Innovating Region: WAEM - West Alabama and East Mississippi

19 counties in Mississippi: Clay, Oktibbeha, Winston, Leake, Scott, Smith, Covington, Lowndes, Noxubee, Neshoba, Newton, Jasper, Jones, Perry, Greene, Wayne, Clarke, Lauderdale, Kemper

18 counties in Alabama: Lamar, Marion, Fayette, Walker, Pickens, Tuscaloosa, Greene, Sumter, Hale, Perry, Dallas, Marengo, Choctaw, Clarke, Wilcox, Monroe, Lowndes, Conecuh

Target industries: Advanced Manufacturing (Aerospace, Motor Vehicle, Steel and Metal Fabrication, Wood and Paper Products, High Technology, Innovative Energy); Entrepreneurship; Health Care; Warehousing and Distribution; Tourism

Credentials:  Modern Multi-Skill Manufacturing (M3) Credential; Career Readiness Certificate

CONTACT

IMPLEMENTATION PLAN (2 MB)

WEBSITES: WAEM.us; MyBiz.am

KEY STORIES/EVENTS:  M3 Credential; MyBiz Entrepreneur Network

Today, citizens in the 37-county West Alabama – East Mississippi (WAEM) WIRED zone are just beginning to identify this area as a “region.”  Parts of it lie in West Alabama, East Mississippi, the Black Belt, and the Pine Belt.  Perhaps the only across-the-region attribute is an historic one that applies to a much broader area, that of an area with a low-skill, low-wage workforce.  The WAEM WIRED grant proposes to change this, to transform the perception and reality of this area into a region that attracts, grows, and retains people, jobs, and wealth.  This will be done through a layered, but integrated “build-it” process. 

WAEM’s vision is to transform a mostly rural collection of people and places into an enterprising region known for its innovative programs in entrepreneurship, workforce development, and wealth creation.  We call that being “Enterprise-Ready.” 

“Building Enterprise-Ready places, people, programs, and regional identity” is our mission.

The Goal 1 Region Building Process, guided by the RUPRI Center for Regional Competitiveness, brought together leaders and potential champions from across the region to engage in enterprise and innovation based planning and development activities.  The highlight of this work was a Governors’ Summit hosted by Gov. Bob Riley and Gov. Haley Barbour.  Leaders participating in these events learned the language of enterprise and innovation, worked together to identify key regional assets and regional approaches to leveraging those assets, and began forming regional networks and identity.

With extensive training from the RUPRI Center for Rural Entrepreneurship, partner colleges have engaged in Place Building and begun to build regional networks.  Such entrepreneurial activity, integrated with Goal 1’s development activities, begins transformation of community and regional civic culture to one with an Enterprise-Ready focus. On September 6, 2007, the WAEM Commission affirmed merging Goal 1 and Goal 2 processes into the WAEM Place Building Program.

Goal 3 drew on the assets, gap, and trend analyses in Goal 1 and guidance from the region’s economic developers to:  1) identify and target advanced manufacturing and entrepreneurship as sectors (clusters) for which innovative workforce systems should provide training, 2) identify an Amatrol-based online advanced manufacturing training system for innovative access and delivery of needed skill training, 3) provide Career Readiness Certification and a regional Modern Multi-skill Manufacturing (M3) Credential system, and 4) identify technology needed to enhance such systems. 

Goal 4 seeks to integrate Enterprise-Ready activities into high school curricula and youth (age 16+) programs.  We seek to bring a balance to the “take-a-job” bias embedded in most “career readiness” programming by infusing “make-a-job” entrepreneurship perspectives in high school and youth activities.  We also seek to provide better access for students to community and junior college Enterprise-Ready programs.