COEUR d'ALENE - Three college presidents and five area business leaders met Friday morning to discuss higher education's role in economic development.

The Coeur d'Alene Chamber of Commerce and the Post Falls Chamber of Commerce hosted the 7:30 a.m. event at the Best Western Plus Couer d'Alene Inn.

At the center of discussion was the state's goal of getting 60 percent of Idaho's high school graduates to acquire a college degree or certified in a one-year college training program.

"That's an unrealistic goal," said Ron Nilson, president of Ground Force Worldwide and North Idaho College trustee. "We need people with basic skills for entry level jobs and we'll train them from there."

Nilson said from his perspective the demand for degrees in the private sector is far below the state's 60 percent goal. He said about 20 percent of his workforce requires a degree and 80 percent of entry level employees who have a basic skill set.

"Don't send us someone who is fully educated and ask us to fit them in somehow," he said. "The state needs to listen to the private sector and set the bar down to an attainable goal of 35 percent."

Jim Glenn, president of Titan Spring and Wire Products, agreed with Nilson, saying his company is looking for "basic entry level talent."

"There is pretty much nothing they teach that I can use other than math and science skills," he said. "I need a KTEC kid like Ron."

KTEC is the Kootenai Technical Education Campus, which trains high school kids in various technical trades.

"If they spend a couple of years working for us, they will get the training they need," he said.

Nancy DiGiammarco, marketing director for Silverwood, said nearly the same thing.

Silverwood has 89 full-time employees and hires 1,400 entry-level seasonal employees each year. She said Silverwood trains those employees and offers incentives for ongoing training related to their employment.

For the most part, she said, the amusement park sends its employees to Florida and Texas to get the specialized training they need.

"There are no schools around here to teach people how to work on a roller coaster," she said. "We do that."

But she said the colleges could do a better job with intern programs and small seminars on software applications that would benefit her administrative staff.

She said there could also be short-term courses in things like professional sales, and groundskeeping skills - like how to operate a greenhouse.

"That sounds like it would be simple, but it's not," she said.

So why are these courses not happening?

"We are a product of the education system," said Joe Dunlap, president of North Idaho College. "Financial aid won't fund a student for a short-term certificate program, but they can get financial aid for a one-year certificate program.

"They follow the money," he added.

Furthermore, Dunlap said that state funding for professional technical education has been cut by 14 percent, while enrollment for those programs has increased 40 percent.

Compounding that is the state's approval process for new programs is cumbersome.

"It's not an easy process. In fact it's incredibly difficult," Dunlap said, adding that they just had a preliminary application returned to them because someone failed to capitalize a letter at the beginning of a sentence in the application.

"Then there is accreditation which is incompatible with short-term certification programs," he said.

Tony Fernandez, president of Lewis Clark State College, said he understands the frustration, and he thinks that short-term certifications should be counted in the state's goal of getting 60 percent of high schoolers into higher education.

"Do the basic skills need to take a year to complete? Probably not." he said. "We train hundreds of certified nurses' aides and that program takes less than a year. Shouldn't that count?"

He believes the state measures all of the programs that count toward economic development.

Nilson agreed, but said it is unfortunate when the state sets a goal of only counting one-year certifications because the funding will only flow to those programs that meet that requirement.

Don Burnett, interim president of the University of Idaho, said there are obvious connections and disconnections between the private sector employers and high education institutions.

"What we are seeing here is a picture of an education system that is out of balance and out of sequence," he said, adding universities need to re-squence things to begin front loading job specific skills.

Steve Wilson, president of the Coeur d'Alene Chamber of Commerce, wrapped up the meeting by explaining the importance of the discussion. He said the community is beginning the process of creating a community vision and this is just one of the areas that should be looked at.

"This is important because as a community we are going to get deeply involved in what we look like in 2030," he said.