I.T. startup trains Appalachians for coding jobs; support for programs like it requires bipartisan cooperation, says op-ed - Entrepreneur Generations

Matthew Watson designs apps for cell phones.
(NYT photo by Mike Belleme)

With the coal industry fading in Appalachia, it can be difficult for people to find good jobs, but a Louisville tech start-up called Interapt is trying to change that by training rural residents to code. Support for Interapt and programs like it will require bipartisan cooperation to secure funding, Arlie Hochschild writes for  The New York Times. Hochschild is a sociology professor at the University of California at Berkeley.

Matthew Watson, 33, of Hueysville, Ky., signed up for the company's 24-week course and eight-week apprenticeship after hearing a radio ad. He had two associate's degrees at the time, but said the best job he could find was selling cigarettes for $10 an hour in Hazard, 45 minutes away from home. Within an hour of starting Interapt's course, he landed a work-at-home job as a software engineer for a Florida-based company for more than $50,000 a year.

Interapt is the brainchild of Owensboro, Ky., native Ankur Gopal, and got off the ground after he persuaded the Appalachian Regional Commission to provide $2.7 million in funding. "With millions of U.S. tech jobs out there, we could help transform eastern Kentucky," Gopal told Hochschild.

"Mr. Gopal is at the forefront of a new movement to bring money and jobs from the coastal capitals of high tech to a discouraged, outsource-whipped Middle America," Hochschild writes. "But continuing to increase access to good jobs in Middle America will take deliberate efforts to cooperate across the bitter political and regional divide. President Trump is not helping by proposing cuts in education funding that will raise the cost of student loans by more than $200 billion over the next decade. Last year, he tried to cut all funding for the Appalachian Regional Commission, which paid Interapt students’ stipends. A group of representatives — eight Democrats and two Republicans — signed a joint letter urging Trump to restore the money (it was)."

Internet technology training isn't going to solve all of Appalachia's problems, Hochschild concedes, but there's so much demand for I.T. workers right now, why not help rural people get in on it?

from The Rural Blog https://ift.tt/2QntVAO I.T. startup trains Appalachians for coding jobs; support for programs like it requires bipartisan cooperation, says op-ed - Entrepreneur Generations

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