News releases

Southern Growth Appoints Dr. Raymond Taylor
Senior Fellow and Director of Workforce Advisory Council

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, NC - Southern Growth Policies Board, a regional public policy think tank, announced today that Dr. Raymond Taylor has joined the Southern Growth leadership team as Senior Fellow and Director of the Council on the New Economy Workforce (CNEW), Southern Growth's advisory council on workforce issues and policies. Taylor is President Emeritus of the Association of Community College Trustees (ACCT), and currently serves as a program consultant to Phi Theta Kappa International Honor Society and Morgan State University's Community College Leadership Doctoral Program.

Taylor will lead Southern Growth's workforce initiatives as Director of CNEW and will direct staff efforts to prepare for The Southern Workforce Summit, Southern Growth's 35th annual conference in St. Louis Missouri this June. Taylor will also guide the research for The 2007 Report on the Future of the South, an annual high profile policy report that is released at the conference. The report will focus on strategies for building a competitive, entrepreneurial workforce in the Southern region.

Jim Clinton, Southern Growth Policies Board's executive director, explained, "Southern Growth has long held that it will be impossible to achieve the quality of life that our region aspires to without increasing our knowledge base and levels of educational achievement. Dr. Taylor's remarkable record as an educator, researcher, and administrator gives us the opportunity to do a better job of supporting our states in their ongoing efforts to prepare the workforce for tomorrow's challenges. His leadership, combined with Southern Growth's strength in listening to the South through our community forum process, will help us create the best workforce in the world."

As a Senior Fellow, Taylor will also provide strategic counsel and support to the Southern Growth staff and board of directors on a broad range of issues, and help assure that all Southern Growth initiatives represent a commitment to creating, accumulating and applying knowledge.

Taylor has a distinguished career in higher education administration. During his 15-year tenure at the Association of Community College Trustees, he led several national initiatives to increase the effectiveness of community college governance and securing new resources. He also held senior-level positions with the St. Louis Community College District, the Eastern Iowa Community College district and Muscatine Community College. He received his Doctor of Education at the University of Missouri, and his M.A. and B.S at Northeast Missouri State University.

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About Southern Growth Policies Board
Southern Growth Policies Board is a public policy think tank based in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina.  Formed by the region’s governors in 1971, Southern Growth Policies Board researches and develops economic development policies by providing a forum for collaboration among a diverse cross-section of the region’s governors, legislators, business and academic leaders and the economic and community development sectors.  Southern Growth provides its members, and the region, with authoritative research, discussion forums and pilot projects in the areas of technology and innovation, globalization, workforce development, community development, civic engagement and leadership.  To learn more about Southern Growth Policies Board, visit http://www.southern.org.