Senate Bill S2662

                                 BILL NUMBER:  S2662

 TITLE OF BILL :  An act to amend the education law, in relation to a
study by superintendents to determine the job market need of their
district

 PURPOSE :

Relates to authorizing each district superintendent to study the job
market need of their district and reporting their findings to the
board of education.

 SUMMARY OF PROVISIONS :

Section 1. The education law is amended by adding a new section 3003-a
to read as follow:

§ 3003-a Study by district superintendents. Each district
superintendent shall study the job market need of their district and
report to the board of education within one year of the effective date
of this section, on how their school's curriculums can be adjusted to
incorporate course to accommodate such need.

 JUSTIFICATION :

As the economy has become not just more global but also more knowledge
              

based, the skill mix in the economy has changed dramatically. The
proportion of workers in blue-collar and administrative support
positions in the United States dropped from 56 percent to 39 percent
between 1969 and 1999, leaving a trail of rust-belt neighborhoods and
cities. Meanwhile, the proportion of jobs that are managerial,
professional, and technical increased from 23 percent to 33 percent
during the same period (Levy & Murnane, 2004). Skill demands within
jobs are increasing too. Jobs that require routine manual or cognitive
tasks are rapidly being taken over by computers or lower-paid workers
in other countries, while jobs that require higher levels of education
and more sophisticated problem-solving and communication skills are in
increasingly high demand. The jobs that once supported a middle-class
standard of living for workers with a high school diploma or less have
substantially disappeared. These new economic realities and rapid
shifts in the job market are fundamentally changing what we need from
our education system. The rapid increase in emerging markets also
means economic growth and the need to prepare students for jobs that
require new skill sets.

 LEGISLATIVE HISTORY :

S6257 of 2015-16 legislative session

 FISCAL IMPLICATIONS :

None to the State

 LOCAL FISCAL IMPLICATIONS :

TBD

 EFFECTIVE DATE :
This act shall take effect immediately.