A&M INKS MOUs WITH SCHOOL DISTRICTS, COUNTY, TO TRAIN WORKFORCE

Special to El RrunRrun

With more than 3,500 local students certified in various specialized vocations and another 1,400 enrolled and registered for future courses after only one year of operating at the Brownsville Navigation District, Texas A&M's Rio Grande Valley's Advanced Manufacturing Hub signed Memoranda Of Understanding (MOUs) with another four local partners at the Port of Brownsville.

With A & M's Chancellor John Sharp and regent Mike Hernandez looking on, Cameron County, the the Brownsville Independent School District, Los Fresnos, and the Point Isabel CISDs inked a deal to provide completely free training to local students through its RGV Advanced Manufacturing Hub located at the port.

Cameron County Judge Eddie Teviño represented the county ad Dr. Rene Gutierrez represented the Brownsville Independent School District. 

It was a continuation, said A &M Chancellor Sharp –a former Texas State Comptroller and legislator – of the state's newest empire, a skilled workforce that will draw industry and progress to the region just as the former empires that fueled Texas like, cattle, cotton, and oil and gas, did before.

Sharp was appointed Chancellor of The Texas A&M University System by the Board of Regents on Sept. 6, 2011 and leads one of the largest systems in the country with an annual budget of $7.2 billion and an enrollment of more than 152,000 at the A&M System’s 11 universities. Additionally, under the System umbrella, there are eight state agencies.

He said that the availability of a young, trained workforce, the biggest south of San Antonio, is making the Rio Grande Valley a magnet for outside industry.

"We have big Texans making a lot of little Texans," he joked. "When industry looks at Texas, they ask, what is the education levels of your work force? This is where the future of Texas is. There is nothing worse than to lose industry because we have 18 to 24 years who are poorly trained. This is the vision that regent Hernandez had two years before he was even named a regent at A & M."

Sharp then recognized the ground work laid by former Texas Senator Eddie Lucio Jr., Hernandez, and  

local leaders to establish the hub which provides completely free courses – either in classrooms or hands-on or online – to help local students develop new skills and improve existing ones and to    receive certification in various fields sought in the workforce by industry like cybersecurity,operating heavy equipment, pharmaceutical manufacturing, COVID-19 protocols, welding, occupational health and safety and process improvement, among others. 

Texas A&M's top engineering agencies, the Engineering Experiment Station and the A&M Engineering Extension Service teamed up with local leaders in the Rio Grande Valley to establish the TRAIN "Es Tu Futuro" program to address the need of industry to have a skilled workforce. Through that program, local community members receive the necessary training to be employed. 

The training is provided at no cost to participants and – in collaboration with educational entities like school districts, community colleges and governmental entities – inform and prepare high school and college students for careers in advanced manufacturing.

"We have some 5,000 kids in then pipeline," Sharpe said. "This is where industry is going to come. We have the most numerous (and that's your job), the best trained, workforce and it will pay dividends like it never did before. We have a whole bunch of kids who don't want to leave the Rio Grande Valley, and  instead of them going to A & M,  A&M is going to come to them. There's nothing you can think of that A&M will not help you with."

"And don't think that these students in the valley are any less than any other A &M graduate," he said. "They get a graduation ring just like this one," he said, holding up his hand to the applause of the people gathered under a large tent where the signing ceremony was held.  

BND chairman Esteban Guerra stated the mantra of the port and A&M's strategy in his introduction at the beginning of the MOU signing ceremony.

"Talent is universal," he said. "But opportunity is not." "We are developing a full-fledged training facility. The port is the economic engine of development of the region and the opportunities are endless. We're transforming economic development and working for a prosperous future."