Giving Compass' Take:

· EdSurge explains Google's IT Support Certificate Program and the positive effects it has on the workforce. The program also creates educational and employment opportunities for disadvantaged individuals and allows Google to fill "middle-skill" positions.

· How can other businesses follow Google's model? What programs can community colleges and businesses collaborate on to fill the needed tech workforce?  

· Read about the ways community colleges are working to integrate apprenticeships into their offerings.

Today’s red-hot job market demands new approaches to skill building, and community colleges find themselves on the front lines of this workforce-development challenge.

This is especially true when it comes to the growing share of jobs that are technology related and hinge on rapidly-evolving skillsets—which today make up more than a quarter of all job openings, according to data from Burning Glass Technologies. These tech jobs cut across industry sectors and many of them can be characterized as “middle-skill”—those that require more education and training than a high school diploma, but less than a four-year college degree.

Despite their often limited budgets, the innovative nature and adaptability of community colleges makes them well-positioned to meet the training needs for aspiring tech professionals.

Unfortunately, most employers have difficulty filling middle-skill jobs, and they are more likely to leave vacancies unfilled or hire temporary workers than to collaborate with community colleges or other training providers, according to an Accenture survey

That seems to be changing though, with industry waking up to the need to invest in middle-skills development. Just look at Apple’s partnership with numerous community colleges to integrate its app development tools and frameworks into curriculum, or Facebook’s plan to teach their social media products based on topics like generating leads on social media platforms, monetizing content, and increasing online sales.

At Google, one of us works as a product lead for the IT Support Professional Certificate on Coursera—a program designed to take beginner-level learners to IT job readiness in about eight months. Since launch this January, the typically eight-month-long program has enrolled nearly 40,000 learners and has already seen more than 1,200 completers just five months since launch.

Read the full article about Google's IT Support Certificate Program by Natalie Van Kleef Conley and Sean Gallagher at EdSurge.