State education secretary talks policy in Cal visit
State Secretary of Education Pedro Rivera addressed about three dozen employees of Intermediate Unit 1 about statewide education policy during the afternoon visit to the organization’s headquarters in California.
Among the priorities Rivera outlined was his desire to revise state graduation requirements. He said his agency is trying to persuade the state legislature to “to look more holistically around graduation requirements” and broaden them to include things like “college-ready standards” and “career-ready standards,” among others.
“If we get our way there’ll be a good number of bills coming down the pipeline that will allow multiple pathways to graduation for kids who can earn and will earn livable wage employment, and that’s going to align directly to a lot of the work you are doing here…,” Rivera said.
His stop at the California headquarters of the IU – which provides services for districts in Washington, Greene and Fayette counties – marked the start of a tour aimed at promoting science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM, education.
That constellation of subjects forms much of the focus of a proposal by Gov. Tom Wolf – a Democrat who named Rivera secretary in 2015 – to earmark $50 million toward closing what Wolf’s administration claims is a gap between employers’ needs and graduates’ job training in next year’s state budget.
Rivera also accompanied IU officials to the unit’s three-year-old Mobile Fab Lab, where program manager Brandon Prentice showed off the trailer – containing 3-D printers, a laser cutter and other technology – which travels to area districts to encourage project-based learning.
The intermediate unit operates similar stationary labs at its campuses in Waynesburg and Redstone Township, Fayette County.