I'm sitting in the high school football stadium on a Saturday evening, waiting for my kids' marching band to take the field.
A kind older gentleman is sitting in front of us by himself, and we start up a typical conversation: "Where are you from, what instrument does your kid play," etc.
He then tells us he used to work at the Maytag plant in Newton, IA. Maytag was sold to Whirlpool several years ago, and one of the Midwest's mighty manufacturing centers had now all but disappeared, with jobs moved to other parts of the country and the world.
He then tells us about the classes he is taking at a community college. Biotechnology retraining classes offered to Maytag workers whose jobs were eliminated.
"We just grew some mouse tails this semester," he says. "And you know what? We're learning how you take smokestack emissions from a factory, shoot them into an algae pond, and watch the algae grow as they suck in the CO2. One day's worth of algae growth can produce 1000 gallons of biofuel."
"And yesterday I just cloned a carrot."
He was slightly giddy as he told us about his coursework and lab projects. This 60-some year old man who probably had spent the better part of 40 years building washers and dryers and should be on the cusp of serious retirement planning was now spending two years to get himself educated to take on the bold frontier of alternative energy and biotechnology.
"Cargill has 150 biotech production jobs at their corn processing complex in Eddyville, and they only have six candidates to fill them so far. They told me there is a job waiting for me when I'm done with my classwork."
I think I sense some bootstraps being pulled.
A kind older gentleman is sitting in front of us by himself, and we start up a typical conversation: "Where are you from, what instrument does your kid play," etc.
He then tells us he used to work at the Maytag plant in Newton, IA. Maytag was sold to Whirlpool several years ago, and one of the Midwest's mighty manufacturing centers had now all but disappeared, with jobs moved to other parts of the country and the world.
He then tells us about the classes he is taking at a community college. Biotechnology retraining classes offered to Maytag workers whose jobs were eliminated.
"We just grew some mouse tails this semester," he says. "And you know what? We're learning how you take smokestack emissions from a factory, shoot them into an algae pond, and watch the algae grow as they suck in the CO2. One day's worth of algae growth can produce 1000 gallons of biofuel."
"And yesterday I just cloned a carrot."
He was slightly giddy as he told us about his coursework and lab projects. This 60-some year old man who probably had spent the better part of 40 years building washers and dryers and should be on the cusp of serious retirement planning was now spending two years to get himself educated to take on the bold frontier of alternative energy and biotechnology.
"Cargill has 150 biotech production jobs at their corn processing complex in Eddyville, and they only have six candidates to fill them so far. They told me there is a job waiting for me when I'm done with my classwork."
I think I sense some bootstraps being pulled.
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