are often unable to use these connections on behalf of the institution, largely as a result of their tenuous connection to the college. Thus, the work of forging connections rests largely with full-time, vocational faculty. Unfortunately, the heavy workload borne by vocational faculty leaves them with little time for supplemental activities of any kind, and the work of linking to local markets is only one of many demands on their time.
4. Institutional connections to community do not automatically or necessarily provide individual faculty with connections and thus have little impact at the classroom level in degree or certificate programs. For example, several of the institutions we studied had strong institutional connections with local communities as manifested in growing contract education programs; but the "lessons learned" in such programs had at most indirect effects on the curriculum and student services provided in for-credit vocational programs.
5. Vocational faculty are motivated to link with local labor markets because such connections are required for their programs to survive, especially to place students in jobs or in required practica and internships. Nonetheless, faculty receive little encouragement from their institutions to build linkages. For example, few institutions reward or recognize faculty efforts to link with local labor markets, provide professional development to help faculty develop skills in linking, or even reimburse faculty for the direct costs they may incur in building contacts with local employers (e.g., attending conferences, travel). Moreover, faculty face many barriers to linking, ranging from a lack of information about local employers to difficulty responding in a timely manner to employers' emerging needs.
6. The community is not a passive recipient of community college efforts to link but rather plays an active role in shaping college-community relations. Linking is easiest when the local labor market is strong and stable. Employers in depressed economic areas have little motivation to link with community colleges because they have little need for new employees. Communities with large numbers of small businesses or an unstable economic base pose challenges to establishing and sustaining meaningful linkages.

• Discussion