How can Northeast Ohio attract and retain educated and skilled employees?  How can businesses in Northeast Ohio gain an increased pool of qualified workers?  A survey conducted by Starting Point, northeast Ohio's child care resource and referral agency, examines family friendly policies in northeast Ohio businesses and institutions.  Read the 2002 Northeast Ohio Work and Family Survey to learn about the results of their work.  Here are some highlights from the executive summary:

We had a small victory in East Cleveland this week. Some days ago, Vic Voinovich and I met with representatives of GE and Nela Park. Although they expressed concern about the long term trends in the city, their most immediate concern was far more mundane: fixing the traffic light at the end of their driveway.

From Good Morning Silicon Valley, an introduction to the movement of the open source community to block patentability of Software - giving new insight on an issue non-obvious and wrong, in America

Gotta love how the editor of Good Morning Silicon Valley gets his points across. To those not in the know - dump Microsoft Internet Explorer and get the free open source browser of choice Firefox! A world-class holiday gift for everyone - read more

The National Child Care Information Center website contains a wealth of information for NEO about the economic impact of child care. In recent years, researchers and policy-makers have begun to recognize the important contributions the child care sector makes to the regional economy in both the short and long term. Across the country, states and localities are using regional economic analysis to measure the economic contributions of the child care sector. Click here to find a sample of publications and organizations that have information about the economic impact of child care on state, local, regional, and national economies.

Facing the embarrassment of being rated the most impoverished large city in America, Cleveland community leaders became vocal looking for solutions. The following NYTimes editorial indicates we stand out in thinking about this issue at all, as 12 million American families are largely ignored in their struggles for enough to eat. Being ranked worst in poverty drove us to some higher consciousness, offering us the opportunity to address serious problems, if we expand the dialogue and act on good words. Have you thought about our chronic poverty lately? Thanksgiving is an excellent day to talk about that, so we may do more for those who are suffering before the new year.

Highlighting the need for a fresh perspective on childcare, Elizabeth Aldred states, "The availability and affordability of high-quality childcare is an economic development issue, an educational issue, and a human services issue. It has both immediate and long-term impacts on schools and employers, as well as on families and the communities in which they live. And if we continue to ignore its importance, we will pay the economic and educational price." Read this article, Childcare solutions require collaboration, by Elizabeth Aldred.

In considering child development opportunities in NEO, the NYTimes offered this insight:

Life Way After Head Start - By DAVID L. KIRP - Published: November 21, 2004

The power of education to level the playing field has long been an American article of faith. Education is the ''balance wheel of the social machinery,'' argued Horace Mann, the first great advocate of public schooling. ''It prevents being poor.'' But that belief has been undermined by research findings -- seized on ever since by skeptics -- that federal programs like Head Start, designed to benefit poor children, actually have little long-term impact.

Over the past day or so, I've been having an interesting e-mail exchange with my colleagues, Mark Chupp at CSU and David Cooperrider at Case. We are exploring what the next steps will be for our Universities Collaborative.

The Cleveland Botanical Garden Flower Show returns to University Circle on May 27 - 30, 2005. This show is the largest outdoor flower show in North America.



Cleveland Botanical Garden is the country's first urban garden center.

Earlier this week, Governor Taft dedicated a utility-scale fuel cell power substation in Westerville. Learn more. Fuel Cell Works carried the story.

Fuel Cell Today, a publication from the UK, also picked up the story.

Last week, The National Economic Development and Law Center (NEDLC) and Build Ohio produced a report outlining that the early childhood development industry in the state is about $2 billion. Read more about the report.

Here's a press release from the Fund on how the Dashboard project will be launched and administered. Read more. 

Ashland Univeristy and Ashland Economic Development have a good program to help companies in Ashland County connect with Canada. Read more from this article from Mansfield. 

Over the past six years, early childhood development has been gradually moving to the center of the economic development agenda. Investments in early childhood make a lot of sense in a global economy that runs on brainpower.  In Northeast Ohio, we could move to a national leadership position by placing early childhood development in the center of our Brainpower strategy. Here are some good links to learn more:

Last month, Missouri held a workforce summit, and they have posted some interesting presentations on the web. See the list.

The 11/14/04 Cleveland Plain Dealer served up a fascinating contextualization of Northeast Ohio entrepreneurship, our innovation and manufacturing legacy, and its demise under America's Wal-Martized big-box consumer culture. Make note, Americans, Wal-Mart says it is all our fault that our manufacturing jobs have moved to China, as all we want is cheap stuff - "We are a seller of goods, not a producer of goods," (Wal Mart's) Wertz says. "Customers make the choice."

You've probably heard of RFID - radio frequency identification - and perhaps you use the technology in a smart ID or toll pass card, but starting in 2005 RFID will begin appearing in every American's life as Walmart uses this for inventory and then storefloor supply chain management and, as the NYTimes reports today, labels on drug bottles featuring RFID antennas will be used to protect pharmacies and you against counterfeit drugs.

REI Director Ed Morrison describes Economic Development as beginning with the unborn child, which recognizes important issues like reducing unplanned pregnancies, delivering world-class prenatal care, providing excellent early child-care and education, insuring great nutrician for children and protecting them from health hazards like lead exposure, and becoming outspoken to educate our community on the importance of breast-feeding, as mentioned today on Brewed Fresh Daily in a posting from Sandy Kristin Piderit, explained in detail on her LiveJournal blog - contact Sandy for more info

Good Morning Silicon Valley makes an important observation about Google's new free email service, gmail - as per their terms of use, they are able to read/analyze and correlate all data in all message you open - basically, by using this service your life is an open book... giving Google, Inc. and whoever they choose to partner or cooperate with access to all your words and other content shared with whoever you communicate with.

I just noticed a posting on Good Morning Silicon Valley about a blog written by Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. I was surprised the owner of a sports team would be into blogging - and his insight so valuable - so I checked out his blog. Turns out he was able to buy the Mavericks because he is a successful IT entrepreneur, and he is an expert in technology matters - so his insight is more valuable than I imagined.

As NEO looks toward sustainable development, our scientific research and engineering community should become involved in Earth friendly technology development - an interesting example was just reported out of MIT, showing fuel cells in a green light.

At the fascinating November 11 NEOSA/REI Future Forum, EcoCity Cleveland's David Beach discussed frightening challenges for our global ecology, and proposed the best place for anyone to start being a solution is at home - NEO. Let's make NEO energy sustainable, all agree. This week, Cleveland was also home to the Ohio Wind Conference and there 100+ global sustainability experts proposed NEO can develop a significant wind generation capacity, and become a center for wind power generation equipment manufacturing, expertise, and innovation. This is one well developed objective our millions of regional citizens should embrace - see notes posted from that important conference, which highlights valuable opportunities, and provides a foundation for actionable planning, all rooted at REALNEOWIND

I participate in a Harvard Law School open knowledge sharing program called H2O, which this week posed an inspiring issue regarding the origins and impact world-wide of Free and Open Source Software (F/OSS), which is the foundation of REALNEO. If you're interested in this subject (if you're into IT you should be), then consider the topic posed, take a look at my viewpoint, and feel free to visit Harvard H2O to review other viewpoints and the discussion. If you like what you see there - feel free to sign-up and participate, for free.

REALNEO Wind is covering and supporting the Ohio Wind Power conference
by posting all available insight from
this important event - held November 9 & 10, 2004 in downtown
Cleveland. See comments post at the close of the event and develop thenafter - all linked together at a special "Community Of Interest Link" at the REALNEO Wind Power COIL