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Employer Quotes

The quotes below are from employers in this industry: Manufacturing

They are talking about this topic: Occupation-Specific Skills

 

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The quotes below are about this issue:
Employers emphasize the need for new hires that have strong mathematical abilities; levels of skill needed vary by position, but range from algebra to trigonometry. Many employers need to send new employees to remedial math courses. Similarly, although mentioned less frequently, some employers feel that reading and writing skills are lacking in new hires as well.

Employer Quote Region
"That's what I was going to say. Some of our hires are entry-level production assemblers, they're working in a team. And I've thought, 'When did we stop teaching reading?' Just in terms of reading instructions." Southwest
"They need math skills." Southwest
"Employer 1: Square roots. Or, I started at 10:00 o'clock and I finished at 11:00 o'clock, so how much time did I put in?

Employer 2: Right. That's how basic it is."		 Southwest
"I think one of the frustrations is the remedial work that they're doing. Even as kids come into the higher education systems, they're going back to do math—math that they should have learned in eighth, ninth, and tenth grade." Southwest
"I had the privilege of teaching at [non-MnSCU college] for three years. And the most stunning part of that experience was how ill-prepared the students were just to write a complete sentence. I had to stop a marketing class to teach people how to calculate a percentage. And so, as we talk about all this technical stuff, those real basic things are so critical. And we don't try to teach them math. If they can't do the basic math, as much as we need employees, we move on to the next person. We just don't have time to do that." Southwest
"We don't have any sort of pre-employment test like the other two employers have mentioned. But I've seen the same things. And it is the basic stuff like weighing product and then subtracting the tank that the product was in to come up with the finished product. And the number of hours and the number of cases. And so this discussion is very interesting. Because I didn't necessarily know—I thought it was just us experiencing these types of issues." Southwest
"There are things that we can teach on the line as far as food handling and food safety and knife handling and knife safety. But it's the basic skills like the math. And then some of the soft skills like showing up on time because the production line starts at a certain time. So, it's important to be on time. And that's where the frustration comes in." Southwest
"And if they're going to go to technical school, here's some of the things that you need to work on: You have to have a basic understanding of logic. You need to have a basic understanding of math. You need to be able to use a computer fairly effectively. You need to be able to problem-solve and troubleshoot. You need to be able to have all these higher skills and, good golly, high school's having trouble teaching them how to read and write." Southwest
"Employer 1: So, to get a certificate in one of these things, do they have to be able to demonstrate algebra skills at the twelfth grade level? Like you said, I don't know if we need calculus, but we need algebra skills.

Employer 2: We have tutors if they need them.

Employer 1: If they don't place at the right skill level, they have to take the skill courses. A very high percentage of the people have to take remedial courses."		 Southwest
"So, we've got to ramp it up because sometimes people don't even have math after their first year. And they graduate." Southwest
"We have a highly-customized shop, and math skills are critical. Math is the theme right here. And job-costing is critical to success. If they cannot help keep accurate records so that we can get an accurate job cost, then I'm lost. So, math is it." Southwest