A southwest Colorado network of agencies dedicated to education and employment training for adults and their families has been recognized by Vice President Al Gore as one of the 13 most effective programs of its kind in the country.

The Southwest Educational Telecommunications Consortium (SWTEC) represents some 50 social service, education and job skill organizations in the Four Corners area, including Montezuma, La Plata and Dolores counties. The group, which also serves the Ute Mountain Ute, Southern Ute and Navajo tribes, is considered a model example of how cooperation among rural organizations can bring in more substantial federal funding for adult education needs that are normally awarded to programs in areas with a higher population, such as those on the Front Range.

"What it has done is brought agencies together and trust each other to work out common problems on a consistent basis," said Ann Miller, organizer of SWTEC, and director of the Southwest Bureau of Cooperative Services Adult Education program, based in Cortez. "It has brought a lot communication, and adult ed now is seen as a force in this area that promotes positive change."

The team effort is essential for rural areas in Colorado, Miller said, especially because it is the only state in the union that does not help to fund adult-education programs, despite a high need for those types of services.

"We totally rely on federal money for these types of programs; in the past two years we have attracted more than $8 million in grants as part of that consortium," Miller said. "Before every agency was applying for these grants and getting denied, but since we partnered up, we were recognized and got the funding we needed.

"Now we split (the grant money) so that each program gets a little, where as before we were all getting nothing."

That partnership and cooperation is uncommon in areas where there is more competition for grants, such as in bigger cities. That’s partly because there is a less urgent need for adult education in urban areas that have the influence to attract larger federal grant packages, plus the backing of corporate giants who help train the workforce that their industries demand, Miller said.

"We do not have huge companies and institutions to call on for labor training programs so as a small farming and ranching area we had to make ourselves unique through a collaboration," Miller said.

"Economic development in rural areas depends on developing a skilled workforce that a company can clearly see is available, one that they can tap into when they get here."

The vice president agrees.

"America’s competitiveness and prosperity will increasingly depend upon high-skill, high-wage jobs," Gore said. "We must work together so Americans can continue learning throughout their lives and get the skills they need to succeed in the 21st century."

Miller, along with organizer Leecy Wise, Director of the Four Corners Resource Center for Distance Education in Cortez, applied to have SWTEC added to Gore’s 21st Century Skills Community Network. Their group, along with two other Colorado programs were chosen this week to participate in the network centered around an interactive web-site. The idea is to give struggling community-education programs across the nation the chance to see what it takes to became successful.

The web site, at http://www.skillsnetwork.gov, acts as a sort of electronic conference center that allows the public to access information on grants, related announcements and job-training education opportunity. Additional communities may also apply to become a network member.

The core goals of the 21st Century Skills Community Network are to:

• close the gap by sharing the best practices and effective strategies for increasing the basic and technical skills of the American workforce;

• support lifelong learning for adults;

• help more workers move into high-skill, high-wage jobs;

• identify and eliminate barriers to success in employment, training and learning programs;

• help communities, local agencies and government offices measure results;

• and provide a continuous feedback system for the federal government as it creates a seamless learning and employment system for all Americans.

The federal initiative was enacted as a way to highlight those programs that coordinate community adult education and job training programs with what companies are saying what they need in a labor force. Also, in order for the federal welfare-to-work programs to be effective, there needs to be the appropriate training and services that will translate into good jobs.

"The concern is that they are not becoming employed at a fast enough rate to satisfy the employer needs, and the fear there is that if this is not done employers will increasingly have to hire employees from outside the country," Wise said.

While participants in the SWTEC program give advice through the web site to other rural communities that face similar problems, the likelihood that Montezuma County’s programs will receive more funding to further improve local programs rises.

"The notoriety that it gives us shows that we are a very viable organization, meaning we are in a good position to obtain more money to keep this important service going. For instance, we would like to eventually like to have a separate adult education center in Cortez to deal with these needs and get people who need it the help they deserve," Miller said.