Community colleges play a pivotal role in preparing a skilled workforce that meets evolving industry demands. Positioned at the intersection of education and employment, these institutions are uniquely equipped to design and deliver career pathways that both empower students and address the talent needs of regional employers. Nevertheless, the imperative to remain responsive and relevant presents ongoing challenges within the structure of higher education. Without sustained, intentional efforts, institutional responsiveness can stagnate over time.                                                                                                                                              

At Rogue Community College (RCC), recent initiatives have focused on identifying systemic barriers to industry engagement and implementing targeted strategies to enhance agility in workforce development. Over the past year, RCC has taken deliberate steps to cultivate stronger partnerships with industry stakeholders and to align curricular offerings more closely with labor market needs to increase responsiveness and relevance in service of both students and workforce partners.

Environmental Scans

In the contemporary higher education landscape, institutions are increasingly challenged to balance academic rigor with the evolving demands of the labor market. Nowhere is this tension more evident than in career and technical education (CTE) programs, where the pace of technological change and shifting industry standards necessitate continuous programmatic responsiveness. While the development of high-quality curriculum and assessments remains foundational to institutional mission and student success, such work requires considerable time, collaboration, and institutional resources. Consequently, once curricular frameworks are in place, they may not be revisited frequently, posing risks to their continued relevance in a dynamic employment landscape.

This challenge is particularly acute in workforce-oriented disciplines, where the alignment between educational preparation and employer expectations is critical. CTE programs attempt to bridge this gap through partnerships with industry advisory boards, which serve as conduits for real-time feedback from sector leaders. When these collaborations are robust, they facilitate meaningful alignment between curricula and the competencies required by employers. Students benefit through enhanced employability, better preparedness for industry-specific challenges, and increased access to upward mobility within their chosen fields.

Nevertheless, misalignments can persist. The so-called skills gap—mismatch between what students are taught and what employers expect—continues to be a concern in many sectors (Chau et al., 2023). These gaps can hinder graduate outcomes and impact institutional performance metrics related to job placement, employer satisfaction, and regional economic development. To address these issues, higher education institutions must adopt proactive, data-informed strategies that support ongoing curriculum refinement and responsiveness.

One such strategy is the use of environmental scans, which are regularly produced and disseminated to internal stakeholders responsible for workforce program planning and evaluation. These scans provide critical labor market intelligence tailored to RCC’s regional context and academic offerings. Typical elements of an environmental scan include real-time data on in-demand occupations, wage progression trajectories, educational credentialing requirements, annual regional job openings, labor market projections, workforce demographics, and an analysis of peer and competitive educational offerings. Such comprehensive analyses equip institutional leaders with the insights needed to make evidence-based decisions about existing and emerging programs.

Moreover, environmental scans are instrumental in shaping new program development. They inform foundational questions such as whether a program should be credit-bearing or non-credit-bearing, the appropriate duration of training to ensure industry readiness, and the optimal modality for instruction. These insights also support alignment with diverse learner profiles and intentions, including those exploring new career pathways, reskilling incumbent workers, or addressing equity gaps in educational attainment. At RCC, environmental scans are one tool used to support agility and relevance, enabling faculty and administrators to align academic offerings with the real-time needs of the regional labor force and to contribute meaningfully to local economic vitality.

Customized Training for High School Students

Strategic partnerships between community colleges and regional high schools are foundational to fulfilling the access and equity mission of two-year institutions. These collaborations not only enhance pathways to affordable postsecondary education and strengthen college readiness but also contribute to the long-term socioeconomic advancement of students and their families. As engines of regional development, community colleges rely on these alliances to address persistent equity gaps and cultivate a more inclusive, skilled workforce. However, establishing and sustaining high-impact partnerships requires more than goodwill; it demands a deliberate, institutionally aligned strategy. This includes intentional planning to support relationship-building, ongoing collaboration, and continuous innovation; each are critical to ensuring that such partnerships remain resilient and responsive amid shifting educational landscapes and policy environments.

Despite the strength of partnerships between community colleges and regional high schools, many students continue to encounter a problematic institutional bifurcation that frames their postsecondary trajectory as either college-bound or workforce-bound. This dichotomy oversimplifies student aspirations and fails to reflect the complexity of modern educational pathways. For students intending to pursue community college and potentially transfer to four-year institutions, the landscape remains particularly fragmented. As Bettencourt et al. (2022) observe, “technical certificates only somewhat serve as a step to associate’s degrees, while associate degrees in CTE subjects are generally not steps to bachelor’s degrees” (p. 467). This misalignment of credentialing structures creates barriers to educational progression and undermines the potential of community colleges to serve as equitable launchpads for both academic advancement and workforce readiness.

As institutions work toward long-term alignment of credentialing structures to more effectively support students’ educational and career aspirations, one promising strategy that RCC has implemented involves the development of customizable noncredit training opportunities for high school students. Through close collaboration with regional high schools, faculty and staff from RCC’s Community and Workforce Training department engage directly with high school educators, administrators, and students to identify areas of career interest and cocreate training programs that culminate in industry-recognized credentials. These programs integrate work-based learning experiences, allowing students to apply newly acquired skills in real-world industry settings. Delivered in a cohort model, the training is thoughtfully scheduled around the high school calendar to account for students’ extracurricular, familial, and employment responsibilities. One of RCC’s most effective practices has been developing training in coordination with high school faculty and then embedding bulk training hours on site within existing high school class periods , thereby ensuring accessibility and minimizing disruption to students’ academic schedules.

Over the past year, RCC has delivered a range of noncredit workforce training programs, including phlebotomy, nursing assistant, and forklift operator courses, that culminate in certificates of completion and enable students to earn industry-recognized credentials. These offerings are intentionally designed to serve a broad spectrum of high school students, from those who do not intend to pursue postsecondary education to those already admitted to four-year institutions. By providing early exposure to higher education environments and career-aligned training, these programs expand equitable access to workforce pathways and significantly enhance students’ readiness for both employment and further education. Embedding these experiences within the high school context not only demystifies college for underserved populations but also positions RCC as a critical partner in regional talent development.

Next Steps

RCC’s experiences underscore the distinctive capacity of community colleges to serve as agile, equity-driven engines of workforce development and regional economic vitality. To maximize this potential, continued innovation, strategic alignment, and systems-level collaboration are imperative. One key next step involves integrating environmental scans into established annual program planning and reporting cycles. This alignment will embed labor market intelligence into institutional routines, fostering a culture of continuous, evidence-based responsiveness. It will also support faculty in refining curricula to reflect current workforce competencies, thereby enhancing both student employability and program relevance.

In tandem, RCC will prioritize the expansion of stackable credential models across both credit-bearing and noncredit workforce training programs. These models aim to create seamless, flexible pathways into two- and four-year degrees while also accelerating time-to-credential through mechanisms like credit for prior learning. By doing so, RCC enhances affordability and accessibility for diverse learners, particularly adult and returning students. These innovations align with broader state and national imperatives to increase credential attainment, advance economic mobility, and close equity gaps in postsecondary access and outcomes.

Sustaining these efforts will require institutional commitment and policy advocacy. RCC and its peer institutions must continue to champion the development of stable funding streams for short-term, noncredit training programs and pursue policy changes that expand student eligibility for financial aid in workforce education contexts. Equally critical is the investment in professional development for faculty and staff, especially in the areas of labor market analytics, culturally responsive pedagogy, and flexible instructional delivery models. Equipping educators with these competencies will ensure the long-term success and scalability of high-impact practices.

As the landscape of education and employment continues to evolve, the imperative for community colleges to align academic offerings with real-world demands must remain both dynamic and sustained. Through intentional partnerships, data-informed strategies, and a steadfast commitment to student-centered design, community colleges like RCC are well-positioned to lead in shaping accessible, future-ready pathways that serve learners, employers, and communities alike.

References

Bettencourt, G. M., George Mwangi, C. A., Green, K. L., & Morales, D. M. (2022). But, do I need a college degree?: Understanding perceptions of college and career readiness among students enrolled in a career and technical high school. Innovative higher education, 47(3), 453-470. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8614215

Chau, H., Bana, S. H., Bouvier, B., & Frank, M. R. (2023). Connecting higher education to workplace activities and earnings. PLOS ONE, 18(3), e0282323. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0282323

Lead image: Local high school students who completed a phlebotomy workforce training cohort

Lisa Parks is Dean, Business and Workforce Development, at Rogue Community College in Grants Pass, Oregon.

Opinions expressed in Learning Abstracts are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the League for Innovation in the Community College.