White Paper
The Coalition For Career and Technical Courses
1. Project description:
The Coalition For Career and Technical Courses is a collaboration between Kansas high schools and Kansas post-secondary institutions to create a web portal where Kansas high school students find and access all virtual career and technical courses offered by Kansas post-secondary institutions. These courses will allow students to pursue concurrent high school/college credit in their desired field of study and to pursue industry certifications where available.
These courses may serve as elective courses for high school students in their career field of interest as identified in their individual career plan completed through the Kansas Career Pipeline.
2. Data:
Last year over 100,000 Kansas students participated in the Kansas Career Pipeline, yet a small fraction of those students developed a career plan; fewer were actually able to work on that career plan. Kansas high schools simply lack the resources to meet the course needs of their students. This problem is exacerbated by the current financial situation, declining enrollment and the sheer number of possible career choices available in a modern society.
This project will allow students to choose from thousands of online career and technical courses. In preliminary research, post secondary institutions surveyed are averaging about 100 virtual career and technical courses each. If that average holds true for just the 26 community college and technical colleges, the project will begin with approximately 2,600 courses. When the courses available at four-year colleges are included, the number could easily exceed 3,000 courses.
3. Program Activities:
1. Gain Support and Set Direction:
A preliminary meeting was held to test the viability of this project. The response was overwhelmingly positive. However, it is clear that this meeting will need to be replicated with K-12 and post-secondary educators across the state to allow them to share their needs, expectations, and stories that lend credence to the necessity of this project. Their buy-in is essential.
2. Develop Website:
Version 1.0 of the website will be developed immediately. It is anticipated that students will have access to the online catalog as well as the listed classes by January 1, 2010. The inevitable complexities will be added as they are identified and released. The continued addition of features will be done on an on-going basis.
3. Add Courses:
The website will include a system that will allow each post-secondary institution to control their own courses Initially, the project site manager will add all available courses which will be up by January 1, 2010, but the site will be dynamically updated as each institution updates their list of available courses throughout the course of the year.
5. Enroll Students:
During the development of the website, simultaneous development of processes and procedures for enrollment, registration, communication with instructors, and other issues will be addressed. These processes and procedures will be ready so that students may enroll beginning January 1, 2010. As with any project of this nature there will be ongoing modifications, additions, and improvements.
6. Ongoing Improvement Efforts:
Continuous improvement of the system will be a primary focus of the coalition. Many features as well as support mechanisms will emerge as the project matures. Continuous work to implement these improvements will be a necessity.
4. Programs Involved:
All career clusters will be represented as well as a vast majority of career pathways. It is safe to say that current opportunities for students will be dwarfed by the offerings available as a result of this project. Many logistical issues will need to be solved as the program evolves and it is anticipated that additional opportunities will be uncovered. A side conversation for preliminary research is based on the desire to improve virtual courses which will include the pursuit of methods and technologies to enhance and improve existing/new courses.
5. Importance Of The Project:
On February 13, 2008, the Kansas State Board of Education (KSBE) passed 9 motions regarding Career and Technical Education. This project directly supports and implements five of these motions.
#1: Create/Approve Gold Standard assessments (industry-recognized credentials/certifications) for each of the Career Clusters that support high expectations.
#2: Integrate core content standards with technical program standards utilizing the 16 career clusters as the organizing principle.
#3: Support implementation of Individual Career Plans of Study for all students in 8th grade and above.
#4: Improve Access to Career and Technical Education by removing barriers and promoting partnerships.
#7: Support Professional Development for teachers (e.g. mentor-mentee model) to help guide students in planning for future careers.
In addition there are 6 bullet points on the Kansas Career Fields and Clusters Model (released by KSBE) that are addressed by this project. They include:
• Career-specific training
• Employer-recognized certification and licenser
• Career program study
• Workplace readiness classes
• High school senior experiences'
• Articulation linking secondary and post-secondary study
In addition, far too many Kansas students are engaging in the Kansas Career Pipeline only to be frustrated by the lack or absence of learning experiences available after choosing a career area. This project will literally provide hundreds of appropriate learning experiences aligned to their career interests.
The emphasis on Career and Technical Education is caused not only by the need for more, but a better-trained, high-skilled workforce. This project will quickly increase the number of well-trained and highly skilled students to meet those needs.
Last, but certainly not least, this project will help educators address the “wasted senior year.” This project will give students alternatives that are engaging and meaningful to them individually.
6. Potential Impact:
The potential impact of this project is immense. The opportunity to select from a wide range of courses will provide previously unavailable learning experiences. Additionally this project will further KSDE’s efforts to integrate career/technical education standards with academic standards as the appropriate fractional course codes for each class will be identified
7. Accountability:
This program will be measured differently than most education programs. It will be measured in a true free market approach. If post-secondary institutions are not engaging enough customers to make the project worthwhile, they will not continue to offer courses through this process. On the other hand if students are not satisfied with the number, selection, and quality of courses, they will not continue to take courses through this process. The one factor not based on market forces will be the arbitrary decision of schools not to allow students to take advantage of this opportunity. This project is based on the economic principle of free exchange of goods and service.
Measures of success will thus be predicated upon factors such as the number of courses made available, the number of students taking courses, the total credit hours taken, and a rating system for feedback for students to rate each course. However, the most important outcome will be the number of students having their personal career goals met, thus leading to successful students and economic growth for our state.
8. Sustainability:
The continued funding of this project will be made by the user community but will likely consist of multiple components. The degree that each of these funding sources is yet to be determined but each will likely be a part of future funding.
Potential ongoing funding sources under consideration include adding a small fee added to each course taken to be paid by students, fees paid by school districts for use of the courses, fees paid by post secondary institutions for participation, and continued exploration of grant funding opportunities.
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