It was my privilege to be in attendance Aug. 26 when Amarillo College rolled out its transformative new Career Accelerator program.
This visionary program not only offers free web-development and cloud computing courses to people throughout our community, but students who take these 10-week “sprints” also receive $2,500 stipends that will help them cover living expenses while they acquire life-changing credentials. The Career Accelerator, part of AC’s new Innovation Outpost, will grow quickly and serve many.
My takeaway from attending the announcement at AC is this: What Amarillo College is doing right now is both visionary and prescient.
The program is essential for our community because the economy is now geared toward information technology, big data and a need for a more knowledgeable, IT-oriented workforce. I recall when Amarillo College President Russell Lowery-Hart stood before members of the business community about a year and a half ago and said, “I think we should rigorously promote technology and coding to our students, really get our community involved in coding and programming because the future of our economy depends on it. I want you to help,” he told us. “I want you to have jobs ready for the students we’re going to prepare for you.”
Now, sooner than it seems possible – with financial support from a multimillion-dollar gift AC received in June from philanthropist MacKenzie Scott – Amarillo College has launched its incentivized Career Accelerator. Both courses of study in the program are on a fast track, and our community stands to benefit greatly. Amarillo currently has a very competitive landscape for programmers; businesses are competing for a small talent pool, which is why I think this program is not only going to benefit the students immensely, but our businesses as well.
I’m writing about something that I honestly believe is a capstone moment for Amarillo. I think that one day we’ll look back at Russell’s announcement and realize the amazing difference Amarillo College made at this point in time because from a business perspective we’re looking for bright, young programmers. The Career Accelerator will give us programmers who can both hit the ground running and start earning a living wage from day one. Career Accelerator will also provide a collaborative platform for AISD and CISD to further develop technology as a path for students who wish to focus on coding, cloud computing, or anything IT-oriented.
Russell’s vision ultimately benefits everyone – even our restaurants and the arts – by creating a new high-tech culture that helps us retain our brightest minds, while bolstering the businesses we have and attracting new ones. Additionally, there’ll be more and more businesses within and beyond Texas that will need qualified remote workers, so a lot of the programmers and coders this program produces can find lucrative remote work – never having to leave home, and continuing to grow the Amarillo economy.
I think we have a brain drain in Amarillo; we’re losing many of our brightest talents to bigger cities. We need to stop that, and AC’s Career Accelerator is definitely a step in the right direction. If we increase the talent pool in Amarillo, our city and its residents will prosper. All of us – all our businesses – should adopt the loving spirit ignited in our town by Amarillo College and get behind and support the Career Accelerator because it’s a win for Amarillo. We should all be proud of it.
So, please join me in supporting this initiative. What Amarillo College is doing in service to our community, to maximize the economic viability of this region, is a game changer.
Alex O’Brien is owner and president of BOC Bank, a fintech bank based out of Amarillo.
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