State tech schools offer free retraining

• By JORDAN BLUM
• Advocate Capitol News Bureau
• Published: May 15, 2008 - Page: 6A - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

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Louisiana’s community and technical colleges are offering to retrain students for free if businesses deem them not prepared enough after hiring them.

Gov. Bobby Jindal, who campaigned partly on the “Day 1 Guarantee,” praised the new plan in a news conference Wednesday at Baton Rouge Community College. The policy was approved earlier in the day by the Louisiana Community and Technical College System Board of Supervisors.

“In the short term you will see employers who say, ‘Look we hired this person; we thought they were ready to do the job. They’re not,’ and send them back to be retrained,” Jindal said.

“The more fundamental, long-term policy shift we expect to see … will increase the amount of collaboration between the (college) system and industry partners … to make sure we’re training the workers right the first time,” he said.

Jindal has touted work-force development as his No. 1 priority for the ongoing legislative session.

Jindal also said he expects to see changes in the state budget plans after $120 million — much of it from higher education — of his budget proposal was slashed Sunday by the House Appropriations Committee.

“We still are concerned about the level of funding,“ Jindal said, noting that the work-force education money is still largely intact.

“We’re very, very early in the appropriations process,” Jindal said, “but I know there were concerns about some of the priorities, some of the decisions that were made.”

There is no funding set aside specifically for the new “Day 1 Guarantee” policy, so there will be limited direct effects. But Jindal said the message and the stronger links between industry and colleges are key.

The colleges have internal funds and Jindal noted that his proposed budget is setting aside $10 million to immediately provide training for high-demand jobs.

LCTCS President Joe May said the “Day 1 Guarantee” is much more than a gimmick.

“This is not lip service,” May said. “We’re printing thousands of these (guarantee policy) documents. We’re sending them to employers and people across the state. Every college catalog will have a copy of this guarantee printed in it.

“I can’t think of greater accountability than saying, ‘We guarantee our graduates,’ ” May said.