Bringing Education to Elgin

Education is vital to our economic growth

My recent What Elgin Can Learn from…Detroit? post generated quite a bit of buzz and conversation, both here and on other social platforms. I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately, and you’ll be hearing more soon. (In the mean time, your feedback is still appreciated!)

In that post,  I talked about how non-negotiably vital it is that we diversify our Elgin economy while also prioritizing education at all levels.

Yesterday, I saw a post from Laurie Faith Gibson-Aiello of the Gibson Group that discussed how important an educated workforce is – and how the Elgin Technology Center is trying to bring these skills to town. ETC has applied for a Motorola Mobility Foundation grant that would enable them to build a tech training facility right in the heart of downtown Elgin, educating the 150+ members of ETC while also serving to mentor new entrepreneurs.

This is exactly the kind of energy we need in Elgin. Through coordinated efforts, we can bring in new businesses that can leverage some of our great attributes, like our location and easy connections to other cities. Good luck to the ETC in their efforts!

And maybe in the fall, we can apply for an IBM Smarter Cities grant, too.