“Action” and “Data” were the watchwords at a key meeting last week of Hartford education leaders who gathered to focus on repairing and improving the K-12-college-workforce pipeline.  The ALL IN! Coalition held its inaugural “Stakeholder Caucus” last week at Capital Community College, hosted by its backbone organization Achieve Hartford! and featuring active participation by both Mayor Luke Bronin and newly hired Hartford Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Leslie Torres-Rodriguez.  What was achieved?

The Stakeholder Caucus event was an invitation-only update for current and potential coalition member organizations that both reported on ALL IN!’s progress since launching last October and solicited feedback for direction in Year 2.

More than a mere update presentation, the Stakeholder Caucus allowed for vibrant, solutions-driven, two-way discussions on how organizations in the room and others can work together to identify and increase the number of young people who not only complete post-secondary education, but who also are hired into high-demand occupations.

Change is Coming

Attendees recognized the need for sweeping change in Hartford to ensure ALL IN! meets its bold but achievable goals (listed below), while noting such progress requires collective action.

ALL IN! is a public-private coalition with a goal-oriented agenda for 2025:

• Increase the high school graduation rate from 71.5 to 95 percent;
• Increase the post-secondary enrollment rate from 50 to 70 percent; and
• Increase the post-secondary completion rate from 23 to 50 percent.

Within the ALL IN! Coalition’s theory of change, Action Teams are workgroups designed to facilitate collective action efforts to solve discrete, concrete pipeline problems. Member organizations sign on to an Action Team and together assess baseline metrics, identify one specific target goal, and realign existing member organizations’ efforts and resources to address the problem.

In May, the ALL IN! Coalition’s Steering Committee will hear full proposals from members on new Action Teams to add in the Year 2 Collective Action Plan, which will work alongside already existing Action Teams from Year 1:

1. Action Team #1: Reduce Summer Melt
2. Action Team #2: Longitudinal Data Analysis Project

The Bottom Line

Nine years is not as long as it might sound to achieve the goals that have been set.  ALL IN! intends to celebrate the above-listed achievements in 2025, while measuring and publicly reporting progress along the way.  As we grow, ALL IN! will design and build out additional Action Teams to help reach the 2025 goals, which will likely span the continuum of the education-workforce pipeline, based on Hartford need.

Everyone knows that the only way to get to the finish line is through the alignment of efforts and resources, which is why key corporate and philanthropic institutions have joined the coalition as well.  Be on the lookout soon for a press release on who has joined the coalition, and be sure to check out the All IN! website, www.AllINHartford.org.