Keeping the brains in town Friday, December 02, 2005 A lot of regions around the country -- especially those in the industrial Midwest and in rural areas -- experience "brain drain", the loss of young people. This problem has led some communities to launch "brain gain" initiatives, such as College 360 in Northeast Ohio. Visit the site. College 360 grew out of Philadelphia's efforts to keep its college talent. This initaitive, called OneBigCampus, is an outgrowth of a partnership between higher education and economic development organizations: The Knowledge Industry Partnership. The consulting firm, Collegia has built its business around the Philadelphia model. Other consultants see a growth industry in this business. Of course, Richard Florida has been focusing on The Creative Class. And, following Florida's popularity, Rebecca Ryan has been advising cities on how to keep their young leaders engaged through her firm, Next Generation Consulting. Jack Schultz has made a good career out of advising small towns -- agburbs he calls them -- through his book, Boomtown USA. Read more. Ft. Wayne, IN is working on a smaller, more targeted scale with its Brain Gain initiative that repays college loans from graduates who stick around. Read more. In Upstate, New York, Pipeline 4 Progress is focusing on how to keep young people. Read more. A number of chambers have launched internship web sites. Here's an example from Indianapolis. Here's another internship site from Albany. Another thread of initiatives focuses on building networks among young professionals. Here's an example from Philadelphia and another from Arkansas. In Michigan, the governor wants to help smaller cities become competitive with a Cool Cities initiative. Some reversal is underway. Here's an article from Indiana on how smaller towns are beginning to attract college educated young professionals. Read more. At the same time smaller cities, like Paducah, KY are becoming magnets for the arts. Read more. posted by Ed Morrison |		This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License. links Some Background on EDPro Weblog The purpose of this weblog is to help economic development professionals -- EDPros -- keep up with the changes sweeping our profession. Strap on your goggles. It's a whole new game. There are no experts any more. The only place to learn about economic development is from other EDPros who are doing it. One other point: the prevaling approach (paradigm, if you like) in economic development is shifting from competition to collaboration. There are a lot of reaasons underlying this shift, but here's the important insight: You, your community, and your region will do better by collaborating and sharing information. So, spread the word...Share the knowledge. Tell a friend about EDPro Weblog. If you are using a news reader, here is the link to syndicate this site: Here's the link if you are a bloglines subscriber: Speaking and workshops on Open Source Economic Development As the idea of Open Source Economic Development starts spreading, more people are asking about it. Visit the I-Open web site to learn more. My colleagues and I are happy to explain the basic concepts in a talk or a workshop. E-mail Susan Alshuler if you'd like to learn more about workshops and speaking. Background on Ed Morrison Download some background information on me here.

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