Gateway Cities and the Gateway Cities agenda is perhaps the most important vehicle in how we can assist in facilitating economic mobility and educational opportunity in every region of the state.

Governor Patrick recently received the Gateway Cities Innovation Award at the annual Gateway Cities summit and had some nice things to say about our work together in pushing and implementing this agenda over the past eight years. I wanted to share his remarks with you in this short video:

Great discussion today. The strength and diversity of the Central Mass economy is increasingly driven by partnerships between higher education and the private sector. Our growing innovation economy in the life sciences, robotics, video and digital gaming is fueled in large part from research and development that takes place on our campuses.

Our Chamber Recruit, Retain, Incubate strategy for Central Mass is very much integrated with our Higher Ed community. A major emphasis of the Chamber is to increase internships among our college students with our member employers in an effort to expose them to the range companies of world class companies in the area to get them to stay and live in the area after graduation.