As Mayor Fischer reiterated today to a Metro Hall filled with education advocates, we must celebrate our successes in education and acknowledge our challenges. It has long been known that education must be a top priority for Louisville to flourish.
In May of 2010 members of an Education Roundtable signed the historic Greater Louisville Education Commitment with five key objectives:
1. Create and support a college-going culture
2. Use the business community's unique points of leverage to accelerate attainment
3. Prepare students for success in college, career, citizenship and life
4. Make post-secondary education accessible and affordable
5. Increase educational persistence, performance and progress
In October 2010, a new public-private partnership called 55,000 Degrees took on this mission with the support of local foundations to launch Louisville into the top tier of our competitor cities with the bold goal of adding 40,000 bachelor's degrees and 15,000 associate's degrees by 2020.
Today marked the first 55,000 Degrees Progress Report.
Successes:
- The number of working-age adults with college degrees increased by approximately 7,000 from 2008 to 2009. Over the last 10 years Louisville posted the second largest increase among 15 peer cities.
- In one year, there has been a 14% jump in the number of 2-year degrees and a 7% jump in the number of 4-year degrees awarded locally.
- In one year there has been a 20% increase in working age adults with some college returning to school.
Challenges:
- Too great a number of college freshmen are arriving to college unprepared.
- 90,000 working-age adults have some college credits, but have not completed their degrees.
- Louisville ranks last among our peer cities in the percentage of African Americans with college degrees.
While these goals are lofty, being a more educated city is a marathon requiring one step at a time to attain one degree at a time. Keeping united and focused on one common goal of improving our educational health will be transformational to our region and future.
For more on 55,000 Degrees, click
here.
To view video of the full press conference, click
here.