Career and Technical Education Facts

FICTION: Career and technical education (CTE) is just another program for low-achieving students.
FACT: CTE students are often in the top five percent of their class. (Ries, E. “Making Grades.” Techniques: Connecting Education and Careers, January 2000.) In the 2000 All-American Vocational Student Awards, for example, the median grade point of students competing was 3.35. CTE classes now are attracting the best and brightest because they give students a jump-start towards their chosen career.

FICTION: Career-technical education (CTE) prevents students from taking academic courses.
FACT: Research shows that among CTE students, 80 percent complete the same number of credits in math and science as their peers who take the academic program only. Of the 80 percent who complete an integrated CTE and academic program, 60 percent go to college upon graduation (this is only slightly lower than the percentage of students in the college-prep program who do so; i.e.72%). More than 50 percent of those who do go to college enroll in pre-baccalaureate technical programs. (http://www.pdkintl.org/kappan/k_v86/k0410gra.htm)

FICTION: Participation in CTE doesn’t improve a student's academic skills?
FACT: Anecdotal data -- the only kind available at present -- suggests the opposite. While some CTE concentrators as a group may enter high school less prepared than academic-only students, the achievement gap is either small or insignificant by the time they graduate. (Karen Levesque et al, Vocational Education in the United States: Toward the Year 2000, and Stephen Plank, Career and Technical Education in the Balance: An Analysis of High School Persistence, Academic Achievement and Postsecondary Destinations, 2001.)

FICTION: Young people do not want to participate in career and technical education programs/classes.
FACT: Young people want relevant learning opportunities. A 1996 summer survey of Seattle youth showed that young people want classes that connect to the real world, with hands-on experience, and they are prepared to take these classes in the summer and after school. In addition, in a series of focus groups held around the state, these young people said an educational system that included CTE was desirable. A national survey of teens showed similar results.