Exploring Career Readiness and Digital Learning
Earlier this week we released the DLC’s latest study, exploring “The Intersection of Career Readiness and Digital Learning.”
It’s been fun and engaging researching (with Kathryn Kennedy leading the way) this report, for a few reasons that I’ll get into here and a subsequent post.
The first reason: we know that our DLC members are the leading organizations in online and hybrid learning, but it’s still so gratifying to hear about their work! We interviewed educators from the Oxford (MI) school district, state affiliates (Virtual Arkansas and VLACS), the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District (part of our Resilient Schools Project with Future of School), and schools working with Pearson and Stride, including two Destinations Career Academies and Indiana Connections Career Academy. We heard so many inspiring stories about their students and programs.
The second reason: the study documents three key findings, explored in school profiles:
Online CTE courses and programs often provide career education options for students who would not otherwise have access to good opportunities.
Full-time online schools provide CTE programs by offering a combination of online career courses and by partnering with businesses, state and regional training centers, and other organizations to combine online learning with on-the-ground, real-world jobs, internships, and learning opportunities.
Hybrid schools and programs, including those run by mainstream districts, provide academic scheduling flexibility to students who seek to prioritize their time in jobs, internships, or career training. No longer do these students have to fit in their career interests after regular school hours or on weekends—when many companies and high-value jobs are not open or available. For example, a student interested in a veterinary career can work at a vet’s office during the regular week and school hours, completing some of their online coursework after normal work hours.
At a general level, I suspect that many DLC members and readers might not be surprised by these findings. The findings, however, explore further detail about the extent to which these schools and programs align with the frameworks of the Association for Career & Technical Education (ACTE). Michael Connet of ACTE was instrumental in helping us think through these issues; we appreciate his support!
Most CTE programs, curriculum, and instructional design use the National Career Clusters Framework as a tool to organize and structure content areas. Sixteen Career Clusters represent 79 Career Pathways. CTE program offerings vary from one school to the next, as individual schools typically offer a subset of pathways, clusters, and courses. For instance, the following figure illustrates the clusters, pathways, and courses offered by the Cyber Academy of South Carolina.
The next figure, from Virtual Arkansas, reflects how clusters and courses may be slightly different based on regional variations or student interests, among other reasons.
The report goes into much more detail about the two schools that provided the figures above, as well as several other schools.
Earlier in this post I said there were three reasons that I found this study particularly satisfying. I’ll discuss the third reason in the next post.