Since the economic crisis emerged over a year ago, there has been a rash of reports on the influx of students into post-secondary institutions, especially community and technical colleges. Here is the most recent from the Economist. In addition to citing economic factors, the article also points to a number of other dynamics that contribute to this trend. First, post-secondary enrollment rates have been going up for several years. Increasing the pool of potential students, the percentage of young people who fail to complete high school has shrunk from nearly 16% to less than 10% over the past 30 years. Additionally, the current economic woes have driven home the point that the availability of well-paying unskilled labor jobs has dropped precipitously over the past two decades marked by cataclysmic changes in the U.S. automotive industry as well as the trend toward the outsourcing of manufacturing

It is clear that the current upsurge of interest in training is in part influenced by the perception by many that they have no other viable options. However, it is hard to think there are not some silver linings in the grey clouds. First, while there are no guarantees that additional training will definitely lead to a job offer at the end of the line, it is hard to think that a broadened skill set will decrease an individual’s employability, especially if schooling is in a skill with high demand. From a broader societal perspective, there also seem to be few negatives in increasing the value of the nation’s human capital which will benefit us all in the long run.

Reid Klion