Workforce and Community Engagement

Description of the video:

My professional journey has been varied, but the consistent themes are around creating connections and building systems that help organizations and communities be better. The way I’ve done that work most recently has been focused on engaging employers and making sure that they are offering good jobs to people in our community who haven’t always been able to access them as easily in Indianapolis.

What I love about that work is the opportunity to focus on creating economic mobility and making sure that we’re building systems and infrastructure that allow lots of people to benefit—whether you're an employer, a student, or a community member.

What makes me most excited about being at IU Indianapolis in this moment is that it is an R1-designated research institution with a long-standing commitment to community engagement. Where we’ve done amazing work, and the community itself is so focused on talent development and really being the economic engine that fuels Indiana’s economy.

My top priorities for the first 60 to 90 days here at IU Indianapolis are really focused on listening to our community and learning more about the many assets that already exist here, while working to build trust and strengthen the partnerships that support our shared success. My top priorities for the first 60 to 90 days here at IU Indianapolis are really focused on listening to our community and learning a little bit about the many assets that already exist in our community, and working to build up that trust on campus. I have been focusing a lot of my attention on the many different schools that exist here, all of the assets that are already here at IU Indianapolis, the labs, the research centers, and the students who are engaging in co-ops and different internships.

What I'm so excited about is understanding how all of that works today, so that then we can think about how we focus and align those efforts to create a single entry for employers who are looking to leverage all of those assets that exist, and create that front door for Indianapolis so that the business community and the entire community understand how they can engage with IU Indianapolis in a more seamless fashion.

The IU strategic plan is very exciting because the work of the Office of Workforce and Community Engagement really aligns most with service to the state, and how we leverage all the assets we have at IU Indianapolis to help ensure good outcomes for students, the region, and our economy. The reality is that the business community is truly looking for ways in which they can find good talent, but also how they can maintain a competitive edge, be innovative, and continue to grow their business in our community. At the same time, the education community is focused on discovery, on learning, on creating impact for students and for the community at large.

So my goal would be that we collaborate well with all of the different schools doing amazing work already, and ensure that the business community understands where they can plug in to find the talent they need, to find the research project or the faculty researcher to help them bring a new product to market, and to work with all of the different partners in IU and more broadly in our community in Indianapolis and across the state, to ensure that those efforts align and create the impact we want them to for the state of Indiana.

I believe, in a lot of the work I've done in the past, that I've been a change agent, but a change agent who understands all of the different patterns and systems that exist and how we bring them together to create positive outcomes for everybody involved. And I'm excited to be able to bring that to IU Indianapolis so that we can fulfill our mission to be the talent engine for the city and the state of Indiana.

When I think of community engagement, I think of all of the work a university, an anchor institution like IU Indianapolis, does in the community. The work we do with nonprofits, with philanthropic organizations, with government agencies, and with the business community is super broad. All of the work that we do already in community engagement with health care systems — I could go on and on.

That work, as I've shared already, is deep and already embedded in many respects within our community. IU Indianapolis is recognized for it as an urban institution and has recently been designated again with the Carnegie Community Engagement Classification, which is a tribute to all of the faculty members and institutions on campus that work to engage civically and in other ways in our community.

When I think about workforce development, it is part of community engagement, and in fact a very natural part of community engagement, where we're working with the business community to engage them and to work with them to ensure that our students have opportunities, but also to make sure that we're adding value to the business community.

So I see workforce engagement as an extension of the great work that's already been happening. And I'm excited that IU Indianapolis wants to focus on workforce engagement in this moment, while not losing sight of the role it plays as an anchor institution more broadly in the space of community engagement.