Michael Brewer, Committee Chair
The Education Committee is directly concerned with promoting education as a attribute of smart growth and quality of life. Partners recognizes that producing an educated workforce capable of attracting quality industrial and commercial growth is vital to Butts County. Attracting this kind of growth will produce a synergy of a balanced tax base, higher community quality and better paying jobs, which in turn will enhance the overall economic viability of the community as a whole. The Education committee concerns itself directly with quality growth in education to match quality community growth. This begins as early as the 3K programs for 3 year olds, through grade school and post-secondary education that includes technical college, liberal arts college and university education.
Michael Brewer chairs this committee. He is the Chairman of the Griffin Technical College Board of Directors and Executive Secretary of the McIntosh Trail Early Childhood Development Council. He is the Deputy County Administrator for Butts County and the CEO of Blue Ridge Consulting Group, a local management consulting firm.
Thank you for your interest in Partner's for Smart Growth. If you are reading this letter, then something has led you to this website-concern for your community, curiosity about what is going on in Butts County or just the desire to become informed about the issues that we face as a community in the future. There is no doubt that growth issues are upon Butts County and education is one of the fundamental issues that goes along with any kind of growth. In seeking to attract the right kind of growth, we must make sure that our educational system is not only the best it can be but that we have a properly educated and trained workforce capable of taking on newer, higher technology jobs that the manufacturing industry will be requiring.
The first big step was the obtaining of a Griffin Technical College satellite campus for Butts County that will offer highly technical, post-secondary training to people looking to expand their abilities and obtain better, higher paying jobs. Adult literacy is on the rise in Butts County thanks to Griffin Tech as well, and now that program will be housed in the new campus. Local officials are turning their eyes towards recruiting other college campus satellites to Butts County also, for those seeking traditional college degrees. Having these facilities in Butts County raises the bar and makes our community the kind of place where people who hold professional, managerial and executive jobs will want to locate, where they will build nicer homes and where they will spend dollars into the local system. It also makes us look more attractive to manufacturing and commercial-retail industry because higher quality communities are better consumers and thus, more desirable to retailers.
Still, we have to get them to that point and we must raise awareness of issues that affect our local school system. Over the years, it has been the default position of the community to focus on the negative aspects of our local school system, even though those aspects are the same in every county school system across the state. What we fail to focus on are those positive aspects that sets the Butts County School System apart from others-our quality administrators, teachers, and staff, our increasing rate of graduates from High School, our modern, state-of-the-art facilities and those new ones that will come on line in 2008 and 2009. All of these contribute to a better school system but they often go unnoticed by our community. Partners wants to promote our local school system, help our schools to become better and make sure the citizens living here as well as those coming in future growth know that we have a good school system that continues to improve itself year after year.
A community that doesn't expect more of its schools will rarely see positive change. We must continue to support our schools while making sure the bar is never set too low. To do this, we must make sure our schools are equipped for the challenges they face. Schools often become the battleground in growth issues; we must try and make sure that our schools are not influenced by growth as much as they are the influence on growth. Our public schools, daycare education centers, private schools, church schools, colleges and adult education centers should speak for themselves in the quality of students they produce who in turn, become positive citizens, influential leaders and stewards of the next generation.
I appreciate your interest in Partners for Smart Growth and the Education Committee. If i can ever be of service to you, please don't hesitate to contact me.
Sincerely
J. Michael Brewer
Education Committee Chairman