Articles by David Tobenkin

Indiana leans into youth apprenticeships

An ambitious statewide youth apprenticeship program modeled on the renowned Swiss system of apprenticeships starting in high school is being developed in Indiana, with Ivy Tech Community College (Ivy Tech), the statewide community college system,…


Candid conversations about Black male student success

A remarkable mentorship and wraparound services program at a New Jersey community college has allowed Black male student outcomes to catch up to those of the general student population by one measure. Lagging Black male…


Gather, analyze and develop

Since 2022, the Alabama Community College System (ACCS) has administered its Skills for Success program through which Alabama community colleges across the state train employees in new careers. The training comprises self-paced online instruction followed…


Using LMI to help disadvantaged students

The odds were long, but in August 2022 a consortium led by Dallas College emerged as one of only 32 worker-centered, industry-led workforce training partnerships in the nation to receive a multimillion federal grant to…


Tapping powerful labor market information for agility

In 2020, after more than 200 years, the Remington Arms factory in Ilion, New York, shut its doors, and nearly 250 mainly skilled labor employees without college degrees were let go. But fortunately, Mohawk Valley…


TRIO celebrates achievements, faces challenges

The future is bright for Chantal Ramirez, a 21-year-old at Klamath Community College (KCC) who will transfer to Southern Oregon University as a junior this fall after receiving a KCC associate degree in psychology. She…


The eight TRIO programs

TRIO programs were first created with the start of the Upward Bound program in 1964. While there are specific guidelines for each of the TRIO programs, the unifying eligibility factors are: (1) students from low-income…


Tackling mental health

Mental health is the next frontier for some community colleges, with Covid bringing into clearer focus the need to improve mental health services to help fulfill their mission of educating students. The Alamo Colleges District…


Fall of a mall, rise of an incubator

For Michael Heindl, president of Northwest Mississippi Community College (NWCC), opportunity knocked when a major new mall at the Mississippi-Tennessee border, the Tanger Outlets Southaven, opened in 2015 and began pulling shoppers and then retailers…


Back in their line of work

Luis Espinoza’s ordeal to be able to practice as a nurse in the U.S. is a cautionary tale.  Despite immigrating from Mexico to Chicago in 1999 with a nursing degree and returning to obtain a…