KnowledgeWorks cut its teeth more than 10 years ago by focusing on two primary objectives: 1) creating and networking college access programs so that more people could have access to education beyond high school, and 2) workforce development which included the reorganization of adult education in Ohio to better allow adults to acquire new skills as well as the creation of career pathway programs that point workers toward fields with growing demand. Back then, all the studies were telling us that having at least some form of college – ideally a four-year degree – increases the chances of getting a good job and being more financially stable over the long term.

Today, as a national social enterprise, we are looking to find the best ways to prepare students for college and career by advocating that education moves past its industrial-age roots to preparing kids for 21st century challenges and creating that model on the ground through our school approaches.

We know that people with four-year degrees tend to make more money over a lifetime than those with fewer years of post-secondary training – and certainly those whose academic career ends at high school. This makes the discussion about how colleges ought to serve “middle workers” all the more intriguing. As Fawn noted in her story on Valencia College in Orlando, it is becoming increasingly important for colleges to provide the kind of education that prospective job-seekers need and that employees require.

Since 2006 KnowledgeWorks has studied trends affecting the future of education with our 2020 Forecast: Creating the Future of Learning. Many of the drivers of change in that forecast have come to pass, including “Amplified Educators and Learners” (see Kahn Academy, for example.

In the next few weeks, version 3.0 of that Forecast looking out to 2025 will reveal a key disruption very relevant to this discussion.

Over the next decade, our research shows that “career pathways will become less tied to the requirements of a single institution or industry.” Instead, those pathways will be validated through “a multitude of alternate credentials, certificates, and reputation markers.” The research also predicts a shift from a work force to a talent cloud, where employers will look to networks of talent to match “specialized skills with interaction-based tasks.”

Comprising that talent cloud certainly will be “middle workers” -- those with highly specialized skills doing highly specialized jobs and being well-compensated for it. This could be called workforce development 2.0, and it is indicative of the flexibility for education to help kids become career-ready.

At the end of the day, it makes sense that we create multiple pathways for kids to be as successful as possible, whether it’s through high school approaches such as the New Tech Network and its project-based learning track, an early college high school model like EDWorks Fast Track that accelerates exposure to rigorous college courses and cuts down on costs as well, or cradle to career initiatives such as Strive, our subsidiary mentioned earlier by Dan Smith. All will play their part in helping to design the “talent cloud” that we see coming over the horizon.

In our 21st Century, multicultural, globalized world, it’s clear that colleges and universities can’t be the isolated institutions educating 18-22 year olds over four years that they once were. Today, there isn’t one single degree that represents a “golden ticket,” but students can count on the fact that higher education of some kind will be necessary to thrive in the current and future economy. Colleges and universities should not only provide a path for “middle workers,” they must see themselves more broadly as part of the fabric of the nation’s (changing) economy.

I believe this is an exciting frontier for higher education. As Fawn cited, colleges and universities have an advantage few institutions can tout these days – they have the trust and confidence of the American people. As such, higher education can be the driver of local economic development in communities across the country; bringing together diverse bedfellows from business, K-12 education, nonprofit and faith-based organizations, foundations, and the government to create a coordinated pathway to success. And this success is not obtaining a college degree in itself – it’s being employed with a meaningful, well-paying job.

The University of Cincinnati and its work with the STRIVE Partnership pioneered a model for 21st Century higher education. Today, seven communities across the country are using the STRIVE framework to bring every child from cradle to career. The idea that colleges and universities have a role to play in their communities is not new. But we’re learning that what is required from higher education is a commitment to the entire community – to ensure students are college-ready before they enroll, to make them career-ready while they’re there, and to provide appropriate training to students after graduation.

Changing the narrative about college requires higher education to think strategically about what jobs are available now, what jobs will be available in 10 years, and how they are supporting kids in K-12 schools. If institutions consider those questions on a daily basis, they will accommodate middle class workers and beyond. It’s a heavy lift, no question, and the burden of strengthening the 21st Century workforce does not only fall to higher education. But colleges and universities are uniquely positioned – because there are models of success to work from, because they are highly esteemed by the public, and because they are already deeply rooted in their communities – to be the center of 21st Century economic development.

While the critical thinking skills learned in a conventional liberal arts education at a university are still valued by many employers, there are many growing and well-paying employment sectors that do not require a four-year degree.

For example, take network administration. While one can certainly learn the trade as part of a computer science program at a university, someone can enter the workforce quicker and with less debt by studying the specific trade in a more focused way.

Community colleges and proprietary universities are adapting to fill in the gap between skills and open jobs. One of the biggest reasons for the success of proprietary higher education is that it is frequently quicker to adapt than public community colleges. Gainful employment tests for federal support for proprietary programs can help focus them around training students for job skills that are needed in the private sector. And community colleges can and should support workforce demands by adapting to the changing needs of the economy.

While the route from community college to four-year university will likely exist for the foreseeable future, community colleges will increasingly beef up practical associates degrees as well as skill certification programs.

"College for all" has persuaded many kids that they're doomed to failure if they can't earn a bachelor's degree. We need to do a much better job of telling students -- by ninth grade at the latest -- that there are multiple paths to a self-sufficient adult life. The choices they make in high school matter.

If they enjoy academic learning and can earn A's and B's (mostly A's) in college-prep classes, then they have the ability and work ethic to earn a bachelor's degree. With a few exceptions, that's the best choice. They'll need advice on how to get financial aid and avoid unnecessary college debt.

Students who don't enjoy academic learning and can't do better than B's and C's should know that working a bit harder will enable them to succeed in a job training program at a community college. A technical associate degree or certificate is worth more in the labor market than many non-technical bachelor's degrees.

Students earning C's and D's or D's and F's should be told they need to work a lot harder on the foundation skills -- reading, writing, math, science -- that they'll need to train for a decent job. Providing high-quality vocational classes -- closely linked to the nearest community college -- would help motivate many of these kids.

I've met a lot of bad students and they all want to get a "good job." They just don't have a clue what they should be doing to reach their goals.

The first step is telling students and their parents what the array of options are. It's not four-year college or failure.

The Obama administration has set a goal - by 2020 the United States will lead the world in the percentage of students graduating from college. It is a lofty goal but notably absent from it is the second half of the US Education Department's objective to get kids to be "college and career ready". There is a full press to get students out of high school and into college but the career portion seems to have fallen between the cracks.

Some twenty years ago vocational education programs were rightfully charged with becoming the dumping ground for minorities and limited English proficient students. Vocational education fell out of favor and the politically correct term became career and technical education. But unfortunately a radical shift occurred away from providing students with skills that would get them jobs after high school and an all our push to get every child into college. Consequently, thousands of students that have no desire to go to college were deprived of a viable option and became high school dropouts.

Every student should be prepared for and given the opportunity to go to college, but they should not be deprived of the option to learn a skill and get a job. Today we are suffering the consequence of having deprived students of that option. Thousands of jobs that do not require college remain vacant while unemployment remains high. Our students' performance is often compared to other countries' on international tests but we fail to note that in many of those countries only a third of students follow an academic track while two thirds pursue occupational education and apprenticeship program and in the process realize a youth unemployment rate half ours.

Industry has stepped up big time in European countries, offering high school aged students paying apprenticeships where students spend half of the school day acquiring job skills that are reinforced in school the other half of the day. Corporate America should follow suit and our culture should move away from labeling students that pursue a vocation as second class while providing all of our students with the basic skills required to succeed in the twenty-first century and the option to go to college, or not.