“To really transform the high school experience, we have to impact student motivation. Kids have to be excited and interested in what they’re studying. They have to see the relevance and meaning in their course work. That’s why we’re doing this.”
Pasadena Unified School District, Pasadena
In the News
Below are articles about Linked Learning as well as other topics related to preparing students for college and career. Please note that in order to view some articles, you may have to sign up for a free account.
Study: Two-fifths of high school graduates are unprepared for college or the workforce
By Daniel deVise
Appearing in The Washington Post
Two-fifths of high school students graduate prepared neither for traditional college nor for career training, according to a study from researchers at Johns Hopkins University and the University of Arizona.
College-preparatory programming has expanded dramatically in the past decade, with participation in Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate more than tripling. Career-preparatory programs have evolved, as well, and school-to-work “pathways” have replaced tired old vocational programs.
But they are not enough. One-third of high school students complete the modern college-preparatory track, and another one-quarter graduate from career-preparatory programs. The remaining high school population, an estimated 40 percent, do neither.
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Academies at High Schools Praised
By Kelly Puente
Appearing in the Press-Telegram, Long Beach, CA
Students enrolled in California Partnership Academies are more likely to graduate from high school and complete courses required to attend the state's public universities, according to a report released this week by State Superintendent Tom Torlakson.
CPAs are small learning communities within larger high schools where students follow a multiyear program focused on career and technical skills. California has 500 CPAs, serving 3percent of all students in grades 10 through 12. The CPAs in the Long Beach Unified School District include Poly High School's Pacific Rim Academy; and Jordan High School's Aspirations in Medical Services Academy and its Architecture, Construction and Engineering Academy, or ACE.
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'Linked learning' will help ensure employers can find skilled workers
By AJ Thomas
Appearing in the Mercury News
As a human resources professional for a high-tech company, I am responsible for screening applicants for jobs in an industry that is growing ever more competitive.Potential hires need more than a solid education; they need work-ready skills and experience. Unfortunately, many candidates lack these prerequisites.
According to a new report from the business leaders organization America's Edge, even at the height of the recession and with 2 million Californians out of work, only 38 percent of the state's workers had appropriate training for 47 percent of California's jobs in middle-skill careers..
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Broad-based coalitions are needed for California to reclaim leadership in education
By Donald Gill
Appearing in the Contra Costa Times
If California high school education is examined closely, there are clear indicators that the system is not working for a majority of our students. State Superintendent Tom Torlakson acknowledged this challenge within weeks of his election last November. In January, recognizing a need for broad-based stakeholder involvement, Torlakson convened a 59-member transition team co-chaired by Linda Darling-Hammond, Ducommun professor of Education at the Stanford University School of Education, and David Rattray, senior vice president of Education and Workforce Development, Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce, to provide innovative and strategic advice.
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UC turns career tech ed-friendly
By John Fensterwald
Appearing in TOP-Ed
A decade ago, 258 career technical education courses counted toward satisfying requirements for admission to the California State University or the University of California. Today, the number has grown to 9,079 courses, closing in on the 2012 goal of 10,000 courses that the Legislature set several years ago.The numbers reflect a dramatic shift in the mindset toward CTE by the University of California, whose faculty determines which courses meet A-G, the 15 subjects that all students must pass to apply to a four-year state university...
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West Contra Costa a Leader in Linking Career and Academics, Board Member Says
Speaking in Kensington Sunday, school board member Madeline Kronenberg also praised Holy Names University's promise of financial support, early admission to district students who meet certain requirements.
By Betty Buginas
El Cerrito Patch, August 22nd, 2011
West Contra Costa Unified schools are at the forefront of a nationwide trend to link academic learning to careers, board member Madeline Kronenberg told a small gathering at a Kensington church Sunday morning. The connection, she said, means students are more engaged, which in turn increases achievement and will stem the dropout rate. Kroenberg gave a brief overview of a Blueprint for Great Schools, which was released earlier this month by state Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson, saying she agrees with its emphasis on raising teacher quality and better preparing students to enter the work force.
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Preparing Students for Success in College, Career, and Life
By Don Gill
Contra Costa Times
It has been a great year for Dozier-Libbey Medical High School. In the short span of three years since this high school opened its doors they have amassed an impressive array of awards and recognitions.
Dozier-Libbey is a school that is the product of the collaborative efforts of the Antioch Unified School District and its affiliated administrators, teachers, staff, students, parents, businesses and elected officials. The results of their efforts show the depth of their commitment to this school's success.
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Career-Relevant Education Prepares Students for Real World, Helps Fill Skills Shortage
By Jennifer Ortega
El Cerrito Patch, June 10, 2011
Forty-seven graduates from El Cerrito High School entered the “real world” June 4 prepared for college and careers in the IT industry, thanks to the education and hands-on training they received through the school’s Information Technology Academy known as TechFutures.
These young men and women, who have already charted their paths by selecting which college to attend, have also chosen their intended majors, including: Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Animation, Photography, Game Design, and Business Administration.
Unfortunately, too few high school students in California have access to this kind of career-relevant education and that spells trouble for our state’s economy, according to a new report by the national business leader organization America’s Edge.
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School Network Readies Students for College and Career: With a program called Linked Learning, California educators show that academics and career and technical education don't have to be mutually exclusive
By Catherine Gewertz
Education Week, May 31, 2011
To the national debate about whether students should pursue career and technical education or college preparation, a California program wants to add an emphatic declaration: Yes.
The refusal to choose between one instructional emphasis or the other symbolizes the work being done to build career pathways in nine school districts as part of Linked Learning, an initiative cited as a national model of career and technical education.
One of the places the project is unfolding is in a cluster of high schools in a district that serves a predominantly Latino, low-income community here among the Central Valley’s olive and orange groves.
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Steinberg’s SB 547 Broadens Accountability beyond Test Obsession
By Fred Jones
Thoughts on Public Education, April 24, 2011
The transition of instructional approaches reflects the natural development and aspirations of youth. What may have worked to inspire a first grader would fall flat with a rebel-without-a-cause adolescent. A grade-school student rarely asks “Why do I have to learn such-and-such? I’ll never use it in life.” Yet that is the most common refrain of a secondary student struggling with a challenging subject. Effectively engaging teenagers by connecting their formal education with their life aspirations is the key instructional ingredient for high school students…
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Poll: Students Grade High School Down, College Up
By Connie Cass
Associated Press, April 19, 2011
Young adults say high schools are failing to give students a solid footing for the working world or strong guidance toward college, at a time when many fear graduation means tumbling into an economic black hole. Students who make it to college are happy with the education they get there, an Associated Press-Viacom poll says.
Most of the 18- to 24-year-olds surveyed gave high schools low grades for things that would ease the way to college: A majority say their school wasn't good at helping them choose a field of study, aiding them in finding the right college or vocational school or assisting them in coming up with ways to pay for more schooling.
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Making STEM Real
By Gary Hoachlander and Dave Yanofsky, ConnectEd: The California Center for College and Career
Educational Leadership, March 2011 – Volume 68 No. 6
There are few more crucial initiatives on the school improvement agenda than increasing student proficiency in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Yet in too many schools, STEM is still mostly science and mathematics, taught separately with little or no attention to technology and engineering…
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New Antioch Academy Places Students on Career Path to Engineering
By Marta Yamamoto
Contra Costa Times, February 23, 2011
ANTIOCH -- At Antioch High School's Academy for Engineering and Designing a Green Environment (EDGE) the three Rs of education -- Reading, wRiting and aRithmetic -- have been updated. In their place stand Relationship, Relevance and Rigor, three Rs that represent a new pathway for high school education, one created to ensure that students leave high school both college- and career-ready…
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Toward a New Vision for American High Schools
By Gary Hoachlander, ConnectEd: The California Center for College and Career
Education Week, February 18, 2011
“Pathways to Prosperity,” released Feb. 2 by the Harvard Graduate School of Education, argues that our high schools are overemphasizing a single pathway to four-year college. The report calls for a broader vision with diverse high school experiences for young people.
The report quickly drew criticism from some who fear that this call will legitimize the pernicious tracking that has pervaded education in America. The polarization around this report, which raised some tough questions, underscores just how difficult it is to have constructive conversations about new directions for American high schools…
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PHS Academy of Business Receives Certification Status
Only three programs in the state have been certified
By Esther Avila
The Porterville Recorder, February 17, 2011
More than 200 Porterville High School Partnership Academy of Business/Finance – PAB – students were honored Wednesday afternoon during a special recognition celebration held at the Frank “Buck” Shaffer Theater inside the Porterville Memorial Auditorium. On hand for the recognition celebration were numerous local, county, state and federal government representatives…
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'College for All' Strategy Misguided
Harvard study urges career training focus
By John Fensterwald - Educated Guess
Thoughts on Public Education, February 4, 2011
A Harvard Graduate School of Education report that urges moving away from a “college for all” approach to education reform has created a coast-to-coast roiling debate.
“Pathways to Prosperity: Meeting the Challenge of Preparing Young Americans for the 21st Century” calls for a much broader approach to secondary education than a college-prep curriculum for a four-year university. It should emphasize multiple career and college pathways in high school leading to associate’s degrees and job skills certificates.
An estimated two-thirds of jobs that will be created over the next decade will require some education beyond high school, notes the report…
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Why does Fresno have Thousands of Job Openings - and High Unemployment?
By Michael A. Fletcher
The Washington Post, February 2, 2011
FRESNO - This city is grappling with one of the most troubling contradictions of the new economy: Even as it has one of the nation's highest unemployment rates, it has thousands of job openings. The dilemma is becoming more common across the country as employers report increasing numbers of job openings. But many of those jobs are not a good fit for those who are out of work…
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West Contra Costa High School Academies Lead Students to Careers
By Shelly Meron
Contra Costa Times, January 29, 2011
In his first-period sports medicine class at Richmond High School, teacher Stanley Nakahara watched as his students practiced taping each other's wrists.
"Have her spread her fingers, or you'll cut off her circulation," he called out to one boy, who carefully manipulated the medical tape around another student's hand.
The exercise is one of many hands-on experiences students have in this class and others that are part of the health academy at the school, one of 15 career academies in the West Contra Costa school district.
The academies, part of the Linked Learning program, are essentially structured educational paths that lead students toward a specific career during their high school years, such as information technology, law and justice, or multimedia. Students spend time each day in classes that are directly related to a chosen field, along with a small group of other students being taught by the same handful of teachers…
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Health Academy Offers Jumpstart to Students
By Esther Avila
The Porterville Recorder, January 18, 2011
Eighth-grade and high school freshman students who have an interest in entering the medical field have the opportunity to jump start their potential health careers by enrolling in the Health Academy Pathway program at Porterville High School.
At Porterville High School, a “Skills Lab” offers students real-world opportunities by learning from local professionals through hands-on projects in medical offices, clinics, labs and hospitals while simultaneously attending high school…
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Pathways Offer Bright Future
By Esther Avila
The Porterville Recorder, January 18, 2011
More than 900 middle school students from 14 outside feeder districts to the Porterville Unified School District were treated to a Pathway Showcase Thursday at the Galaxy 9 Theatre.
Held in four screening rooms, the event featured PUSD high school students talking about their schools and offering an insight into the Pathway Academies – in business, finance, health, multimedia and technology, environmental science, digital design and communication, law and justice, agricultural technology, engineering, and performing arts – offered at their respective schools…
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Career Tech Center Feeding Grads to College
By John Fensterwald - Educated Guess
Thoughts on Public Education, January 17, 2011
The Center for Advanced Research and Technology in Clovis is an impressive place, a model facility for career and technical education that other student districts will recreate one day when they once again have money.
Serving 1,300 students in Clovis and Fresno, CART blends college prep academics with technical skills for juniors and seniors who work half-days in 13 labs. They include biomedical engineering, forensic science, engineering, advanced communications, and global dynamics…
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Career Academies Must Become Model, Not Niche, for Engaging Students
By Kish Rajan
Thoughts on Public Education, January 12, 2011
While unemployment rates remain stubbornly high, there is another grim reality we cannot ignore. Figures released last month by the California Dept. of Education indicate that more than one in five students – 22 percent – in the Mt. Diablo Unified School District drop out of school, matching that of the state as a whole.
As a parent with three children in the district, I find this statistic alarming. As a businessman, I know this data is indicative of the trouble companies have in finding highly skilled workers to fill jobs. As a local policymaker, I am proud to say that there are efforts under way within the district and throughout California to address both the dropout crisis and the challenge of preparing all of our youth for the modern workforce…
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Report Ties CART to Higher College Attendance Rate
By Marc Benjamin
The Fresno Bee, January 11, 2011
A seven-year study has found that students from the Center for Advanced Research and Technology attend college at a higher rate than their peers, findings that local school officials had long suspected.
The study, funded by the James Irvine Foundation and conducted by California Partnership for Achieving Student Success, a data-collection organization, also showed that CART students were more likely to be in college a second year...
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Rigorous, Relevant High School Program Leads Kids to College
By Caralee Adams
Education Week, January 22, 2011
Students in a high school program that combines strong academics, demanding technical education, and real-world experience were more likely to go on to college than their peers, new research released in California today shows.
Each year, about 1,400 students from 15 high schools in the Clovis and Fresno unified school districts attend a half-day program where they are taught by teams of instructors from both education and business in project-based labs at the Center for Advanced Research and Technology. CART uses the Linked Learning education model in which 11th and 12th grade students follow a pathway of study that connects learning in the classroom with real-world applications outside of school…
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The Power of Real-world Application
By Brad Stam, ConnectEd: The California Center for College and Career
Leadership, January 2011
During my four years as the chief academic officer for Oakland Unified School District, I wrestled daily with the challenges of improving teaching and learning across a large, complex system. I witnessed some real success; OUSD has charted a 118-point API gain since 2006, surpassing Los Angeles, West Contra Costa, and Fresno in the rankings of large urban districts in California…
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