Mark Phillips, a professor at San Francisco State University, recently penned a blog in the Washington Post about the value of today’s vocational education, more commonly called Career Technical Education (CTE).
His prior experience teaching CTE educators in Norway influenced Phillips’ support for CTE, which he says should be “highly valued, well funded, and effectively implemented.†Phillips fears that a “college-for-all†mindset held by parents will be detrimental to some students. Teaching only academics may steer some students off the course of their true ambitions, Phillips says. The author references psychologist Howard Gardner’s multiple theories of intelligence, noting that individuals with “bodily-kinesthetic†and “spatial†intelligences are especially apt for the hands-on, critical thinking skills required of technical workers.
Phillips emphasizes that more funding for CTE is needed and, in some cases, improvements to program implementation are necessary. He notes that great CTE programs, such as those mentioned in a recent TIME Magazine article, should serve as models as locals take steps to elevate CTE in their communities.
Read the full blog here.
Kara Herbertson, Education Policy Analyst