When educators and business executives get together, sparks literally fly. At least that is the case with the Rhode Island Information Technology Academy, a newly formed collaboration of government, education and private business leaders designed to prepare Rhode Island’s future workforce by implementing technology instruction at the high school and college levels.
”Our goal is to provide the spark for students in a career that most kids in high school don’t think of,” said George Loftus, acting head of the RIITA.
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The program, created out of a concern over the shortage of qualified information technology (IT) professionals that currently exists in technology-related industries, was the “brainchild” of current IT professionals.
Loftus said the idea was first discussed at an ITECH convention in Providence in the fall of 1998, and was embraced immediately by members of the business community who agreed to sponsor the program in three high schools and at the Community College of Rhode Island. The five founding businesses are: Atrion Networking Corporation, Lighthouse Communications, Merill Clark Inc., Synet, Inc., and Unicom Computer Centers.
“All of the founders have a direct role in the field today,” he said. “What we really wanted to do is foster the development of Information Technology as a career.”
According to program developers, a crucial part of Rhode Island’s economic development strategy is to develop an IT “capability and competency” within the state’s business sector and labor force.
The state estimates a real shortage in the number of IT professionals, and the program was designed specifically to close that gap.
“In the future, any job or career is going to require people with more technical skills as well as an academic background,” said Barbara Ruffino, vice president of business services for Merrill Clark Inc., and also serves as vice chair of the academy.
An IT professional is considered a networker for computer programming, said Dennis Alpert, a program curriculum instructor at East Providence Career and Technical High School.
”Networking people can tie computers together, tie building computer systems together, and connect computers to the Internet,” he said. “It’s a good career that unfortunately many students don’t know about.
The two-year technical curriculum designed by Cisco Systems had been deployed throughout 1,046 academies distributed across 49 states and nine countries. Rhode Island has three sites: East Providence Career and Technical School, Exeter West Greenwich High School, and Woonsocket Career and Technical School. All three sites are coordinated by a main center at CCRI.
”The curriculum is primarily on-line,” Alpert said “It’s certainly a tough course. With only occasional labs and lectures, students are required to do much of their work on-line, including taking all of their tests.”
Alpert said the first semester is always the hardest for students because much of the time is donated to learning computer “lingo” and acronyms. Once students complete that, the rest of the course in most of their work is hands-on learning, he said.
Ruffino said that although in other states, programs like these are called Cisco Academies, organizers felt the program needed a different name in Rhode Island.
”We wanted our students to have a broader view,” she said. “We decided that we did not want to teach kids just the technical skills associated with Cisco, but we wanted to have a focus of introducing different aspects of technology.”
Merill said so far one of the hardest things is helping students realize that technology can be more than just a “tool” in their chosen career path.
”Kids have taken to technology like ducks to water,” she said. “But they see it as a tool instead of a career path. We are trying to get them to understand that it is more than just a part of life.”
The Information Technology Academy can have a total of 10 sites in the state as part of the program, and recently began soliciting bids from more schools that would like to begin the program in the fall of 2000. According to Loftus, the process is very competitive and each school must commit close to $30,000 for the project.
”As we look for as the next six schools, we are also looking at what they offer students prior to the taking the course,” he said.
Loftus said the academy is also looking for additional business sponsors to be partnered with the six schools.
