News for Career Planners

26 Companies Creating 3,000 New Oklahoma Jobs

June 30, 2010 — FlightSafety International broke ground in Broken Arrow today for a 340,000-square-foot design and manufacturing facility that should support more than 300 new jobs following its completion in June 2011 — and that’s just one of dozens of recent actions by new and existing Oklahoma companies that will add nearly 3,000 new jobs in the state. Read more.

Last week, Paycom, a payroll services company with offices in 15 cities, broke ground on a new Oklahoma City headquarters to house 450 employees and a data center. Paycom, which is getting $4.5 million from Oklahoma’s Quality Jobs program, is already hiring around 20 new employees a month and plans to add at least 400 jobs over the next three years. Read more.

Two other Quality Jobs creators also announced expansion plans. Critical-use electronics manufacturer LaBarge, Inc., is adding 108 jobs at its Tulsa facilities, and AEGIS Food Testing Laboratories of South Dakota is already hiring microbiologists, lab techs and others for its new Oklahoma City laboratory. Read more.

A new venture, Eagle Claw Fabrication, leased space this week at the Port of Muskogee for a $28 million cutting-edge facility that will create 175 jobs building wind turbine towers. It’s expected to start production in the spring and build to full capacity later in the year. Read more.

$94,000-a-Year Quality Jobs

And Lansing Trade Group of Overland Park, KS, became the first company to take advantage of Oklahoma’s new 21^st Century Quality Jobs tax rebate program — which requires at least 10 new jobs averaging $94,418 a year — by opening a Natural Gas Liquids trading office in Tulsa. Lansing expects to create 18 jobs. Read more.

The Oklahoma Department of Commerce, which helps companies develop expansion plans, reports additional job announcements by the following manufacturing, call center, distribution, health care, retail, bioscience and other companies:

• Halliburton, Duncan (logistics)
• Bearwood Concepts, Tulsa (fixture design, fabrication and manufacturing)
• PRC, Durant (call center)
• Cancer Treatment Centers of America, Tulsa
• Geophysical Research Company, Tulsa (data acquisition and technology)
• Loki Weapons Systems, Coalgate (gun manufacturing)
• M&M Manufacturing, Tulsa (CNC machining and fabrication facility)
• Citi Trends, Roland (distribution center)
• Parkside Psychiatric Hospital and Clinic, Tulsa
• Agio Technology, Norman (managed IT hedge funds)
• State Farm, Tulsa (customer service center)
• Dell, Oklahoma City (customer service center - military)
• US Highland, Mounds (motorcycle and engine manufacturing)
• ACS, Oklahoma City (call center)
• U.S. Cellular, Tulsa (call center)
• Oklahoma Materials Recycling, Atoka
• CelluTissue, Oklahoma City (distribution center)
• QuikTrip, Tulsa (regional convenience store chain)
• Cytovance Biologics, Oklahoma City (biosciences)
• Mint Turbines (formerly Northstar Aerospace), Stroud (aerospace turbine engine overhaul and repair)  

IT Pros Like American Fidelity, Chesapeake, OU

June 22, 2010 — ComputerWorld recently ranked Oklahoma City employers American Fidelity Assurance and Chesapeake Energy, along with the University of Oklahoma in Norman, among the best places to work in information technology.

American Fidelity, in it's 8th straight appearance on the list, ranked No. 14 — and No. 2 among small companies. Chesapeake was ranked No. 17, and the University of Oklahoma hit the top 100 at No. 85.

American Fidelity and Chesapeake — along with Devon Energy in Oklahoma City and QuikTrip in Tulsa — also are among Fortune Magazine's "100 Best Companies to Work for in America."

11 OK High Schools Ranked among Nation's Elite

Eleven Oklahoma high schools made Newsweek's "America's Best High Schools" for 2010 based on the ratio of students taking Advanced Placement or similar tests. Schools that average at least one AP test per graduate — which make up just 6 percent of the nation's public high schools — made the list.

The rankings are objective, based on a simple count of participation in challenging courses, but also narrow, ignoring graduation rates and performance of less-than-top students.

Three Oklahoma schools, averaging more than four AP tests per graduate, made the top 100. Oklahoma schools among America's Best, with their tests-per-grad Challenge Index, are: 

Rank, School, City, Index
39, Classen School of Advanced Studies, Oklahoma City, 5.569
68, Harding Charter Prep, Oklahoma City, 4.615
73, Booker T. Washington, Tulsa, 4.495
392, Edmond North, Edmond, 2.507
497, Edmond Memorial, Edmond, 2.292
729, Edison Prep , Tulsa, 1.931
734, Norman, Norman, 1.915
933, Jenks, Jenks, 1.665
1178, Edmond Santa Fe, Edmond, 1.417
1475, Chickasha, Chichasha, 1.128
1500, Norman North, Norman, 1.110 (inadvertantly left off published list but confirmed as qualifying; rank approximate)

One in 213 Oklahomans Started a New Business,
Highest Start-Up Rate in U.S.

If you know 213 Oklahoma adults, there's a good chance one of them started a business last year. Our state, along with Montana, had the nation's highest rate of business creation in 2009, according to the Kauffman Foundation.

In Oklahoma and Montana, 470 out of 100,000 adults (0.47 percent of the population) started a business. The national rate rose to 340 per 100,000, the highest rate since the study began in 1996. The lowest rate, 170, was in Mississippi, according to the latest edition of the Kauffman Index of Entrepreneurial Activity.

The start-up rate in Oklahoma would translate to more than 100,000 new businesses in 2009.

Nationally, most new start-ups were construction companies. Services, trade and manufacturing businesses were started much less often. Men started more businesses than women. Latinos started more businesses than other races, although whites and blacks closed some of the gap last year. By age, entrepreneurship flourished most in people 35-44 and 55-64, almost double the rate for younger people.

OK Manufacturers Ship
$4.4 Billion in Goods to 170 Countries

Oklahoma industries exported $4.4 billion worth of aerospace components, pumps, machinery parts, pork and other products in 2009. 

Thirty-one percent of those exports went to Canada, our largest market, followed by Mexico and Japan. Exports to Mexico shot up 47 percent, led by a sudden boom in the market for machinery parts there. 

Exports are responsible for one in five manufacturing jobs in Oklahoma.

“The export figures prove that Oklahoma companies are succeeding in today’s global economy,” said Natalie Shirley, Oklahoma Commerce Secretary. “Products made in Oklahoma are shipped to more than 170 countries around the world.” She said Oklahoma’s international success is critical to the development of some of the state’s most exciting small and medium sized businesses. Read more.

OK Cities Are Top Spots for Young Adults

Among the top cities for launching a career and finding kindred spirits are Oklahoma City and Tulsa, according to a new Portfolio.com study.

The online pub picked Oklahoma City 6^th and Tulsa 8^th among its top 10 metros for young adults. Scoring was based on job growth, population growth, per capita income, population data for people between ages 18 and 34, rent, and other factors.

Tulsa and Oklahoma City, respectively, had the second- and third-lowest young adult unemployment rate among the 67 cities studied. Oklahoma City also had the third best income growth, and Tulsa had the third-lowest median rent at $503 a month. Read more at Young in the City.

Oklahoma Gets $6 Million for Green Jobs Training

Oklahoma is getting the maximum $6 million in federal Recovery Act funds for training in energy efficiency, renewable energy and other green job sectors.

Training should begin by March and will be conducted at CareerTech sites, the University of Oklahoma's Lean and Green Institute, and Tulsa Community College. TCC will use a portion of the funds to create a Center of Excellence for Energy Innovation at its Northeast campus.

The goal is to train 1,000 workers in two years for jobs with above-average pay. Training will target the unemployed, 18- to 24-year-olds, and workers who need green skills.

The grant is one of 34 totaling nearly $190 million in State Energy Sector Partnership and Training Grants awarded by the U.S. Department of Labor. Oklahoma was one of 24 states receiving grants at or near the maximum $6 million. Read more. 

Olds Is Relegated

If you're looking for a news item that used to be here, and now it's gone, try our new Olds page of archived items such as:

• Pilot Nano Camps Take on Invisible Technology
• Oklahoma Pulling in Transplants
• OK Cities among Nation's Strongest