Worcester Business Journal

wbjournal.com | May 1, 2017 | Worcester Business Journal 13 W C O L L E G E S & U N I V E R S I T I E S F O C U S A MAJOR ANNIVERSARY... A NEW BUILDING... A MAJOR COMPANY MILESTONE Whether it's the celebration of a major anniversary or the opening of a new headquarters, Worcester Business Journal's Custom Publishing Division can help you create a custom magazine for your business. Our division's top flight team of writers and designers can help you tell your story – and make your business look great! Based on our unique publishing model, it's surprisingly affordable. Can we create a CUSTOM magazine for you? Call WBJ Custom Corporate Project Director Christine Juetten at 508-755-8004 ext. 270. Worcester Business Journal WBJ Custom Publishing Division Celebrating 50 Years of Growth, Jobs and Development 1 50 Years 1 9 6 5 - 2 0 1 5 C E L E B R A T I N G An advertising supplement to the Worcester Business Journal A T T L E B O R O | S T U R B R I D G E | S W A N S E A 2 0 1 6 H O L I D A Y G I F T G U I D E Shrewsbury Public Library: Building the Next Chapter SHREWSBURY Building the Next Chapter public library school year to the 2015-'16 year, slight- ly higher than the statewide communi- ty college drop, according to the state. Pedraja sees several ways of attracting and keeping students, including dual- enrollment programs with high school students to get them earning college credits and show they can succeed in a college environment. Once students are on campus, he said, the school should put students on what he calls guided pathways, with sets of classes and cohorts that keep students moving in a clear way toward their diploma. Community colleges can better serve their students by better preparing them for jobs they'll enter after graduation – teaching a profession, not just a disci- pline, as he put it – and to keep up with a changing job field, Pedraja said. "What's going to be the job market when they graduate? What's going to be the job market five years from now?" he said. "That's a challenge for us, and I'm willing to pick up that challenge." Creating funding, business partnerships Quinsigamond, one of the state's larg- est community colleges with more than 5,000 full-time students, has had state funding remain largely flat in the past 15 years, with about $20 million coming from the state this year. Higher educa- tion funding overall in Massachusetts has fallen by 14 percent since 2001, according to the nonprofit Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center, even as enrollment rose sharply during that time. QCC needs to look beyond state funds for revenue, Pedraja said. "Education is an economic driv- er, and I think people forget that," he said, touting the value colleges give to an area he said isn't always appreciated. States should support colleges better, he said, but schools like QCC must partner with businesses that can help provide students with internships and other training opportunities. The Board of Higher Education is scheduled to vote on Pedraja's appoint- ment May 9 at QCC. An influential upbringing Pedraja's upbringing brought him toward a career of what he says is help- ing those like him. He was born in Cuba and moved at age 6 with his parents to Spain in 1969. When the Cuban government found out his family was leaving, they took his father's produce shop, leaving him to work in forced-labor camps cutting sugar cane in the short period before Sue Mailman, the QCC trustees chair- woman the family actually left. After two years in Spain, the family moved to the United States, with Pedraja in awe at the time of a what he called a magical place of color televi- sion and opportunity. He entered school in Miami's Little Havana neigh- borhood, excelling in math and science but struggling to speak English. His father told him to work hard because an education was something that could never be taken from him. "That seeped into me and became part of my DNA," he said. Without an example for how to get to college, he wasn't sure where to go. Princeton was deemed by his parents to be too expensive and too far away, so he picked nearby Stetson University. It wasn't until a mentor at Stetson told him to imagine the title "Luis Pedraja, Ph.D." that he was able to see it for himself. For first-generation stu- dents, an example to follow and a sup- port system can make all the differ- ence, he said. Pedraja, who was born in Cuba, said his parents pushed him to earn an education because it would be something that no one could take from him. "I want kids to be able to dream beyond their current circumstances." Pedraja's path wasn't always headed in the direction of a career in higher education. He first thought to study philosophy and religion. The impulse to give back first led him to the church. He became an ordained Baptist minister. "I felt I could do greater good through education," he said. Pedraja's career has taken him since from the University of Puget Sound in the Seattle area to Southern Methodist University in Dallas, to the Middle States Commission on Higher Education in Philadelphia. Since August, he has been the interim vice president of academic affairs at the Peralta Community College District, which includes four community colleg- es in or adjacent to Oakland, Calif. "He's an integral part of our district," Peralta Chancellor Jowel Laguerre said. "He's very versatile in his knowledge." Peralta hired Pedraja for a one-year term until they could find a permanent hire. In his time in the role, Pedraja has brought a greater faculty focus on aca- demic affairs and student services, Laguerre said. "He has a calmness about him," Laguerra said, "a way to address people and see the goodness in others and to help them move forward."

• Cover