Want a Job? Come to Charlottesville

Posted on July 14, 2009 by Jim Duncan

So says Kiplinger.com.

At the heart of it all is Jefferson’s university, and its concept of an "academical village." The village is built around an architecture meant to foster lifelong learning and ensure interaction between students and faculty. Today the university spreads that intellectual spirit to its surrounding city, and the school employs 18,000 people — one-fourth of the local workforce.

But UVA provides Charlottesville with more than employment. The faculty’s research, especially in biotechnology, often results in private spinoff companies, such as former professor Martin Chapman’s Indoor Biotechnologies, which develops allergen-detecting products. And UVA produces fine employees, too. Graduates "provide good intellectual talent," says Michael Latsko, chief talent officer for SNL Financial, a global financial-research firm headquartered in Charlottesville.

The city is a two-hour drive from Washington, D.C., and three hours from the Norfolk naval base. This proximity helped it draw in the U.S. Army National Ground Intelligence Center, which employs 750 people in a variety of fields, including engineering and foreign affairs. Next year the center will add 800 to 1,600 jobs.

You may recall that Kiplinger ranked Charlottesville* in May the fourth-best place to live.

Kiplinger.com loves Charlottesville. Just ask Google.

*Point of clarification: When they say “Charlottesville” they mean “Charlottesville MSA.”

h/t: Michael on Twitter.

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About Jim Duncan

A Charlottesville Realtor who tries to stay on the bleeding/cutting/functional edge of technology and real estate trends. I have been selling real estate for the past 10 years, lived in C'Ville for twenty+ and am married to one of few Charlottesville natives left.
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  • patient buyer

    Is it a joke? It makes you wonder about credibility of all those rankings. :D
    UVA isn’t hiring. UVA president said the University would like to avoid layoffs as much as possible and plans to do that by continuing to avoid new hires, identifying “non-core services” that can be eliminated, and by deferring “discretionary spending”.
    http://www.scribd.com/doc/17239009/Letter-on-Impending-Budget-Axe-by-Casteen

  • http://www.realcentralva.com Jim Duncan

    patient buyer – agreed.

    One has to wonder what the criteria is for their lists, or, as much as I hate to write it out loud, whether they read anything other than the marketing material put out by the tourism boards.

  • Dirt Worshipper

    Lifelong commitment to learning? So is that why they reduced education benefits, and completely elimitated tuition waiver for a significant number of employees? Or, how they offer core classes only during the daytime? Perhaps that commitment to lifelong education is why you can never get a second bachelors degree at UVa (since no one ever changes careers in the real world). UVa is by far the most unfriendly university in the state in terms of adult education, and it is pretty much by design. They’ve got a long way to go to acheive Jefferson’s noble vision of life long education for all.

    As far as the “intellectual spirit” goes, UVa inherited that from Charlottesville, not the other way around. We are not Blacksburg, and there’s a reason for that which goes far beyond simply having a University and lots of students in our midst. After all, there’s a reason Jefferson moved here in the first place…

    Don’t get me wrong, UVa is a great University that provides immeasurable benefit to Charlottesville and the state of Virgina. I just feel that it does a disservice to Charlottesville citizens to make it sound as if our entire culture and history revolves around UVa. The University benefits as much from Charlottesville as we benefit from it.

  • http://www.cvilleHoods.com Pavel

    I’m convinced that folks who put out these reports love to go back to their list of “favorites”. Or may be to folks from out of town it looks like Charlottesville is surviving the recession as compared to other towns.

  • http://www.realcentralva.com Jim Duncan

    Dirt Worshipper – you are dead on. There’s quite a bit more to “Charlottesville” than “Grounds.”

    Pavel – yep. We’re hit too, much as others might wish to say otherwise.

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