I just ran across this. I’m not sure if it is a blog, or a web site, using blog technology. But there is some interesting information here in terms of places in the U.S. with lots of smart people.
According to the 2000 Census Decennial, the Counties (or Parishes) in the United States range, in terms of percent of population (over 25) with a Bachelors Degree or Higher, from a high of 63.8 percent in Falls Church city, Virginia to a low of 4.8 percent in Aleutians East Borough, Alaska.
The ten most highly-educated counties or parrishes in the U.S. are:
1. Falls Church city, Virginia (63.8 percent)
2. Los Alamos County, New Mexico (60.4 percent)
3. Arlington County, Virginia (60.2 percent)
4. Pitkin County, Colorado (57.2 percent)
5. Fairfax County, Virginia (54.8 percent)
6. Montgomery County, Maryland (54.6 percent)
7. Alexandria city, Virginia (54.4 percent)
8. Howard County, Maryland (53 percent)
9. Boulder County, Colorado (52.4 percent)
10. Douglas County, Colorado (51.8 percent)
You can also click individual states to see a list of the ten most highly-educated counties or parrishes. North Carolina reveals the following.
1. Orange County (51.4 percent)
2. Wake County (43.8 percent)
3. Durham County (40.2 percent)
4. Mecklenburg County (37.2 percent)
5. Watauga County (33.2 percent)
6. New Hanover County (31 percent)
7. Guilford County (30.2 percent)
8. Forsyth County (28.6 percent)
9. Dare County (27.6 percent)
10. Chatham County (27.6 percent)
It might be interesting to ask students why they would want to live in these places. What draws people to these places, or what is it about these places that produces highly-educated people.
A while back, I saw an address presented by Richard Florida, author of The Rise of the Creative Class and the Flight of the Creative Class. He said that the aspects that draw creative people to certain places is aesthetics and open communities.
What do you think?
Technorati Tags: warlick education statistics creativeclass
Well he said a lot more than that. In particular, one of the major things he noted was that regions that promote diversity develop a stronger creative class. Diversity includes welcoming gays and lesbians, encouraging different ethnic groups and religions, promoting art, culture and leisure, and more.
It seems to me that these counties are centers of (or bedroom communities close to) the military-industrial complex, and government bureaucracy in general. These places aren’t examples of the kind of phenomenon Florida describes at all.
I don’t get that at all, Tom. Of the counties mentioned, the only possible military locations are New Hanover, NC, which is not too far from Ft Bragg, and other NC bases, and Los Alamos, which certainly has a military history, but I suspect that it’s a lot more than that now.
It is true that Falls Church, Arlington, Fairfax, Montgomery, Alexandria, and Howard, are all in the vicinity of Washington, DC, but I really don’t see how that detracts from what Florida is talking about. I do not think that people live there just so they can deal with traffic and be a bureaucrat. After all, he lives in the DC area. It’s an incredibly diverse location.
Among the NC counties mentioned, all but two of them are defined to a large degree by universities, or major research centers. The other two are characterized best by just being beautiful places to live. Ever been to the Outer Banks?
This thread is good conversation. Over the holidays, we left our cozy coastal hamlet for the bright lights of Cary Town Center. I let my kids know that the average salary for Cary-folk is about 80K, the average age about 36. It is a smart place and there is great opportunity. A good place to live, but you better have a good education.
Most well educated kids don’t stay around our retirement mecca, beach community. There is limited opportunity for them. They choose to go to Raleigh, Charlotte, Greensboro, DC, Atlanta if they want exciting and challenging work. That general flocking to urban centers creates the vital dynamic to which Florida alludes.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about provincialism. If someone lives in a province, it generally limits their exposure to diverse people. What if someone only knows one browser or computer platform. Isn’t that a form of provincialism, as well. Suppose I can only learn if someone lectures at me…better yet, suppose I can only teach by lecturing. Am I not stuck in a singular province of learning?
What is the opposite of provincialism? Would it be globalism? If we are stuck in a province of learning, can we truly be preparing students for success in a global economy?
Florida was a professor at Carnegie Mellon from about 1987 – 2004, which includes all the time I attended CMU and lived in Pittsburgh. I haven’t read his work in detail, but it was much discussed in Pittsburgh, which for obvious reasons is in a constant tight cycle of near-collapse and re-invention.
Beyond that, I’ve always felt like he was writing about me and my friends. His work explains why a small town boy like myself moved from (lovely) Central Pennsylvania to Pittsburgh (good record library at WRCT, good punk scene), subsequently only stayed briefly in Eastern Connecticut (pretty, good cycling, but too resistant to change, although Willimantic has an admirable concentration of freaks) and finally landed in Providence, which is a quintessential creative class destination, although gentrification threatens. The only place in North Carolina that I’ve considered living is Chapel Hill, because my former band’s label was based there, and thus I knew lots of other musicians there.
People don’t move to suburban DC to experience a diverse cultural experience. They move there because they have a job in DC. Likewise Colorado has big concentrations of jobs related to the federal government. Check out the section on the economy of Colorado in Wikipedia. Also from Wikipedia, “In fact, the Denver-Aurora Metropolitan Area has more federal workers than any other metropolitan area except for the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area.” That accounts for Douglas County. Pitkin County is somewhat of an outlier as an extremely high income ski resort community.
The ultimate problem here is that percentage of people with advanced degrees is just not a good statistic for measuring the impact of the creative class. You aren’t going to get any cities in that measure, because no matter how many educated people are here, there are a lot more poor, uneducated people around as well, compared to the affluent suburbs. Also, the creative class is not necessarily defined by advanced degrees anyhow.
I’m about half though Florida’s Flight of the Creative Class. He takes care not to attribute creative class impact to advanced degrees. He looks at 3 T’s: Talent, Technology and Tolerance.
Talent and technology may or may not have anything to do with advanced degrees. But tolerance is degree independent. By default, places that celebrate diversity will be creative places. Places that do not will be…well, provincial.
Florida’s research points to talent, technology and tolerance as drivers of creative class economies. Like Florida, I would push this discussion to a global context. Smart places in NC and US are fine, yesterday. But today, tomorrow, we should be looking at global smart places. Talent and technology seem to flourish in tolerant markets. We are seeing more of those markets emerge outside of US borders.
Florida shares research that lists the 56 cities that lead the global economy. 11 are in the US. Although no other country boasts that percentage of inclusion, it still means there are 45 non-US cities competing for the global talent pool.