Earlier this year, Advance CTE conducted a survey of State CTE Directors asking how states were implementing the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act of 2006 (Perkins) and using their Perkins Basic State Grants. It is important to note that Perkins requires that at least 85 percent of each state’s Perkins grant go to local eligible recipients (e.g., school districts, area technical centers, institutions of higher education, etc.). The focus of the new fact sheet, “How States Use Perkins – The Basics” details how states are using the remaining 15 percent and other flexible portions of their grants. The findings include:

• 50 states report using a portion of their state leadership funds on supporting or improving new CTE courses or initiatives and the improvement of career guidance and academic advisement;
• 38 states report dedicating a portion of the local allocation to the creation of a reserve fund, which can be used for specialized projects benefiting rural areas, areas with a high number of CTE students and/or areas with a high percentage of CTE students; and
• 12 states report that they require local secondary recipients to distribute 100 percent of their Perkins funds to programs of study

To learn more about the top uses of state leadership funds, how states are distributing their reserve funds and more, check out the fact sheet here.  

On Friday, October 20th, the American Youth Policy Forum (AYPF) and the Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation (MDRC) hosted the “Employer-Driven Innovations in CTE: Promise, Practice, & Opportunities for Policy Capitol Hill forum,” moderated by Jennifer Brown Lerner of AYPF. Presentations, followed by a panel discussion, were given by Mary Visher, Senior Associate, MDRC; Stanley S. Litow, President Emeritus, IBM International Foundation and Vice President Emeritus, IBM Corporate Citizenship; Cate Swinburn, President, YouthForce NOLA and Van Ton-Quinlivan, Vice Chancellor, Workforce & Digital Futures, California Community Colleges System. 

The forum showcased trends and new movements in CTE, and some highlights included:

• MDRC’s emphasis that CTE must include both college and career pathways. Visher also spoke about the important relationship between employer needs and student needs, and expressed that programs must address both.
• IBM’s P-TECH program, “a new grade 9-14 public school model focused on STEM fields and Career and Technical Education,” reported increased academic achievement in its partner schools. This model is also attempting to reduce the stigma around CTE through new terminology. For example, “soft skills” are labeled as “essential skills” and the phrase “new collar” is used to refer to the evolving job market. 
• YouthForce NOLA broke down career readiness into three parts: job-specific skills; soft skills and work experience. Skilled crafts, health sciences and creative/tech were named as three of the most relevant career sectors today.
• The California Community College System is emphasizing the value of a postsecondary experience in the current workforce. The state has a shortage of skilled employees with an associate’s degree, certificates or industry-valued credentials. Ton-Quinlivan also spoke about the need for colleges to work together regionally to meet the skills demand, instead of competing with one another.

Support for reauthorization of the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act of 2006 (Perkins) was firm and widespread. Multiple groups acknowledged the need for current Perkins funds to be used to address the workforce demands through experiential learning and collaboration (between secondary and postsecondary, as well as regionally).

Meredith Hills, Graduate Fellow for Federal Policy

Staff Reflection: Honoring Our State CTE Directors
Kimberly Green, Executive Director 

One of the best parts of working for a membership organization is the chance to meet interesting, inspiring leaders from every state in the country! During my tenure with the organization, I began in 1993, I have seen a lot of State CTE Directors come and go but the one constancy among them has been leadership. Our members, by definition of the positions they hold, are leaders; they are also leaders because of the beliefs they hold and the work they do every day to help more students find success by demanding excellence, ensuring equity and building support and visibility for Career Technical Education.

What often gets lost in our drive for improvement and achievement is the celebration of success. That is why I am so happy that annually Advance CTE’s Star of Education award recognizes former State Directors who have helped pave the way to get us where we are today, as well as rising stars who will pick up the ball and continue to move the work forward. Congratulations to this year’s winners – Kathy Cullen (former State Director in Wisconsin); JoAnn Simser (former State Director in Minnesota); Francis Tuttle (posthumous recognition, former State Director in Oklahoma); and our Rising Star – Marcie Mack, current State Director in Oklahoma! CTE and the lives of many are indelibly better because of each of you.

Staff Reflection: Supporting Our Members
Andrea Zimmermann, Senior Associate, Member Engagement and Leadership Development

During Monday’s Star of Education Award Ceremony, there was one comment that would stick with me for the rest of the meeting. Tom Friedemann, superintendent and CEO of the Francis Tuttle Technology Center, accepted the award on behalf of Dr. Francis Tuttle, who is known as the grandfather of Oklahoma Career and Technology Education. Friedemann said Tuttle always surrounded himself with “idea people.” This habit helped him create the infrastructure that still supports CTE in Oklahoma today.

Over the next few days, I would walk around the conference hotel and pop into various sessions. I’d listen in on the conversations and Friedemann’s words about “idea people” kept coming back to me.

As the staff member who is responsible for member engagement, leadership development and the Advance CTE meetings, I was struck by how many “idea people” were in these session rooms both as speakers and attendees. My favorite part of each session is the rich cross-state sharing and “a-ha moments.” Those were in abundance at this year’s Fall Meeting, and I know this was driven by the people in the room.

This year’s meeting saw attendees from 46 states and the District of Columbia, and they hailed from all corners of the CTE landscape – from K-12 and postsecondary to workforce development and even industry representatives. A point of pride for me was that 77 percent of attendees are Advance CTE members, and of that, 25 percent are brand-new members experiencing their first Advance CTE meeting. Most of these new members are part of Advance CTE’s newly expanded state membership structure.

Advance CTE members enjoy up to 35 percent off the price of a regular registration. Join today and take advantage of discounted registration rates for the 2018 Advance CTE Spring Meeting, which will be held April 4-6 in Washington, DC.

Staff Reflection: States Leading the Way in Shifting the Perception of CTE
Katie Fitzgerald, Senior Associate, Communications 

CTE’s continued success is evident in the compelling sessions held throughout the Fall Meeting, where states were featured prominently in sessions spanning a variety of topics from supporting rural learners through innovative strategies, to strengthening secondary-postsecondary credit alignment.

While dedicated state leaders have continued to focus on program quality and demonstrated that Career Technical Education is an option that is truly for all learners, states are still grappling with how to ensure that students, parents, employers, educators and policymakers understand that CTE sets up learners for both college and careers.

To tackle the ongoing CTE stigma challenge, we dedicated a half day of sessions to highlight our communications and messaging research and explore how states are improving their communications in an effort to shift the perception of CTE.

The day began with a panel featuring leaders from Washington and Maryland, who shared their findings from a one-year pilot that tested communications and recruitment strategies anchored by our research outlined in “The Value and Promise of Career Technical Education.” Both states focused on virtual campaigns including developing a video template that Washington’s 200+ districts can use to ‘sell’ their own CTE programs, and developing sample social media posts and a how-to social media guide for two districts in Maryland.

Following the panel, attendees were able to choose from four workshops to further dig into the most effective ways to communicate about CTE including:

• Advocacy 101: How to Advocate Effectively for CTE;
• Leveraging Your CTE Champions to Reach Parents;
• Building Effective Messages to Communicate About CTE with Parents and Students; and
• Maximizing Employer Engagement

Be sure to check out the 2017 Fall Meeting agenda to view session PowerPoints and handouts, and learn more about the communications research in a recent webinar here.

Today,  Advance CTE, in coordination with the House and Senate Career Technical Education (CTE) Caucuses held a briefing focusing on how to combat negative stereotypes about CTE, and more effectively communicate the many benefits of CTE with parents, students and additional critical audiences.  The briefing, “Communicating the Value and Promise of CTE,” highlighted the key findings from research that Advance CTE commissioned with support from the Siemens Foundation. Kate Kreamer, Advance CTE’s Deputy Executive Director, moderated the briefing and shared some of the most important findings from this research, including:  

• CTE students and their parents are overwhelmingly more satisfied with their education compared to non-CTE students. In fact, 82% of CTE students are satisfied with their ability to learn real-world skills in school, compared to only 51% of non-CTE students;
• College and careers are both key aspirations for parents and students;
• Parents and students are both attracted to the ‘real world’ benefits of CTE programs. In fact, 86% of parents and students want the opportunity to gain more real world skills in high school; 
• CTE relies on champion messengers such as school counselors to convince them that CTE is a good option for their education; and 
• In addition to ‘real world skills,’ the terms ‘exploration’ and ‘finding your passion’ were other messages that resonated with parents and students.

The briefing highlighted these findings and began with opening remarks from Representative Glenn Thompson (R-PA), who emphasized CTE as “an important rung on the ladder of opportunity,” and its ability to provide a pathway to in-demand and high-wage careers. He also discussed the necessity to communicate effectively about CTE to combat CTE’s stigma issue.

Each panelist provided remarks, including David Etzwiler, CEO of the Siemens Foundation. He emphasized the importance of effective messaging about CTE, noting that “far too few youth choose high-quality CTE programs in high school, even though they lead to strong postsecondary outcomes.  While that choice might be because of a personal preference, it’s often because of a stigma that exists around CTE and the careers it supports.”

Dr. Lynne Gilli, the Assistant State Superintendent, Division of Career and College Readiness at the Maryland State Department of Education shared details about the focus groups conducted in Maryland as part of their involvement in this work. She shared that students and parents often knew about specific programs, but that they didn’t always connect those programs to the term  “CTE.” Additionally, she noted that parents and students were excited to learn about how CTE programs deliver project-based, problem-solving curriculum and hands-on experiences.

Lauren Fillebrown, a senior at Penn State University shared her experiences as a CTE student and how it helped her discover her purpose in both her education and career, opened up opportunities for her to pursue a variety of internships and allowed her to meet teachers, coaches and mentors who invested in her. She noted how this network of people is dedicated to her growth and helped her to believe that she can impact the world.

Advance CTE is thankful to the CTE caucus and our panelists for sharing the importance of communicating effectively about CTE.

Kathryn Zekus, Katie Fitzgerald, Advance CTE

This post is written by Fleck Education, a Gold Level sponsor of the 2017 Advance CTE Fall Meeting.

Perhaps you have sat in a meeting like the one I attended recently. State leaders were once again discussing graduation requirements when one said, “What we really need is to bring back vocational education.”

As those at the table nodded in agreement, my mind quickly disregarded the outdated term for Career Technical Education (CTE) and shifted to the disappointing lack of awareness of CTE’s amazing accomplishments in our state.  “Bring it back?” I said to myself, “Doesn’t he know how well it’s working?”

While trying hard not to dismiss the speaker as out of touch, my perspective slowly began to change. How much of his lack of awareness was my fault?  And how many others – I wondered – were also unaware of the positive impact of our CTE programs?  How is it that intelligent men and women who set important policies and honestly want to do the right thing for students are sometimes in the dark about our work?

Of course, this is not a new problem. When I was a State CTE Director, we had similar communication challenges. At that time, I naively presumed that once we expanded our communication efforts all would be better; that somehow, once you got the word out it stayed.  But advocacy is not a website or news release that needs occasional tending. Effective CTE communication is an ever-changing entity that needs constant weeding, fertilizing and replanting.

What I had not considered when I was a State Director was our office’s responsibility for getting out ahead of the issue and the importance of advocacy as a proactive, front-end strategy instead of an after the fact approach. At my recent meeting, I wanted to raise my hand and explain – in what could have sounded like a condescending tone – all of the progress being made by CTE in the state. Doing so, however, would have only made me feel better and likely embarrassed the state leader.

As obvious as constantly advocating for CTE is, the important work is what is done beforehand. Advance CTE’s new Virtual CTE Institute, announced earlier this month, is a perfect example of this strategy seeking to “to raise awareness and create new advocates for high-quality CTE. “ So are annual state CTE summary reports like those Fleck Education has produced for the state of Indiana the last four years. When we changed the title from “CTE Review…” to “Career Readiness Report…” and added colorful graphics, more people took notice.

Perhaps your state is already ahead of the advocacy challenge. Use these questions as a gauge.

• Do you have a written, proactive state-level CTE advocacy plan?
• Do you have a process for quickly updating new legislators, agency heads or program chairs regarding what CTE is and what it does?
• Do you meet personally with new state and regional leaders – or their staff – to give a thumbnail progress report on CTE in your state?
• Do you produce and distribute an annual state/regional CTE summary report highlighting CTE student and program progress made in the last year?  Does it include graphics or an executive summary with graphics and figures that are quick and easy to digest?
• Does your website include brief explanations of common CTE terms?
• Do you have a one page handout that explains CTE in a nutshell and highlights your most recent accomplishments?

If some of these questions give you pause, we can help.

At Fleck Education, our staff includes two former State CTE Directors as well as former CTE teachers, school counselors and district leaders who know the CTE landscape well. We combine our seasoned CTE perspective with practical solutions that both accelerate your CTE accomplishments and help your state address the challenges.

That way, more leaders in more meetings will know and support CTE even before the conversations begin.