CodeAcross and the Student Pathways Challenge
A guest post by Yvan Baker, Member of Provincial Parliament and Parliamentary Assistant for Digital Government.
As Ontario’s first Parliamentary Assistant for Digital Government, I’m thrilled by the idea of bringing together data, tech and civic smarts to make government better, faster and easier for the people of Ontario.
One area I’ve been thinking a lot about is what I call “student pathways” through school and into work. We hear from students a lot these days about how tough it is to find a good job when they graduate. At the same time, employers talk about a “skills gap”, and how they can’t find the talent they need.
While for many students finding a job is a key reason to pursue postsecondary education (PSE), the existing tools and available information don’t always help in answering the key questions they have — like, what PSE program should I go into? What type of job or career path will that program lead to? How do the skills and experiences I’m gaining help me find employers that are looking for good people?
That’s why, with the Ministry of Advanced Education and Skills Development (MAESD), I’m pleased to be a challenge owner in this year’s CodeAcross in Toronto — we believe that the civic tech community can help work with us in making a tool to help students better understand their educational pathway options.
CodeAcross 2017 is taking place this Saturday — you can learn more about the event on its website — and we’re hoping you can be there. The daylong event brings designers, coders, urban planners, mappers, government staff, students, communications strategists, and others together to collaborate on civic tech challenges, presented by government, nonprofit organizations, and community groups.
The government has a great deal of employment and education data, but needs your help to re-imagine it for public use. We want to learn about the student educational experience and what students across Ontario need to make informed decisions about their futures. And we want to create a tool that would help students better understand their educational and career options, the required skills they’ll need to succeed in the workplace, and the job market demand for what they want to do.
For this challenge, the available data includes:
• Canadian Occupational Projection System
• Postsecondary Institution Information
• Postsecondary Enrolment
• OSAP Default and Repayment Information
The data will allow the development of product(s) that will help students align their skills and postsecondary education choice with student experience, graduate outcomes and labour market demand.
The Ontario government is currently working on a broader digital strategy for Labour Market Information. This challenge will help inform the development of future tools that emerge from the digital strategy to help Ontarians be able to better plan and prepare for future careers.
I’m looking forward to seeing you at CodeAcross this weekend, and to work with you to help make career and educational pathway choices for students in Ontario simpler and better. See you on Saturday!
