As he revamped the program, Carter sought help from local IT hiring executives and found them very receptive. "Some are incredibly busy, but they said, 'Yeah, I'll help. I need to hire those people,'" he says.

The relationship between IT employers and community colleges is sometimes a rocky one. Squeezed between private technical schools and four-year universities, many two-year programs have seen enrollment drop sharply since 2000. Serious communication gaps hamper cooperation between industry and many community college IT programs, according to an ongoing two-year study by the National Workforce Center for Emerging Technologies (NWCET). The study, called "Strengthening Connections," seeks to bridge those gaps by detailing employer perceptions of community college IT graduates and identifying exemplary education-employer partnerships.

In general, employers perceive community college graduates as technically skilled but not well-rounded enough, says Sandra Mikolaski, the NWCET's associate director. "They don't have the life experiences or the problem-solving skills employers are looking for," she says. Employers are also frustrated with community college IT training programs because they seem so bureaucratic. "[Employers] don't understand why change takes so much longer than in business, and they start to think the colleges aren't listening," Mikolaski says.

But some community colleges are listening, and in response to advisers' input, they are overhauling their career-related curricula, developing new courses more quickly and enhancing internship opportunities for students.

Green River starts over