Grow with Google coming to Connecticut

Educating the workforce with digital-skilled development

Grow with Google coming to Connecticut

Christiana Lenzer, Staff Writer

“Grow with Google” is Google’s economic opportunity initiative that provides free digital skills workshops and one-on-one coaching sessions across the state of Connecticut for the month of February. The training tour will visit cities such as Hartford, New Haven and New London this coming month. Google has teamed up with local libraries throughout the state to offer Connecticut residents with the opportunity to learn digital skills to improve and advance your career or business.

Google will first be visiting the Hartford Public Library on Feb. 11 from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., continuing Feb. 13, at the New Haven Free Public Library and Feb. 15th at the Public Library of New London, both events 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Why Connecticut? Erica Swanson, Google’s head of community engagement says, “Connecticut is one of our country’s most historic centers of innovation, entrepreneurship and manufacturing.

By Bringing the ‘Grow with Google’ tour to the state, we are making a commitment to help develop a skilled workforce that can meet the needs of the Constitution State’s growing economy.” Google’s 2017 Economic Impact report found that the tech company helped 14,000 Connecticut businesses generate 4.1 billion in economic activity through its search and advertising tools. The tour is to educate communities with the necessary skills to excel in the digital economy, as our current time is advancing more towards a technological based society.

The all-day sessions include hands-on courses in a variety of tech topics that are geared towards small business owner, educators, students, entrepreneurs and job seekers. Leading the workshops will be Google staff who will conduct interactive sessions discussing search engine optimization, online marketing, coding, email basics and other topics.

Those interested can also register for individual training with the Google staff or tour demo booths to learn more and seek Google’s free products. In addition to partnering with the state libraries, Google says that it will explore other partnerships with area organizations to support job-training’s and digital-skills development.