The $1 Trillion Workforce Opportunity for Rural Education - Duwain Pinder, Partner at McKinsey & Company

Rural America is on the brink of an economic transformation. With more than $1 trillion in advanced manufacturing investments (and nearly two-thirds of that flowing into rural regions) this moment represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to revitalize local economies, strengthen school-industry partnerships, and empower students with career pathways in advanced manufacturing.

Matt Kirchner sits down with Duwain Pinder, Partner at McKinsey & Company and a leader of the McKinsey Institute for Economic Mobility to explore the institute’s new report: Manufacturing in rural America: A plan for K–12–industry partnerships

This conversation examines the gap between the career-connected learning students want access to, and the opportunities afforded them in rural districts. Matt and Duwain discuss how manufacturers and school districts can work together to close this gap and prepare the next generation for the influx of jobs coming to rural America.

Listen to learn:

• Why 63% of $1 trillion in new U.S. manufacturing investment happening within 15 miles of rural communities means for K-12 education
• How we solve the problem of 8 in 10 students wanting access to career-connected learning, but only 3 in 10 having it
• The $34 billion annual wage impact advanced manufacturing could create for rural Americans, and what must happen to realize it
• Why employers should think about school districts like they do about their suppliers
• What success could look like in 2035 if schools and industry build long-term, evidence-based partnerships that sustain economic mobility

3 Big Takeaways from this Episode:

1. Rural America is the new frontier for advanced manufacturing. McKinsey’s analysis found that 63 % of $1 trillion in announced U.S. manufacturing investments are being built within 15 miles of rural communities. Pinder explains that these projects will define America’s manufacturing future and bring high-quality jobs to places that have long been left behind.

2. The skills gap solution isn’t either-or...students need basic academic and technical skills. McKinsey’s research shows that foundational reading and math scores are eroding across the U.S., especially in rural communities, even as demand grows for advanced manufacturing talent. Duwain and Matt agree that employers shouldn’t accept this trade-off. Students must graduate ready to read, calculate, and communicate and understand robotics, PLCs, and other manufacturing tech, which requires schools and employers to work together on both fronts.

3. Using existing successful models (not always reinventing the wheel) will help rural K-12 accelerate and scale career-connected learning. Nearly 8 in 10 rural students want apprenticeships and hands-on learning, yet only 3 in 10 can access them, a gap that represents a massive opportunity. Evidence-based models like youth apprenticeships, dual-enrollment, and early-college high schools already exist. If districts embrace these, plus partner with employers and workforce associations, they can create career-connected learning more quickly.

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Episode Transcript

Matt Kirchner (00:00):
Welcome into the TechEd podcast. I am your host,
Matt Kirkner, where this week,and every every week, we do the
serious work of securing theAmerican Dream for the next
generation of STEM and workforcetalent. And when we talk about
that American dream, we mean allAmericans. You know, I spent 30
years of my career, give or takein the world of manufacturing. I

(00:22):
think a lot of times when wethink of manufacturing plants,
we think about those plants andfacilities in or around big
cities who can't think of amanufacturing company and then
tie that specific company to thecity in which they are
headquartered, the city in whichthey manufacture products. The
truth of the matter is, yes,manufacturing is alive and well
in our big cities and in oururban areas, but it is equally,

(00:45):
if not more, alive all overrural America. All those years I
spent going and visiting withcustomers and prospects and
partners and suppliers. And alot of times you drive into
these small towns, towns of insome cases, a couple 1000 people
or less, and they had a majoremployer there, manufacturing,
doing contract manufacturing,doing OE manufacturing. The

(01:08):
truth of the matter is that ourmanufacturing sector would be
next to nothing without theparticipation of these rural
companies and the amazing peoplethat work in them every single
day. That is going to be thetopic of our discussion today,
my guest is a gentleman fromMcKinsey and Company. Many of us
know McKinsey. We've had severalguests from McKinsey on over the

(01:29):
years, huge, huge, globalconsulting company doing major,
major work in a whole variety ofsectors and industries. And our
guest this week is a partner atMcKinsey. His name is Dwayne
Pinder. He is the leader withMcKinsey's Institute for
Economic Mobility. Dwayne,thanks so much for coming on.
Thank you for having me. Soyou're a leader in McKinsey's

(01:50):
Institute for Economic Mobility.
I'm going to be honest with you,Dwayne, I didn't even know that
was a thing until we landed youon the podcast and I started
doing a little bit of research.
Tell us a little bit about yourwork the institute, what its
mission is. What are you up to?

Duwain Pinder (02:03):
Yeah, so we founded the Institute in 2020,
at the time, it was theInstitute for black economic
mobility. It was a part ofMcKinsey's a series of McKinsey
actions, both inside of McKinseyand outside of McKinsey, really,
to accelerate racial equity andfiguring out, how could McKinsey
help to accelerate socio andeconomic mobility. And they came

(02:25):
to some of the leaders inside ofMcKinsey, and one of the things
we told them is, we have aMcKinsey Global Institute. We
should have an institute that'sreally focused on accelerating
economic mobility forunderserved populations. And
that was, I would say, wildlysuccessful, so much so that we
have expanded it over the pastyear to be focused on rural
populations, Latino, Hispanicpopulations and black

(02:46):
populations as well. So that'swhy we are the McKinsey
Institute for Economic Mobilityunder that broader umbrella,
really focused on acceleratingeconomic mobility for those
populations to start through amix of public, private and
social actions,

Matt Kirchner (03:01):
you mentioned huge success early on. Give us a
little bit of a sense for whatyou would refer to as huge
success. Why you define it thatway? Yeah.

Duwain Pinder (03:09):
So we do three things at the institute. One is
research. We published over 70reports 2 million readers and
folks who have engaged withthose insights from everything
from maternal mortality tohigher education to financial
services to retail and foodconsumption. So really, across

(03:33):
the gamut of, how do youaccelerate economic mobility,
with an acute focus on how doyou do that via the private
sector, in addition to thepublic sector and social sector.
So the research has been reallywell received, really well read,
and we've been able to see theimpact of that research from
folks coming up to us atconferences or nonprofits that

(03:53):
have said that they have beenstarted based on some of the
research that we've done. So asignificant impact relative to
that. But we don't just doresearch. The second thing we do
is we do convenings, conveneleaders from across the sector
and participate in convenings.
We just finished our eighthannual Black Economic Forum on
Martha's Vineyard, where we haveabout 300 public, private and
social CEOs who are reallyfocused on accelerating economic

(04:16):
mobility. Incredibly successful,and that has continued to be a
staple event that leaders fromacross the country come to to
really talk about how toaccelerate economic mobility.
And the third is what we callreal world impact. We're not
trying to just write researchreports or have conversations.
We're really trying to work incollaboration with organizations

(04:37):
that are trying to accelerateeconomic mobility. So we've
partnered with largephilanthropic organizations.
We've partnered with largeprivate sector organizations,
really to try to accelerateeconomic mobility via their
business model or via theirstrategies. And that has been
successful as well. And so we'veseen the impact across all of
those pieces, and we're. We'reexcited about the potential

(05:00):
impact that we can have goingforward with this more expanded
mandate. So

Matt Kirchner (05:05):
partnering and convening and performing
research, lots of things to likein that last response. Dwayne,
first of all, never been toMartha's Vineyard. Love
Nantucket. I got to believethey're very similar. Being
islands, they're off of CapeCod, Massachusetts, very, very
similar. But what a great, greatplace to get a bunch of thought
leaders together to do thisimportant work. I also like the
idea in your in your focus onthe private sector, and

(05:28):
certainly I would see itsimilarly. Lots of great things
that we can do in the publicsector in terms of advancing
ideas and pushing for whatever,whatever endeavor we think is
important. And certainly thework you're doing really
important here in the UnitedStates. So I like that, but also
engaging the private sector andunderstanding that in so many
ways, in really almost everyway, that's the economic engine

(05:48):
of our entire economy. And sobeing able to leverage folks in
the private sector and make surethat they're they're super
engaged with the work thatyou're doing. I love that. On
the research side, publishingreports over 2 million readers.
That's that's impressive. Onesuch report is the McKinsey
Rural Education report, which isthe topic of our discussion
today. So let's, let's move intothat, you know, in that report,

(06:10):
and some of the other researchthat I've done in terms of the
work that you're doing, Dwayne,you know, one of the things that
we found, and I agree with you,is that we think about advanced
manufacturing happening in andaround our cities and our
populous areas. Certainly that'shappening. But when we think
about advanced manufacturing,lots of great things going on in
rural America as well. Why doyou believe rural America is so

(06:31):
important and maybe even at thecenter of this new wave of
advanced manufacturing? Yeah,

Duwain Pinder (06:36):
the short answer is, that's what the facts tell
us. You know, we analyzed alittle over a trillion dollars
of manufacturing investment thatis coming into the United
States. And we asked thequestion, where is that
investment going to? And what wefound is nearly two thirds of
that investment is going toplaces in and around rural
areas. You know, 63% of that atrillion dollar investment is

(07:00):
going to areas within 15 milesof a rural region. And so as we
think about what the future ofmanufacturing is going to be in
the United States, it really isgoing to be defined by rural
America's response to thisinvestment. And so we think it's
a significant opportunity, aonce in a generation
opportunity, not just for ruralAmerica in terms of the regions

(07:21):
across the country, but reallyfor the country in and of
itself.

Matt Kirchner (07:24):
So you think about a trillion dollars. I
mean, that is almost a mindboggling number. Even a billion
dollars is a ton of money. Youthink about $100,000,000,000.10
100 times more than that, andthen 10 times more, again, a
trillion dollars of investment.
That is certainly not a not anumber that we should that we
shouldn't take seriously, right?
I mean, that is just tremendousinvestment. 63% as you say, of

(07:44):
that investment is taking placein and around rural America. I
guess one question, why? Why doyou think that is, is that? Is
there a reason why all this, allthis investment, is finding its
way to the rural parts of ourcountry? Yeah, it's a

Duwain Pinder (07:55):
good question. I mean, one is, there's just a
general reshoring trend that wesaw that really predates any
conversations around tariffs orsome of the trade dynamics that
we've seen in the past fewmonths, but coming out of the
covid 19 crisis, there reallywas a move to make supply chains
a lot more resilient and a lotmore diffuse across different

(08:21):
geographies. So that has ledmany companies to say, how do we
increase our manufacturingpipelines and supply chains in
the United States? So that'sthought, one thought, two is,
there has been a significantamount of competition from
different states and localgovernments to be able to
attract some of theseinvestments in Ohio, where I'm
from, you know, Intel, forinstance, is building a $20

(08:43):
billion plant to make the nextgeneration of semiconductors.
And that was a competition thatthe state of Ohio won via, you
know, incentives, but also viaaffordability, via availability
of education, via availabilityof water. And so my sense is
that, you know, the answerprobably is bespoke for every
single investment, but thecombination of affordability and

(09:06):
availability of land and orresources is likely why a lot of
this investment is going to morerural regions across the
country.

Matt Kirchner (09:13):
Got it? Yeah, I certainly agree with the premise
we talk about often on thispodcast, the whole idea that,
you know, before covid and intocovid when we could get what we
wanted, when we wanted, at aprice that seemed reasonable to
us. Nobody really thought aboutsupply chain. And then all of a
sudden, when that isn'tavailable, you know, we start to
have an appreciation for theimportance of domestic
manufacturing, bringingmanufacturing closer and closer

(09:34):
to the point of consumption. Ithink that's a trend that's
going to continue. And then youthink about some of the
geopolitical aspects of it,certainly in some cases, moving
semiconductor manufacturing fromplaces like Taiwan to the United
States, so that we know thatwe've got a free flow of
technology that we need here inour in our country to be able to
support the growing technologyindustry and so many great
things happening in tech. So100% aligned on that premise and

(09:57):
interesting that you knowmanufacturing is going to find.
Mind, once it gets here, thelowest, most convenient cost of
production, it's going to find,find the most efficient cost of
production, proximity tosuppliers, proximity to
consumers, proximity totransportation, all of these
things playing in more and moreproximity to water. I live here
on the east side of LakeMichigan. West side of Lake

(10:18):
Michigan, I should say, you knowthings that are happening in the
data center space here because,because we have access to water,
and we use water to cool a datacenter in your case, in Ohio,
and I've watched closely thethings that are happening with
the Intel investment, hugeinvestment, the way that the
entire state of Ohio, andparticularly your education
sector, is rallied aroundpreparing the next generation of

(10:38):
technology talent for thosetypes of jobs, I think probably
fits pretty squarely into thisconversation that we're having,
because really, all of thistranslates into meaningful
economics and potentially socialchange as well. For rural
communities, talk about that alittle bit. I'm sure you agree
with that. And what does thismean for a rural community?
Yeah.

Duwain Pinder (10:57):
I mean, it's significant, right? Not just in
the, you know, the one time orshort term, and a media hit that
happens when you're sayingthere's an investment that's
going to come to x community,but we really saw the
opportunity for a long term,durable economic change, you
know, to the tune of about $34billion a year in terms of wage

(11:20):
increases from the jobs that arecreated, both directly and
indirectly. That's, you know,almost 10% of rural America's
manufacturing GDP, in and ofitself, right? So a significant
increase, if you just thinkabout, how does that $34 billion
break down? The first is, if youthink about K to 12 graduates

(11:43):
that potentially would fillthose advanced manufacturing
jobs. They could earn anadditional 40% in incremental
income, right? So the additionalincremental income that comes
from getting a better, higherpaid, more sustainable job. You
know, that's one aspect. Thesecond aspect is, if you think

(12:03):
about, okay, what happens interms of those additional wages,
and where are those additionalwages going to be spent? You
know, those could create someindirect and induced wages in
the rural areas, because youhave a population that now has
additional flexible income thattherefore could be spent and,
you know, the third is, one ofthe things that we were seeing

(12:24):
is there's not just opportunityfor new, you know, K to 12
graduates to come into advancedmanufacturing positions, but
also, what does it mean for theexisting manufacturing
workforce? And what we wereseeing was that there are
benefits for the existingmanufacturing workforce, if you
imagine that existingmanufacturing workers who are
able to stay in their jobs overthe long term could also see an

(12:48):
additional set of wages. So youhave two to three major impacts
that could really transformrural America's economy, where
these investments happen, aswe'll talk about more the the
potential outcomes are notcertain, right? There has to be
additional investment inpreparing the workforce of the
future such that theseopportunities are realized. So

(13:11):
there is, like, a pot of gold atthe end of the rainbow, but we
have to do some work in order toget there,

Matt Kirchner (13:16):
tremendous amount of work to get to that pot of
gold at the end of the rainbow.
You know, you talk about acouple things that I was
reflecting on as you were, asyou were going through that
Dwayne, you know, the first oneis, I just read an article in
the Wall Street Journal wherethey talk about the idea that,
you know, for like, new collegegraduates and the the advent of
artificial intelligence, orincreasing implementation of
artificial intelligence, andcreating some real challenges in

(13:37):
terms of, in terms of thoseindividuals finding jobs right
out of college, right? I mean,the numbers are just telling us
that. And I think there's acombination of things, some of
them economic, some of ittechnological, but a lot of
these, you know, a lot of theseworkflows that are more
automatable are going to beautomated in in business,
because we can, you know, we cando things with AI agents that in
the past would require peopleand there again, you know

(14:00):
business is going to find thelowest and most efficient way to
lost, lowest cost and mostefficient way to do any process.
So I think that's a reality ofthe workforce. But then you
think about students graduatingfrom high school, students
graduating from technical orcommunity colleges, and in some
cases, getting a 30 to 40%premium in wages, according to
the National Association ofManufacturers, for every dollar

(14:22):
we spend in manufacturing, forinstance, that reverberates
through the economy somewherebetween two and a half and three
times in all the ways that thatyou're talking about, not just
the wage for that individual,but they're buying insurance,
they're buying cars, they'rebuying houses, they're consuming
entertainment, they're shoppingfor groceries, I mean, and that
just creates more and moreeconomic vitality. So super,
super important. I think, youknow, there's a risk here too,

(14:45):
right? I mean, you to yourpoint, we've got to upskill a
generation of whether it's theexisting workforce and great
opportunities there, as wechange technology, as we get
closer and closer to advancedmanufacturing jobs, the wages
tend to go up if you've got theskills. To be able to engage
with advanced manufacturingtech. And same thing for people
that are new to manufacturingand maybe just coming into the

(15:05):
workforce. But at the same time,there's a huge risk of not
getting this right, right. Wehave to prepare that next
generation to be able to beworkforce ready when these jobs
are coming to their communities.
So talk about that. What aresome of the risks if we screw

Duwain Pinder (15:19):
this up? Yeah, well, you know, the first thing
is this investment is happening,and so that is creating a
certain amount of demand. We, inour analysis, found that the
demand for workers isoutstripping the supply, such
that there could be a potentialshortfall of a little over 2

(15:40):
million workers by 2030 right?
So you have a significantopportunity, but our education
and workforce systems are notcreating the workers relative to
that opportunity. And then youcan imagine that if the
workforce shortage continues tomanifest, then that could slow
investment, right? You know,we're already seeing, for

(16:01):
instance, in some places thatyou know have announced some of
these manufacturing investments,that the timelines for the
actual implementation areslowing because they can't find
the relevant constructionworkers, or they can't find the
skilled workers that are neededin order to finish the project
on time and on budget. So that'sthe risk that I know folks in
Ohio are thinking about, butother folks are thinking about

(16:25):
is, how do we make sure that wenot just have the investment,
but the investment staysdurable, and that actually leads
to the opportunity for theindividual communities that you
know, we all think is possible,

Matt Kirchner (16:39):
you know, it can become a flywheel, if we're if
we think about this the rightway, and you're exactly right.
So many times we see majorgrants, major investments, major
initiatives, and the money comesinto a community or comes into a
project once, and that's great,right? I mean, you're depending
on what that looks like,construction jobs, maybe
consulting jobs, maybe a new setof jobs for a group of people
for a period of time. Maybe themoney's being spent in the

(17:00):
public sector, and it createsemployment. Nothing wrong with
that. The real question, and Ithink it's the one that you're
answering, is, how do we how dowe create that flywheel? How do
we create an environment wherewe make the investment, we
create the jobs? You know, thejobs are advancing technology,
bringing more opportunities to acommunity, maybe more investment
on the part of employers, andthen that flywheel continues,

(17:21):
and we've seen that work aswell. Really, really important.
But I think in order for us tobe able to experience that, I
think you're right, we've got tohave a super focus on creating
this next generation, these 2.1million individuals, as many as
2.1 million individuals by theyear 2030, coming into advanced
manufacturing, making sure thatwe have the workforce, so that

(17:41):
people in companies,organizations, when they're
ready to make those investments,are recognizing that there's a
Work Ready group of individualswho are trained, who are
skilled, that can fill thepositions that we're going to
create. That's really, reallyimportant, I can tell you, as
someone who spends a lot of timein rural America, and a lot of
time, particularly in education,a fair amount of that being in K
12. You know, you see somedistricts that are leading.

(18:03):
We've had some of them on thepodcast in the past that are
really making progressiveinvestments in what the future
of work is going to look like.
And we have other ones that arejust for one reason or another.
Just have no idea the freighttrain that's coming down the
tracks and how we have totransform education. So talk
about that. I think one of thethings that we saw in the report
is it something like eight in 10young people would be interested
in, for instance, anapprenticeship, but yet it's

(18:24):
only available to about three in10 individuals. Now that's a
huge gap, right? So in otherwords, we have more than double,
almost triple, the number ofstudents or individuals who
would love to have access toapprenticeships, hands on
learning is a huge, huge thingfor me, and we're only getting
to maybe three and 10. Talkabout that gap and what we do
about it.

Duwain Pinder (18:44):
Yeah, it's interesting, because that gap
between desire motivation, butthen access is something that we
see across the gamut in rural,urban settings. In education,
you often find that students andparents have a significant
amount of desire, motivationwill to advance and to learn,

(19:06):
but they are not always met withthe access that is commensurate
to that desire and will. Andthat's what we see here, right?
We see that, you know, to yourpoint, eight in 10 students are
desiring some sort of careerconnected learning when it comes
to, you know, apprenticeships orCTE, or, you know, just some

(19:26):
hands on training, but yet,three in 10 students, you know,
feel like they have the accessto those things. So this really
highlights the the gap, but italso highlights the opportunity.
If you said, Okay, what is, whatis the role of some of these
advanced manufacturing industryinvestments in creating the
workforce of the future. Youknow, there's a real opportunity

(19:47):
to partner with K to 12 schools.
You can imagine that, you know,as an advanced manufacturer
expands their footprints in andaround rural America, they would
have a role to play in formingpartnerships with their nearby
school. School district or thenearby school system to say, how
can we create more opportunitiesfor career connected learning?
How can we partner, you know,either individually or through

(20:09):
an Industry Association, to, youknow, expand access to
apprenticeship and otherworkplace learning
opportunities. So, you know, Ithink there's a significant
opportunity relative to theinvestments that are coming into
these locations, if it's takenadvantage of and that's where,
really what we were trying toshine a light on is there's a
significant opportunity, bothfor the school districts to

(20:30):
potentially reach out to theadvanced manufacturers, but also
for the advanced manufacturersto partner with school
districts. No

Matt Kirchner (20:37):
question, that's a huge opportunity. I like the
way that you look at that. Imean, it is a risk, but with any
risk comes opportunity. And ifwe've got, we think about any
business or any any problem youtry to solve at all. In the
economic side, if you've goteight out of 10 people are
demanding something, and threeout of 10 people are getting it.
That means there's this hugeopportunity for us to offer that

(20:58):
to the other the other five and10, which is literally versus
literally, half. So hugeopportunity there. And so the
next question, of course, is,how should we be thinking about
this, in terms of how we takeadvantage of these
opportunities? You mentionedemployers reaching out to to
educators. For instance,educators reaching out to
employers, buildingpartnerships. Once they're

(21:19):
having the conversation, whatshould they be thinking about in
terms of new ways to implementand provide access to those,
especially in underservedcommunities, be they rural or
otherwise, in terms of makingthose opportunities available to
everybody?

Duwain Pinder (21:32):
Yeah, well, the first thing I'll say is, and we
wrestled a lot with this when wewere writing the report, is if
you were to say the first andmost foundational thing that
needs to happen in schools andschool systems to prepare for
advanced manufacturing jobs ofthe future. It is foundational
reading and math like that. Iswhat we heard from many industry

(21:52):
associations and manufacturingemployees where the actual
skills that are needed are notthe, you know, kind of more
future for technological skills,but it's more can you read and
do you know basic math? And youknow, the challenge is, when we
look at the ability to read anddo basic math across the

(22:15):
country, the scores arecontinuing to erode, and so our
ability to actually providethose foundational math and
reading skills is not as strongas it was five to 10 years ago,
and this is coming at exactlythe wrong time when we actually
need those skills even more. Andso, you know, step number one, I
would say, is for any advancedmanufacturing employer, you

(22:37):
know, how can you support yourlocal school system to be able
to provide the basics, right?
You know, one of the things wesay in the report is it does not
do any good to have investmentsin significant career connected
learning if you're not doingthose basics. So that would be,
you know, step number one. Stepnumber two, though, is there's a
lot of evidence in terms ofthings that have worked from

(23:01):
across the country, that youknow can be implemented. This is
not a case where we have toreinvent the wheel. There are a
lot of examples from across thecountry of different
partnerships that have takenplace, that you know, different
schools and school systems canlearn from to say, Can we do
that here? Versus, you know, howdo we create something from
scratch? That would be the twothings I would say. But I cannot

(23:23):
emphasize the math and readingpoint hard enough, because it is
something especially it's noteroding just across the country,
but when we look at differenttypes of rural communities.
Because, as you know, ruralcommunities are not a monolith,
but in some rural communities,the access to high quality
instruction and the ability toshow the fundamental math and
reading skills is starting tosignificantly erode, even faster

(23:45):
than the United States averages.
So, you know, all hands on deckmoment to say, how do we
increase the math and reading inthose communities to prepare for
the investment that's going tohappen?

Matt Kirchner (23:59):
You know, I like the two step approach that you
mentioned. And starting with thebasic math and basic reading
abilities. And I would add tothat, in some cases written in
oral communication as well, wehear from employers quite a bit,
and then talking about step two,which is kind of the actual
technology or advancedmanufacturing skills. The way I
like to characterize thequestion to employers, because I

(24:20):
hear it a lot the same time.
They're like, you know, give mesomebody who has basic skills
comes to work every day and cantake some modicum of direction.
And they're like, give me thatperson. And I say, Okay, let's
say we have two people, and thefirst one has no basic math
skills and no basic readingskills and no basic workplace
skills, and the other person hasall three of those. Which one
are you going to pick? And theysay, Well, it's the second

(24:43):
person. Of course, I want theperson that can read and write
and can work in a workplace. Isaid, Okay, of course, of
course, that's a choice. Now letme give you three people. The
first one is has no skills.
Second one has reading and mathand workplace skills, and the
third person also has that, butalso understands basic ACDC.
Electrical and electric relaycontrol and motor control and
motion control and PLCs andmachine operation. All right,

(25:05):
robotic programming andoperation. Which one of those
are you going to pick? It'salways the third one. So I like
the way that you stack that weneed those basic math and
reading skills. And in truth,it's almost impossible to teach
those other skills unless theyhave the basic skills. So that's
that's exactly right. I havenumber of questions that kind of
flow out of that last littleconversation. But what are we
not getting right in terms ofteaching reading and math? I

(25:26):
mean, that seems like that's thebasics. Did your report go in or
your research go into anythingalong the lines of what we need
to change there?

Duwain Pinder (25:33):
We actually referenced a report that we had
done previously, which isbasically looking at how the
world's most kind of improvedschool systems are continuing to
advance. It's called spark andsustain, and we can send that
over to you and your readers.
Yeah, we'll link it up in theshow notes. That'd be great.
Yeah. You know, one of thethings that we found in terms of
the specifics to, like, thefoundational math and reading,

(25:57):
is quality, standards alignedcurriculum, and then, like,
supporting teachers and usingthat high quality curriculum. So
those are, like, the two thingsthat we lifted up from the spark
and sustain report. But youcould imagine there are other
interventions. But if that was aplace to start, it would be, you
know, like, oh yeah, like in thestate of Ohio, for instance, in

(26:18):
other states they're doing,like, science of reading
curriculum. You know, those are,like, high quality evidence
based curriculum that we knowteaches kids how to read, same
thing, high quality evidencebased curriculum we know teaches
kids how to do basic math. Let'suse those that high quality
curriculum, and then let's alsogive teachers the relevant
supports in using thatcurriculum. Think those would be

(26:40):
the two things that you know toyour point, it's not as if we
are not doing it right. Thereare definite pockets where it's
happening. It's just nothappening at scale and
consistently the way that wewould like to so every child
having access to curriculum,every child having access to a
teacher who is skilled and usingthat curriculum, like that's
where we need to go toeffectively,

Matt Kirchner (27:03):
couldn't agree more, you know. And I'm glad you
know there's you mentioned Ohio.
There's a lot of really greatthings happening in your state
around technical education. Ithink even going back 10 years
with the advent of the of the MTechEd. So you have all over
your state and full of FANUCrobots. Mike Chico, of course,
the President and CEO of FANUCAmerica, it's been on the
podcast four or five times now.
So really, really cool thingsgoing on there. I would point

(27:23):
also to the stuff that Buckeyeeducational is doing with
programs like Ignite andindustry 4.0 in terms of getting
K 12 students and even in somecases middle, middle school
students excited about thesekind of careers. And I think
it's an example of how, if youfocus on the basics, and you
learn basic math, basic reading,basic writing, basic
communication skills. And thenyou pile on top, or layer, I

(27:44):
should say, on top of that, someof these hands on skills that
make students career ready whenthey get to advanced
manufacturing. Lots of great,great things happening in your
in your home state and certainlyacross the country that we could
point to. Are there otherexamples of, you know, career
connected learning, as you putit, that you think you'd like to
highlight for the audience. Howcan we get this right in terms
of connecting students tocareers? Yeah?

Duwain Pinder (28:06):
Yeah. I mean, to your point, there's a lot of
examples, and we highlighted afew in the article, just to give
some inspiration for folkswho've started to think about
it. We highlighted one example,like the Greene County Career
Center that's in the state ofOhio. But to your point, there's
a lot of great things thathappening in the state of Ohio.
Another example that's outsideof Ohio that I was really
excited about is this modernapprenticeship program by an

(28:30):
organization called employeeindie. And it's basically a
three year initiative to prepareIndiana high school students for
in demand careers. And what Ilike about it was it, you know,
it's paid hands on work startingin junior year. Students are,
you know, earn a living wagerelative to the geography. They
gain more than two years of jobexperience. They earn college

(28:53):
credits in the process andthings like it, health care, and
then they're also partnered withlocal employers, you know, like
the Indianapolis AirportAuthority, for instance, and you
know, like that combination oftraining, employer connection,
paid work and college creditfelt, you know, really

(29:14):
significant from kind of apreparation for any potential
pathway. If you're a studentthat wants to go to college,
you're going to college, you'regoing to get college credit.
You're a student who's excitedabout one of the potential
employers. There's a pathwaydirectly into those potential
employers. And you know, it'snot something where you have to
sacrifice, from an economicperspective, to be able to
learn. There's an economicincentive as well. So that's one

(29:36):
example, but there are otherexamples that are being tried
across the country, as we talkedabout before, and really, how
can we be inspired by theseexamples so that they not they
turn from examples to just theeveryday of how K to 12
education is happening,especially in some of these
areas where there's significantinvestment, absolutely,

Matt Kirchner (29:54):
and I think that's where we're going. In a
lot of cases, we're starting torecognize the fact that, yeah,
you could solve it for a year ortwo. To or we could create
generational change by solvingit for many years, across many
communities, for millions andmillions of students. And I
think that's where, where weneed to go. And certainly your
report indicates the, you know,not just the risks, as we talk
about, but as you suggest, doingthe huge, huge opportunities we

(30:16):
have if we get this right. Youknow, we have listeners from
across economic sectors thatjoin us every week for this
podcast, certainly lots ofstudents and educators, but also
a lot of industrial employers,particularly in the space of
advanced manufacturing, becausewe talk about that topic so so
frequently, if I'm an industrialemployer, especially if I'm in a
rural community, or consideringinvesting in a rural community,

(30:38):
you know, what do you think Ican play as an industrial
employer in terms of, you know,creating consistent engagement
with students and not, like theone off stuff that you know,
we've already criticized alittle bit of get it right once
and then forget about it. Buthow do we, how do we do this
consistently? Yeah,

Duwain Pinder (30:52):
I think there a little bit is a mindset of, a
mindset shift that I think needsto happen, where your K to 12
school district becomes aworkforce and a supply of
workforce partner, manyemployers, and this is not just
in rural settings, are not justlimited to advanced
manufacturing. I think manyemployers, their engagement with

(31:13):
the local school district isfrom a corporate social
responsibility perspective, orlike a volunteering perspective,
not from a this is a partner interms of my future workforce,
and how am I going to partnerdeeply to create the workforce
of the future? Because I'mreally not just committed to
this community from a socialimpact perspective, but I'm
committed to this communityfrom, you know, an overall

(31:35):
economic vitality perspective.
And so I do think there's amindset shift to say, okay, my
conversations with thesuperintendent or with the local
principal or with a set of localteachers is a lot more about
here are the skills that I'mthat I need and and what are the
ways that we can partnertogether in order to build those
skills? I think thoseconversations are not yet
happening as consistently and asreadily as possible. The second

(31:58):
thing I would say is, you know,this doesn't have to be done
like one employer to one schooldistrict, but how do we have
more scale across so you couldimagine that, like industry
associations are havingconversations with a group of
school districts, and there's acollaborative conversation that
is happening, versus the kind ofOne off conversation,

(32:18):
manufacturing employer to K 12School District. I don't yet
think that our industryassociations, chambers of
commerce, etc, are beingutilized to their fullest extent
when it comes to this potentialuse case. And I think there's a
lot of opportunity relative tothose things. So I think the
mindset you're the thing is thefirst thing. But I think there's
also, you know, industryassociations and other

(32:39):
organizations that can providescale for employers that we're
not yet utilizing to our fullestextent.

Matt Kirchner (32:46):
You just gave me an idea for an article, and I'll
and I'll credit you and I when Iwrite it, but, but this is it,
you know, and I this is comingfrom a guy that spent all those
years running manufacturingcompanies, and you think about
what we called supplierdevelopment, right? So if I'm a,
you know, an OEM, so an originalequipment manufacturer
manufacturing a product for anend use market. And I've got all

(33:06):
my suppliers, right? It might bean equipment supplier. It might
be the people that I'm that arehelping me with my staffing. It
might be somebody that's that'sbuilding components. Because
most, almost every manufactureris not completely vertically
integrated. They all rely onsubcontract manufacturers to
build parts of their assembly orto handle parts of their supply
chain, and we obsess oversupplier development, right? We

(33:26):
do audits, we do quality audits,we do qualification audits. We
spend all this time checking onthe quality of the product
coming in, understanding, are wegetting what we pay for, staying
on top of changes in technologythat might affect our suppliers,
helping them with continuousimprovement events to drive
waste out of their system sothey could be more successful,

(33:47):
you know. And so the wholeconcept of the of the article,
Dwayne, is going to be, what ifwe treated our school districts
as a supplier and not thatnecessary, and we're certainly
not commoditizing our studentsor treating them as a product?
Obviously, they're human beings.
But if we put the same level ofcare into building relationships
with our educators that we didinto building relationships with
key suppliers, imagine whatcould flow out of that. And I

(34:08):
think that's kind of what I'mhearing you say, is that, look,
if you're an industrialemployer, there's all of these
things that you could be doingin terms of partnering with your
with your local school districtthat maybe you're not and if we,
if we start thinking about, youknow, plant tours and visiting
the school and mentoring thestudents and supporting
financially, in some cases,their technical education or
their STEM programs, reallychecking the agendas at the

(34:31):
door, because a lot of times weget, you know, some of the
political friction you might seebetween somebody that works in
education someone that works inmanufacturing, forgetting about
all that and Just saying, Howcan we do what's right for STEM
for students, for our employersand for our communities? We
should be doing more of that andthen doing it at scale to your
point. So you think about achamber of commerce, either a
statewide one or a local one.

(34:53):
You think about industry tradeassociations. I was involved in
numerous ones in the coatingsindustry, actually president of
one of them for several years.
Dollars, all the opportunitiesthat we can have to be reaching
out and building thoserelationships, and it's for the
benefit of students. And then wecreate this kind of evergreen
model, as you suggest, wherewe're not just spending money
that's coming from one grant orfrom, you know, from one

(35:13):
investment, but we're figuringout how to do this over and over
and over again. If I'm a so youtalked about, you know, the
industrial employer. What if I'man educator and I want to do the
same thing? What recommendationsdo you have for us, especially
in a world? And I think aboutall the money that flowed out of
the out of the Cares Act, theEDA funding that we saw, all
this, all this money that cameinto education, rightfully so,

(35:34):
in out of covid, and now we'reseveral years out from that. How
do I create that evergreenmodel, if I'm if I'm an
educator?

Duwain Pinder (35:45):
The first thing to note is, to your point is the
environment has significantlychanged relative to the amount
of resources that are cominginto school districts. You know,
we've written multiple reportson the past on, okay, school
districts are getting asignificant amount from cares,
act and covid 19 funds, here'swhat they should do with it. We
just published a reportbasically saying all that money

(36:07):
is gone. So, so what shouldschool districts be thinking
about? You know, the title isfrom surplus to scarcity, and we
just published it, actually lastweek, and talks about just the
priorities of district leaders.
I mean, in actuality, you know,the conversation is very much,
how do district leaders andschool leaders do more with
less? How do they become moreefficient so that they can, you
know, invest in the prioritieslike career, connected learning,

(36:31):
etc. You know, I think it's arecognition that there's a
significant amount of ofcompeting demands that are
happening with educators today,and the complexity of being an
educator today is a lot moredifficult relative to, you know,
what it was like before. And Ijust finished Jonathan heights
book, you know, the anxiousgeneration, which talks about,
you know, phones in schools, andthe increasing anxiety and

(36:54):
mental health challenges ofstudents. So, you know, I think
it's just a recognition thatbeing an educator is incredibly
important and even more soimportant today, but then b that
it's also becoming increasinglycomplex, you know, let alone
when you think about the fundingenvironment that being said, you
know, I think there are asignificant amount of
opportunities. One is thinkingabout, okay, how do I, as a

(37:18):
school leader, you know, reallyfocus on the sets of priorities?
So if there are organizationsthat are coming in to
potentially to support my schoolwith, you know, different
opportunities to help, you know,how would I? How do I then
communicate that our biggestpriority right now is improving

(37:39):
our reading and math, and here'sthe support that I need so like
just kind of clarifying andcommunicating those priorities,
I think would be, you know,thing number one, that it
actually is really beneficialfor the overall workforce if I
as a school district reallyfocus on reading and math versus
doing some of these other thingsthat may feel a lot more
interesting and exciting to theoutside world, but may, may not

(38:01):
be as linked to, you know, theoverall end goal. So that's, you
know, thought one, thought twois, if you are doing a set of
career connected learning thequestion, I would say, is, how
evidence based and tied are yourcareer connected learning
models? I think what we seeoften is there's a lot of
activity that's happening, butit may or may not be linked to

(38:22):
the overall evidence. And so howdo you say, you know, we're
doing career connected learning,but could we do that better?
We're spending a certain amountof dollars on career connected
learning, but is there a way wecan have more scale and
potentially have betteroutcomes? So it's less about
saying we need to spend more,but it could say, is there
opportunity for us to spenddifferently, potentially

(38:43):
learning the lessons from otherplaces? So those are two things,
at least, I would say, is likecommunicating the priorities of
math and reading, but then alsosaying for the career connected
learning that you are doing, howare you learning the lessons
from other organizations andentities that have done that in
the past?

Matt Kirchner (38:58):
So it sounds like certainly sharing best practices
and understanding what's workingelsewhere, so we're not starting
from scratch. I'm a hugeadvocate of that, especially as
someone who spends as much timeas I do in education, and
everybody wants to come up withthe next best thing. And it's
like, okay, maybe we don't needto leapfrog all the way to
something, you know, 10 years inthe future and do the next best
thing 10 years out, but maybelooking at the community next

(39:21):
door, or going to an educationconference and educating
ourselves about some of thechanges that are happening in
education, whether it's forreading and math or in other
disciplines, and thenduplicating those and maybe you
put your own spin on it. Maybeyou do it a little bit more
interesting. You know, everycommunity is different, every
student is different, everyemployer is different, every
institution of education isdifferent. So you can do it in

(39:43):
your own way, in terms ofapplying that to your particular
community or your particularinstitution. But why start from
scratch? Let's leverage some ofthese other best practices. And
then it also comes back to, youknow, measuring outcomes. Any
thoughts on how we actuallywould measure those outcomes
from an education standpoint, ifI'm a K 12. Educator, for
example, there's

Duwain Pinder (40:02):
a certain set of things, which are your end
outcomes, which are like, youknow, are the students actually
getting access to the relevantjobs that are being sourced and
hired for in your localcommunity. Now, what is the
overall median wage relative towhat it was before? And
transparently, the educationsystem just doesn't do this kind

(40:23):
of outcome reporting. Well, ifyou look at, like many post
secondary educationalinstitutions, and you said, you
know, like, tell me where yourstudents go, how much do they
make, you know, they rely on,you know, surveys. But it's not
as specific and detailed as itcould be to say, you know, the
jobs of our, you know, newgraduates, and also graduates of

(40:45):
10 years are a really importantoutcome for us in terms of
measuring the quality ofeducation. Therefore, we're
going to have specific data. SoI think there's, there's an
opportunity for the educationsystem to invest more in that
data collection to be able tomake, you know, some of these
things that I'm outlining a loteasier. But then I also think
that there are a certain set ofmore near term things, which is,

(41:06):
you know, asking students, whatare the types of experiences
that you want to have inside andoutside of school, and do you
feel like you're accessing thoseskills? So that gap that we
talked about of eight to 10versus three and 10 having
access, you know, it. Do you seethat gap actually closing? You
know? Do we actually see thatpeople are getting the access to
the apprenticeships and thecareer connected learning

(41:28):
opportunities? But then you alsohave to then make sure that
those career connected learningopportunities are actually
leading to the outcomes thatdoesn't do anybody any good, if
anybody's if everybody'sparticipating in career
connected learning, everyone'shappy. But then you ask the
question of, like, Well, did youactually get a job, or did your
wage increase? And then, youknow, there isn't any outcomes
to show for that. So I thinkthose are the two things, at
least, I would start with. Andthen the third, I guess in more

(41:50):
immediate term, is, would say,frequently is there
communication between, you know,a school system leader and a
manufacturing employer? Like,what is the frequency? One of
the things I'm thinking about islike, your your analogy of
supplier development. I mean,when that's done, well, you're
talking to your suppliers on aregular basis, because you are

(42:11):
very tied together. And there'stwo way communication. I think
an immediate question would say,can we increase the quantity of
communication betweenmanufacturing employers or
employer associations andschools and school systems. You
know, one person said, when wewere interviewing, they said
that they're effectively twoships passing in the night. And,

(42:31):
you know, how do we just, like,start the communication to
actually have them say, okay,here are the things that we're
seeing in the classroom. Hereare the skills that we're trying
to build. How does that alignwith the things that you're
seeing in the workplace and theskills that you're trying to
hire for. I think that would beat least an initial start. I

Matt Kirchner (42:47):
like all three of them outcomes in terms of access
to employment, access to workbased learning and career
connected learning. And to dothat, I like the way that you
said, let's ask the students,are they getting what they think
they need? From that standpoint,think that's a really good way.
And couldn't agree more on thewhole idea of communication
between employers and educators,and we've seen great examples,

(43:08):
by the way, when they open upcommunication of getting away
from the two ships passing inthe night. But I would agree
that in far too many communitiesstill looks a lot more like that
than it does like, you know,complete partnership and working
toward the same end goals. So,so 100% agree with you just a
handful of questions in the fewminutes we have remaining.
Dwayne, one of them is, youknow, in as much as measuring

(43:28):
all this is important, let'sturn the clock ahead 10 years.
All right, so it's 2035 andwe're sitting here in the fall
of 2035 having a conversation.
How will we know if we got thisright?

Duwain Pinder (43:38):
Well, it's a great question. So in addition
to having flying cars and, like,you know, robots that can we
will buy all our chores exactly,you know. So I'd say a couple
things. One is that you wouldprobably see GDP that becomes
less concentrated in urbanversus rural areas. Like, if you

(43:58):
could imagine that, if you know,this is done right, and some of
the economic benefits happenthat you would start to see more
economic vitality in some ofthese kind of rural places that
would grow over time. It's notgoing to, you know, be at the
same level as some of the urbancenters, but I do think you
would see a much more diversegeographic mix in terms of, you

(44:20):
know, our economic profile. Sothat would be, you know, thought
number one. Thought number twois that you would probably see
the amount of manufacturinginvestment and potentially other
investment that is coming torural areas increase. Because,
you know, if people are seeingthe significant benefit, they
would say, wow, you know,there's a significant
opportunity. And, you know, likethe private sector is the

(44:41):
private sector and trying tofind market opportunities. And
so if you know this marketopportunity is proven out to be
profitable, then that wouldcontinue to increase and attract
more investment from otherpotential sources. So those
would be the two things I wouldbe looking at. Is, you know,
kind of the GDP profile in termsof concentration. And the second
is, how. Has the investment inthese rural economies, has it

(45:03):
continued to increase, or was ita one time blip that went away,
and you would hope that, ifwe're successful, that it was a
more sustainable set ofinvestment that continues over
the long term?

Matt Kirchner (45:14):
I love how quantitative that is, right? I
mean, so much of what we what wemeasure in education, is
qualitative, and here it's like,all right, what is the, you
know, what is the distributionof GDP, rural versus urban? You
can measure that, right? That'snot hard to measure that. Data
is available. And same thing forinvestment, you know, in terms
of new manufacturing, advancedmanufacturing investment,
whether that's public andprivate investment, which is

(45:36):
certainly my preference, andthen and then the public
investment that goes alongsideto support the private
investment important as well.
But are we investing in thoserural communities? I think I
love the way that we can measurethat. We'll have you back in
2035 to talk about that. Twoquick questions, we'll have to
do a rapid fire in the time wehave left here. Dwayne Question
number one, everybody has theirown personal experience through
education based on yours. What'ssomething that would surprise

(45:59):
other people. I

Duwain Pinder (46:01):
think many folks who look at education, who are
not deep in it, underestimatethe desire and will of students
and their individual parents,and think that the reason why
many people are not successfulis because, you know, they're
not motivated, or because theythey need, like, some
additional, you know, like firein their belly, but what you

(46:23):
actually see in the data is thatstudents and their parents have
all of the desire, willmotivation, but what they lack
is access to opportunities. Andonce you close that gap in terms
of access to opportunities, youknow, then the sky's the limit.
And so, you know, if we couldhave more of our you know,
public discourse andinterventions really focused on

(46:44):
increasing access and decreasingobstacles versus like, trying to
shift motivation, I think we'dbe better served.

Matt Kirchner (46:52):
I agree with you, by the way, by and large,
students and their parents wantgreat outcomes. Want great
educations for their students.
How do we make sure we get themaccess to that takes tons and
tons of forms. We could take doa whole episode just on those
but 100% agree with thatpremise, Dwayne and one final
question, if we could go back intime, we asked this question, by
the way, of every guest here onthe TechEd podcast, go back in
time to that 15 year old DwaynePinder. You're a sophomore in

(47:15):
high school, give or take, andyou could give that young man
one piece of advice. What wouldyou tell him? It's

Duwain Pinder (47:21):
a really good question. I'm thinking about who
I was as a sophomore. I wouldsay, you know, thinking about
this, I would say, like, yourdefinition of success and
happiness needs to be broadened,right? Like, I thought a lot
about, hey, I'm gonna get agreat job. I'm gonna make a lot
of money, and then, you know,why would I ever want to have a
family and like, I have two twogirls now, one is five and one

(47:44):
is one, and they give me, like,more happiness than I get from
any professional pursuit. So Ijust think that that wasn't
anywhere in my purview when Iwas a sophomore, but it has
been, what a it's been a reallypleasant surprise.

Matt Kirchner (47:57):
I had my eyes, my eyes open to what you just said
when I was in my early 30s thereagain, we could, we could go
through a whole episode on thatone as well. But you're exactly
right. Obviously, partner atMcKinsey, you've been incredibly
successful from, you know,professional standpoint. And
people can look up a role likethat, you know, you do just fine
economically, and then some aswell. But you're right. I mean,

(48:18):
those things are really, reallyimportant, and in many cases,
not taking anything away fromhaving those professional
dreams. But the real value oflife comes from everything that
you can wrap around that and andhaving two little girls like
that, I'm so envious my kids areall grown up and and what a
great stage of life, what agreat conversation we've had
today. Many thanks to DwaynePinder of McKinsey for joining

(48:38):
us on this episode of The TechEdpodcast. I am so excited for
what is coming to rural America,all of the manufacturing jobs,
all of the opportunities, Ifonly, if only we upskill the
next generation of the workforceto fill all these awesome
careers that are going to beavailable to our young people
and to people of all ages. Hopeyou enjoyed this episode as much

(48:59):
as I did. Love the report fromDwayne. We will link that up in
the show notes. Be sure to checkthat out. Read it. You will find
those at TechEdpodcast.com/pinder that is
TechEd podcast.com/p i n, d, er, of course, when you're all
done there, check us out onsocial media. You will find us
everywhere, on Instagram, onFacebook, on LinkedIn, on

(49:21):
Tiktok, wherever you go toconsume your social media, you
will find the TechEd podcast,and you will find us right here
next week for our next episode.
Until then, I'm your host. MattKirkner, thanks for joining us.
You.