Center for the Innovative Workforce
Preparing Tomorrow’s Workforce: Diversity, Inclusion, Resilience, Innovation
MISSION
The Marymount University Center for the Innovative workforce serves as a multi-disciplinary research hub to inform workforce education, planning, and policy and to advance solutions to transform, build, and sustain a high-quality, resilient, and diverse workforce to meet the changing needs of society.
The Roles of the Center will be to:
- Engage in meaningful research that informs society of the requirements for tomorrow’s workforce
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- Develop models and frameworks to enhance understanding of changing needs and implementation strategies to address workforce needs.
- Advance the science of workforce assessment methods and analysis, including assessing workforce, supply/demand measurements, and workforce over- and unemployment.
- Apply workforce analysis methods, models, and frameworks to determine the effectiveness of implementation strategies.
- Investigate optimal teaching and learning strategies that support student readiness and success in the workforce.
- Promulgate the knowledge learned in peer-reviewed publications and presentations.
- Stimulate professional and societal communication of complex information regarding workplace issues.
- Actively pursue external funding to support center research activities.
- Foster student learning experiences that promote a diverse, resilient, and well-educated workforce in areas that have been identified as societal needs.
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- Encourage more students in K-12 into STEM and other needed workforce areas.
- Support learners (new and returning students and individuals returning to the workforce) to complete degree and training programs that address current and future workforce needs.
- Develop novel certificate and training programs to fulfill identified workforce needs.
- Advocate for inclusivity and diversity in the workplace. (gender, ethnicity, neurodiversity, etc.)
- Promote financial security and paths out of poverty by reskilling women and men for tomorrow’s workforce.
- Advance cultural awareness in the workplace (diversity, equity, and inclusion).
- Develop learner knowledge, skills, and attitudes supporting leadership, resilience, and advocacy to prepare them for making significant contributions to the current and future workforce.
- Actively pursue external funding to support center educational activities.
- Partner with regional, state, and national government and non-government organizations, businesses, and institutions to address workforce needs.
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- Engage the national, regional, and local community, governmental and non-governmental organizations to sponsor and partner with center activities.
- Facilitate communication, research, and training activities with local businesses and institutes to identify and address workforce needs.
- Establish business relationships to support center goals while maintaining the mission and values of the university.
MU is well-positioned for the roles identified above. MU has:
- A strong relationship with national, regional, and local workforce development groups and employers in our region.
- A vigorous experiential learning component to our curriculum ensures workplace readiness that ties in with many of the objectives of this Center.
- An expanding external funding track record that focuses, in part, on workforce research.
- A diverse student population who are representative of the workforce of tomorrow.
- A prime DC Metro location, replete with opportunities to engage with workforce policymakers and other professionals to address many of the concerns facing our workforce of tomorrow
- Academic resources and personnel that are equipped to address workforce issues from unique multidisciplinary and interprofessional perspectives to enhance the impact of the Center.
- A faculty with a high interest in pursuing research projects focused on the scholarship of teaching and learning (SOTL) with a particular focus on best practices in career preparation and inclusivity.