All-Washington Academic Team (As Written)

March 2, 2006

Governor Gregoire: This is a great day for the family and friends who have supported the scholars we honor today. Those who have encouraged, inspired, and helped all of you along the way. Those who have believed in you and helped you believe in yourself. Let�s give these special people a round of applause too.

Today, we honor your outstanding academic performance, and your service to your colleges and communities.

And we honor something more. There are 64 outstanding students here today on our 2006 All-Washington Academic Team. And there are 64 inspiring stories of determination, hard work, a will to succeed, and a drive to make this world a better place.

Some of you are starting or returning to school after years away, working or raising children. Or both! Some of you are getting an early start in college. Some of you are right where you planned to be at this point in your lives. Others took a few detours first.

Whatever your individual circumstances, you all have one thing in common: You�ve shown that you are among our state�s best and brightest.

Diversity is our state�s greatest strength. The 2006 All-Washington Academic Team is an incredibly diverse group. Together, you reflect a broad cross-section of backgrounds, ethnicities, cultures, and income levels.

This week as I read through your biographies to try to get to know each of you, I was struck by how involved and busy you all are.

You are all very active on campus�and off campus. I�m impressed by how many of you volunteer at elementary schools, churches, charitable organizations, and recovery and treatment organizations. You organize fundraisers, help the needy, and tutor struggling students.

We are proud of all of you. And I am proud of our state�s institutions of higher learning.

Lawmakers have spoken about the value of education for generations now. You know, as academic achievers, that you�ll be much more valuable in the workplace. You know that you�ll have a greater earning potential to benefit your families than your peers who don�t graduate from college.

That�s important, but let�s step back a few paces and take a broader look at why higher education will literally determine the future of our state and of our country for generations of Americans.

When I was growing up in the 1950s and 1960s, we had what was known as a �national economy.� Our competitors were other states like California and Oregon. Today we live and work in a global economy. Our competitors are India, China, and Japan. Thomas Friedman captured this idea in his book, The World is Flat.

Here�s what we need to take away as one of the critical lessons of the new, global economy: We�re in a race and we�re lagging way behind. We�re way behind in the number of engineers we�re graduating. We�re way behind in the number of scientists we�re graduating. Simply put, we�re way behind in creating a vital, 21st-century workforce that will keep the United States competitive with the rest of the industrialized world.

I talk quite a bit about �Globalism� and the international arena because Washington is the most trade-dependant state in the union. And the thread that stitches our competitive advantage together is our network of community and technical colleges.

Our community and technical colleges are �nimble:� If I�m in China or South Korea, I can tell businesses that, yes, we have the capacity to generate a local, specially trained workforce for aerospace engineering at Edmonds Community College or computer programming at Big Bend Community College in Moses Lake. When I speak to businesses, I can assure them that if they�re here in May, we can have a customized training program up and running at the local community college by September.

That�s impressive, and that�s why our community and technical colleges are so central to my vision of what we need to do to elevate our educational system�to meet the needs of both our citizens and the state�s economy.

But we�re in a race and we need to gear up. It may not be a big deal that China will surpass the United States as the world�s largest economy in 2010 or that China has replaced us as Japan�s number-one trading partner. However, it is a big deal when our standard of living drops and when our American spirit of enterprise begins to fade.

We need to do better.

We�ve had calls to get our educational act together before: The Cold War challenged us to produce more scientists and engineers five decades ago and we did. Today, more than a decade after the Cold War, we must renew our focus on higher education or we will fail you, just as we will fail future generations.

Right now we need to re-evaluate our whole education system. We need to take up the challenge from Bill Gates and create an educational system for tomorrow�s workforce- not yesterday�s.

We can�t get there with piecemeal fixes.

Which is why I launched an 18-month, comprehensive study of our entire education system, from top to bottom, called �Washington Learns.�

I care so much about this initiative, I am personally chairing the work of the committee, and I believe it will provide a roadmap�quite literally�for the future of our state.

The community and technical colleges are places where our citizens will turn for training to sharpen their skills and to maintain their competitive edge in the labor market.

So, let�s challenge ourselves. When I was young, President Kennedy said something that many thought foolish�that we would send a man to the moon by the end of the 1960s. That was idealistic, but JFK�s idealism inspired, and Americans rallied to the call.

So in that spirit, let�s say to this generation that we will invest in higher education. Let�s say to this generation that we will embrace the challenges of a global economy.

In this year�s supplemental budget, we included funding to expand access to baccalaureate-degree-completion programs on community and technical college campuses�which is a start.

Funding was also provided to permit our community colleges to contract with baccalaureate schools to offer upper-division classes on community college campuses and for the community and technical colleges themselves to offer 4-year degrees in applied fields � like the Baccalaureate of Applied Technology.

With higher education in Washington, getting by isn�t good enough. We can do better.

We need to remain competitive in a world economy, recognizing that education is our best vehicle for ensuring a prosperous future.

In my State-of-the-State address in January, I said that each of us owes it to the families of our great state not to lose our way.

Each of us must see ourselves through history�s lens, and create a legacy by building on our success.

We achieve this by sticking to our vision and remaining true to our values. The members of the All-Washington Academic Team breathe life into this calling. All of you are living proof that dreams can be made real.

And that one especially important dream�the American Dream of a college education�is alive and well in Washington State.

Now, let�s go to the moon.

Congratulations and thank you.


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