ORBAA Scholarship Summary
In 2008, business aviation leaders in Central Ohio began a collaborative effort with the goal of partnering with collegiate aviation educators in preparing students with the skills and knowledge required for future jobs in our industry. This workforce development goal gathered the interest of Ohio’s State government who joined the partnership through the offices of the Department of Development, and the Board of Regents. The common goal was to improve the education of students that lead to retaining them as a talented workforce and bring future economic prosperity to our state.
Much work was accomplished in setting up relationships within this partnership between Industry, Educators and State Agencies. Rotational meeting were hosted by educators and industry within each of Ohio’s six economic regions, and gathered additional momentum. This formal effort eventually became known as the Business Aviation Collaborative of Ohio (BACO), and helped support development of classroom curricula in the business aviation programs of four of Ohio’s four-year aviation collegiate institutions, as well as three community colleges. Industry continues to outreach and support students and educators through classroom lectures, onsite operations tours, and by supporting industry internship programs for these students.
In late 2011, BACO requested to move under the auspices of ORBAA to collectively further the outreach of the Ohio Business Aviation Industry, and formalize a more robust offering of internship opportunities statewide. ORBAA eagerly agreed to oversight of the program, as it aligned with an outreach and workforce development goal that the organization was trying to develop. ORBAA proposed to add a scholarship offering as a part of the program, and asked for assistance in forming this model.
At the ORBAA Board Elections meeting in January 2012, Eric Black was voted as an at-large board member to assist in the oversight of the industry workforce development, and scholarship offering. Work is being started on benchmarking other regional aviation organizations around the country to research options for the ORBAA scholarship. Other ORBAA pillars of development have offered assistance, as the OBATS has proposed to move 25% of its funding to the scholarship fund. Integrating the offering with state initiatives might lead to a more broad offering of a scholarship in each of Ohio’s six economic regions, and support the State’s ohiomeansinterships.com website network. Several options and proposals will be considered at the February 15 ORBAA Board meeting for further consideration. The goal is to formalize the ORBAA Scholarship for rollout in 2012.
