With sustainability and green energy set to play a critical role in the growth of our national economy, community colleges represent a way to meet the needs of local businesses and residents.  Join experts and practitioners from the U.S. and Europe in Asheville on April 26-27 as they highlight expanded roles for colleges in educating students, businesses, and communities about and for economic opportunities in renewable energy, conservation, ecotourism, and local sustainable agriculture and manufacturing.

Topics to be discussed include:

• Skills for new green-oriented industries and for sustainable practices in other sectors
• Enhancing local and sustainable agriculture, natural resources, and crafts
• “Green thinking” in all programs
• Making campuses models of sustainability

Go to www.ta3online.org/2010meeting/ for more information including information about registration and scheduled speakers.

The theme for the 2009 symposium and meeting of the Trans-Atlantic Technology & Training Alliance in Tampere, Finland was New Learning Environments and Cultural Differences.  Organized by Marjut Salminen of Tampere College and hosted by the college on May 4-6, 2009, the first day included presentations on the Finnish educational system, skills to cope with cultural differences, new business incubators as learning environments, creative entrepreneurship, cross cultural understanding for international employees, and benchmark practices.  Members from seven countries were took part in the three days of professional, business, and cultural events.  TA3 members toured Tampere College and visited the Kuru Forest College, where they held their business meeting, which included a strategic planning discussion led by EUC-Syd—and also test-drove the school’s log haulers and had an evening meal at a log cottage.  The agenda and selected presentations can be downloaded here

The 2009 TA3 Conference will be held May 4-6, 2009 in Tampere, Finland, hosted by Tampere College.  Our proposed conference theme is “New Learning Environments & Cultural Differences.” We’ll discuss the innovative ways that colleges create learning environments that are experiential, reflect real life or work situations, and/or are immediately relevant to a student’s particular interests or background. Speakers will address topics such as entrepreneurial learning through incubators, simulated work situations or enterprises, and learning based on the characteristics of a certain sector or industry cluster.

More information will be available soon.

Our ongoing work with the Rapides Foundation continues this month, with RTS making presentations to community leaders in Central Louisiana around the future of Workforce Development.  Chris Beacham, our Director of Economic Development Programs, talked about the current state of Cenla’s economy and what the future holds for the region.  Chris’ presentation can be downloaded here and you can read about the effort in the Alexandria newspaper here.

A group of international experts on cluster-based economic development gathered in Burlington Vermont, September 21-24 in a meeting sponsored by RTS and the Ford Foundation.  The group discussed issues around clusters in rural, disadvantaged communities and how effective strategies can be devised that address not only economic development but social equity and inclusion and enivronmental impact–or what is being called the triple bottom line of development.   RTS is in the midst of a project for the Foundation in which several organizations are tasked with looking at different ways to approach the TBL. While RTS is looking at clusters, other groups are looking at entrepneurship, finance and supply chain development as ways to impact rural development in a triple bottom line manner.  In the coming weeks, we will be posting more materials from the meeting on this web site.  You can see a full participant list here.

We recently brought together  more than 80 community leaders, business owners, artists and non-profits in Bentonville and Little Rock, Arkansas to hear  our preliminary recommendations on the next steps that the state can take to enhance its creative economy  Local press featured the meeting as well.  Click here to read their account.

We plan to hold two more of these meeting later this Fall.

You can read more about RTS work in Arkansas, sponsored by the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation, with our Year 1 and Year 2 report, plus our series of vignettes on Arkansas’ economy.