NRCCTE Articles

An initial survey conducted by the authors in 2009 determined the amount and type of preparation CTE educators had regarding the use of assessment data for program and instructional improvement; this survey was the basis for development of an intervention for teachers on interpretation of assessment data for improvement of classroom instruction. The intervention, titled Career and Technical Educators Using a Data Driven Improvement Model or CTEDDI, was developed and successfully piloted in five states during spring semester 2010; the results of the pilot study have been used to revise the materials and process to produce a professional development program to help CTE educators improve their data skills and instruction.

This longitudinal study examines the impact of programs of study on high school academic and technical achievement. Two districts are participating in experimental and quasi-experimental strands of the study. This article describes the sample selection, baseline characteristics, study design, career and technical education and academic achievement results of 9th and 10th graders, and qualitative findings from site visits. Few differences existed across groups in 9th grade, but by the end of 10th grade, students’ test scores, academic grade point averages, and progress to graduation tended to be better for the students in programs of study (i.e., treatment students) than for control/comparison students. Qualitative results suggest that treatment schools have created school cultures around programs of study that appear to explain improved engagement and achievement.

This article provides a broad overview of the history of career-focused education in the United States and the reauthorization of the federal Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Improvement Act of 2006. The Perkins act required that the recipients of its funding offer at least one program of study, and this reauthorization included four core components that play a central role in the implementation of the overall Programs of Study initiative. As such, we provide a background of the development of the Programs of Study initiative in Perkins through earlier initiatives: Tech Prep, career pathways, youth apprenticeship, and dual/concurrent-credit programs. We also offer a brief overview of the challenges faced by each initiative, along with an overview of the three NRCTE longitudinal studies represented in this special issue.

In 2009-2010, the NRCCTE conducted a cross-site evaluation of the Center’s three field-based longitudinal studies of POS through the project, Programs of Study – A Cross-Study Examination of Programs in Three States. This evaluative study, now concluded, allowed the NRCCTE to explore lessons learned regarding POS across three schools that were identified as having a high level of POS implementation. The researchers’ goal was to compare common elements across the schools in order to uncover key components that could be shared with others actively involved in developing more effective POS.

This article describes one of the NRCCTE’s two qualitative investigations of POS, Six Stories About Six States: Programs of Study. This project, now concluded, focused on how POS were developed, and especially on how technical assistance was provided to strengthen and improve them.  

The Six States project report noted the power of project-based learning (PBL) and hands-on, active participation in both classrooms and in the community/workplace to sustain student interest, engagement and understanding. In study sites, skills and knowledge were also developed and enhanced through instruction that met both academic and workplace competency expectations. Such strategies led to improvements in student achievement outcomes. Districts and states in the study were able to cite data that showed that CTE students were doing well and even outperforming average, non-CTE students in their states. District and state data also showed that students in POS had higher high school graduation rates.

In 2005, the state of South Carolina initiated an innovative approach to career-focused education through the Education and Economic Development Act (EEDA). Developed with the backing of the state’s business community, EEDA aims to improve student achievement and preparedness for postsecondary education and high-skill, high-wage, and high-demand jobs. It does so through a focus on career awareness and exploration and the creation of locally relevant career pathways and POS.

There is perhaps no better place to start in advancing a new image of career and technical education (CTE) than by creating the kind of classroom instruction that will prepare students for further learning and the workplace. The quality of our teachers and their capacity to construct rich learning experiences for students represents the “front line” of our work in CTE. Teachers shape the learning experiences that produce competent and confident graduates who are ready to begin their career paths; well-trained graduates are both advocates and evidence that the field is truly living up to a new image.

Just one of the ways career and technical education (CTE) is revamping its image is through increased attention to data-driven instructional techniques as a means of improving and focusing instruction on what matters most. Accountability and data have increasingly become a core focus of research, news and commentary about education in recent years. Though some of the attention to accountability and data use may be tied to regulatory requirements, there is also recognition among educators that metrics matter.

As of September 2010, the U.S. manufacturing sector grew for the 14th consecutive month, leading some economists to speculate that, as with the Great Depression, American manufacturing will lead the economy out of the recession. It’s a little bit of good news in a long stream of depressing employment reports. Career and technical educators contribute to the growth of this sector by training career-ready graduates for increasingly high-skilled manufacturing jobs. However, skills aren’t the only important aspect of career-readiness— so are work philosophies, like a commitment to continuous improvement. Great plant managers do not issue dictates from the office suite. Instead, they include everyone involved in production in discussions about process improvement. Training career and technical education (CTE) graduates in how to contribute to these discussions will make them more employable. This article relates how one manufacturer, Dant Clayton Corporation in Louisville, Kentucky, applied lean manufacturing philosophies to its welding shop, and describes how educators might incorporate lean philosophies into instruction in all skill areas.

In 2005, the state of South Carolina enacted the Education and Economic Development Act (EEDA). The Act, commonly known as the Personal Pathways to Success initiative, was designed to improve student achievement, graduation rates, and preparedness for postsecondary education and high-skill, high-wage jobs. EEDA is intended to work through a focus on career awareness and exploration at all school levels and the creation of locally relevant programs of study (POS) in high schools. EEDA contains nearly all of the basic requirements of Perkins IV plus additional elements intended to support and sustain the implementation of POS. These include extra assistance for high risk students, the organization of high school curricula around at least three career clusters per school, an enhanced role for school counselors, evidence-based high school reform, regional education centers charged with facilitating business education partnerships, and greater articulation between secondary and postsecondary education.

Improving comprehension skills is vital to building cognitive skills. Reading and literacy skills enable youth to gather information and create knowledge from various sources, and then to consider solutions to problems in and about their lives from both a cognitive and a creative standpoint. By implementing disciplinary reading strategies in the career and technical education (CTE) curriculum, teachers enable all youth with the requisite skills to succeed in school, careers and daily life. The goal of reading strategy instruction is to enable students to independently select appropriate strategies, adapt them to particular texts, and employ them to solve reading problems (Pressley, Symons, McGoldrick, and Snyder, 1995).

“High-skill, high-wage, high-demand occupations” is the rhetoric most often employed when describing the aim of workforce development, not only for Perkins-funded programs, but also for many high school reform efforts. The assumption is that all other occupations are “low skill, low wage.” Phrases like “high skill, high wage” conjure up visions of technology-driven occupations that demand baccalaureate degrees or higher, intensive mathematics preparation, and the like. In reality, many states define a high-skill occupation as a job requiring any post-high school education; this may include anything from related work experience to a doctorate. High wage is defined as anything above the median for all occupations. This means jobs that may pay between $30,000 and $40,000 per year are considered high wage. In short, the phrase “high skill, high wage” tends to blur important distinctions in the labor market, distinctions that especially matter when thinking about potential foci for career and technical education (CTE) programs.

Many of those working in the field of career and technical education (CTE) have continuously grappled with the need for a uniformly global set of information—a national-level database or, at minimum, a common, standardized set of definitions and measures—to meet CTE’s multiple needs, including accountability and evaluation, career guidance and program improvement. This article primarily focuses on data and CTE accountability and why these matter in the current policy context. It also describes the work currently being undertaken by the National Research Center for Career and Technical Education (NRCCTE) and others toward establishing common data standards and a new direction for CTE accountability and evaluation that anticipates changes in federal policy.

The building design of many comprehensive high schools can hamper communication and collaboration between academic and career and technical teachers. Leaders at Texarkana Area Vocational Center and Arkansas High School, two parts of a large campus in the Texarkana, AR, school district, launched a successful effort to unify the campus and strengthen relationships among staff members. The project prompted teachers to understand their students better and to design more interdisciplinary projects to combine academic and career studies.

In the summer of 2006, Congress approved the renewal of the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act. Provisions within that act caused a refocusing within the career and technical education (CTE) community due to changes in articulation, testing, rigor, programs of study and general philosophy. More specifically, there was a renewed focus on assessment and the data that assessment results provide. The accountability section (113) emphasizes that assessments must be “valid and reliable and include, at a minimum, challenging academic standards and attainment of skill proficiencies, including achievement on technical assessments that are aligned with industry recognized standards.”