Friday, May 30, 2008

Making the Case for Career and Technical Education

WIB Should Embrace Career and Technical Ed

By David Jason Fischer, Project Director, Center for an Urban Future


The promise of career and technical education (CTE) has fired much of the recent

energy around education reform in New York City, as indicated by a high profile
task force Mayor Bloomberg convened earlier this year to develop recommendations

for the field. My organization, the Center for an Urban Future,

recently released a report looking at CTE, titled Schools That Work. The study

presented two major findings. The first is that CTE seems to produce better

educational outcomes—higher graduation rates, fewer dropouts—than academics-

only secondary schooling, despite serving students who are poorer,

lower-skilled and otherwise at greater risk of failing to complete high school.


But the second finding carries even greater potential significance for New York

City’s economy. Simply put, CTE prepares young people for jobs in vital high growth

sectors like health care, construction, and information technology. CTE

programs are responsive to industry trends and informed by business leaders

who take an active role in shaping curriculum, donating equipment and

supplies, and providing internships and other work experiences to students

interested in exploring a career in the field. And CTE programs lead to higher

education as well as the workplace: to earn state approval, they must reach

agreements with colleges for advanced placement in the relevant field, and

culminate in attainment of a nationally recognized industry certification.


In other words, CTE bears a striking resemblance to the vision many in the research

and advocacy world hold for workforce development programming:

career orientation, close ties to industry, multiple pathways to employment

and higher education. Yet until very recently, CTE and workforce development

have proceeded along separate tracks, with virtually no connection between

the two systems.


Happily, this trend has begun to shift. Workforce Investment Board staff members

have been in attendance at recent meetings of the CTE Advisory Council,

a collection of educators, advocates and business leaders who meet quarterly

to support CTE programs. As a next step toward stronger ties between the two

systems, the mayor could appoint a prominent CTE official—perhaps Advisory

Council chair Stanley Schair, or Gregg Betheil, Senior Executive for CTE within

the Department of Education—to join the WIB.


The workforce development and CTE communities share common goals: to

help New Yorkers meet their career objectives, and to address the workforce

needs of city employers. Both will benefit from greater communication and

coordination. With short-term and long-term challenges to the city economy

in view, the time to act is now.

Posted by CTW at 18:28:08 | Permalink | Comments Off

Friday, May 23, 2008

Labor Demand in the Energy Sector Heats Up

From Workforce Developments
Posted by Bronwyn Mauldin

Another industry that’s poised for high labor demand is energy. I wrote about a projected shortage of line workers a while back, but concerns aren’t limited to that occupation. Whether you’re talking about jobs in traditional electrical utilities or the emerging new field of green energy, growing demand for electricity (check out the table below) combined with baby boomer retirements means jobs will be opening up. Here are two resources workforce development professionals may find useful in helping inform and direct job seekers to opportunities in the energy sector.

Energydemand_2For old-fashioned energy companies, check out the Center for Energy Workforce Development (CEWD). They have an interactive website where, in addition to the articles, videos, curricula and other materials you’ll find there, CEWD encourages you to add your own materials and best practices. It looks like there’s a fee to join, but you don’t need to be a member to access much of the info.

The Apollo Alliance focuses on green jobs and green energy, and their website has a wealth of information, including this recent report on “green collar” jobs. You can join the discussion on the Apollo blog.

In addition, WIRED Nation is currently setting up an Energy Regions section on its wiki, similar to its sections on Bioscience and Transportation/Distribution/Logistics. It will be yet another resource you’ll want to bookmark.

Energy Consumption Table: US Department of Energy

Posted by CTW at 22:12:51 | Permalink | Comments Off

Monday, May 19, 2008

The Importance of Career and Technical Education

On the heels of a new report, “Schools That Work,” released by the Center for an Urban Future (see the Resources/Research section of the CTW website),  NY Daily News columnist Errol Louis chimes in with an Op-Ed discussing the importance of career and technical education as an option for young people.

Schools that work, in two ways



Thursday, May 15th 2008, 4:00 AM

Like generations of white-collar wage slaves, I grew up believing that high school classmates who weren’t college-bound - and were consigned to the dreaded vocational education track (“voc ed” for short) - were doomed to a lifetime toiling away at poorly paid, low-prestige jobs.

Decades later, having shelled out untold thousands of dollars to a long string of plumbers, electricians, auto repairmen, opticians and the like, it’s hard to remember what was so funny about voc ed. I, for one, would gladly trade in every minute I wasted on high school trigonometry for training in how to fix my busted furnace on a cold winter night.

Not only is career and technical education nothing to laugh at, it’s a way to replace the unrealistic “college for all” bias of public schooling with a greater degree of practical preparation for lucrative and rewarding careers in fields like nursing, desktop publishing, computer networking and the building trades.

So says a report called “Schools That Work” being released today by the Center for an Urban Future, a Manhattan-based think tank. After a year spent studying New York’s 21 career and technical education high schools (CTEs for short), the report concludes they are “one of the most overlooked, underfunded and misunderstood parts of the city’s education system.”

CTE students, it turns out, have attendance rates up to 10 percentage points higher than high schools in general and are four times less likely to drop out than their counterparts in all-academic high schools. That’s true even though CTEs have a higher percentage of low-income students and kids with the lowest English and math standardized test scores.

And here’s the kicker: Two-thirds of CTE students go on to college, and when they do, there’s research suggesting they outperform other students. Those that go straight into the world of work are generally getting jobs in fields where the pay is good and demand is strong.

We need their hands on deck. New York has a perennial shortage of trained nurses, for instance, and it’s about to get worse: About a third of New York City nurses are over 50 years old. Ditto for plumbers, a third of whom are over 50.

Some CTEs are recognized as star performers: Aviation High School in Queens and the High School of Fashion Industries in Manhattan were ranked among the nation’s 100 best high schools by U.S. News & World Report.

But in general, the old “voc ed” stigma continues. The city’s CTEs, for instance, have a Web site that’s separate from the main Education Department site, and the planners at Tweed recently slashed the staff of CTE managers from 30 to 10.

Worse, a 2007 study by the Independent Budget Office found that the Education Department has allocated $750 less per student to CTEs than to other schools, a disparity that’s only begun to be cured in the current budget. As a result, it’s hard for some CTEs to get funding for the expensive machinery they need to run first-rate classes.

New York’s business community is frustrated. At a forum on CTEs, Lou Coletti, president of the Building Trades Employers’ Association, pointedly said, “I don’t think anyone from the Department of Ed has ever asked me, ‘Can you send some contractors into the schools to talk about career opportunities?’”

That is inexcusable.

In a belated gesture, Mayor Bloomberg recently created a panel, headed by former Mayor David Dinkins, to look into ways to strengthen our CTEs.

It’s a start. Now, parents, teachers and educational leaders need to focus on - and fund - CTEs as aggressively as they do schools like Stuyvesant and Bronx Science.

Not everyone is suited to be a lawyer, investment banker or office administrator. But there are a lot of kids who, with training and guidance, can form a strong middle class that keeps the city humming for generations to come.

By Errol Louis

Posted by CTW at 23:16:18 | Permalink | Comments Off

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

U.S Economy is Threatened by Lack of Investment in Workforce

From Workforce Management magazine:

Group Tries to Make National Skills Agenda a Political Priority
A Washington organization dedicated to strengthening U.S. economic clout is trying to make the issue of improving the skills of American workers a top political priority.

The Council on Competitiveness, a group of leaders from industry, academia and the labor community, called for a national skills agenda that would “ensure a rising standard of living” during a Capitol Hill meeting on Wednesday, April 30. 


The council warned that U.S. productivity is threatened by a combination of a shrinking U.S. workforce and inadequate reading and math skills among those who are in the labor market.


It urged an increased emphasis on “middle” skills—for jobs that don’t require a bachelor’s degree but do call for training beyond high school—and “service economy” skills, such as problem solving, collaboration and teamwork, that enable workers to interact better with customers.


Although the United States needs to produce more scientists and engineers, quantity alone is insufficient, the council said. U.S. technology workers need to have stronger interdisciplinary and entrepreneurial skills.


The recommendations are contained in the council’s report, titled “Thrive: The Skills Imperative.”


Sen. Max Baucus, D-Montana and chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, embraced the report and encouraged the council to provide Congress guidance on the issue.


“Skills are our most sustainable competitive advantage,” Baucus said at the event launching the council report. “They can be our anchor in the turbulent world economy we have.”


Baucus took listeners on a verbal tour of Highway 93, which bisects his state. He mentioned several towns where companies are able to engage in the global economy because of the quality of their machinists, welders and research scientists.


“Montana competes with its workforce,” Baucus said. But he also said that he constantly hears from companies having difficulty attracting and retaining skilled workers.


A major global technology firm has a similar challenge. James Spohrer, director of service research at IBM and a council advisor, says the company can find plenty of engineers and MBAs who are trained to work in manufacturing.


The problem is that IBM has transformed itself from a manufacturing to a business services company. The universities and colleges where it recruits haven’t undergone a similar metamorphosis.


Their science, engineering and management curricula continue to focus about 80 percent on manufacturing and 20 percent on services. In the latter area, students learn about dealing with networks, supply chains, markets and—most important—customers and their quirks.


“The knowledge economy and the service economy are two sides of the same coin,” Spohrer said. “We’re not preparing scientists and engineers for the services economy.”


It’s one thing to bring such concerns to Congress and get a prominent senator to pay attention. Substantial traction, however, requires putting the issue on the presidential campaign agenda, a place where it hasn’t popped up so far.


“Competitiveness, education and investment in research has hardly been addressed at all,” said Norman Augustine, former chairman and CEO of Lockheed Martin and a council advisor. “There is not yet a real broad understanding among the populace of the risks we’re taking if we don’t address” workforce issues.

—Mark Schoeff Jr.

Posted by CTW at 19:58:12 | Permalink | Comments Off

Friday, May 9, 2008

New Workforce Development Funding Announced at the NYCETC Summit

From the NYC Workforce Weekly:

Senior staff of the New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance previewed upcoming training-related funding opportunities and policy changes at NYCETC’s Workforce Development Summit on May 2. These include a new $5 million career pathways program, improved access to contexturalized literacy services, and streamlined vocational college programs.

Russell Sykes, deputy commissioner of OTDA’s Center for Employment and Economic Supports, said that the state Economic Security Cabinet — the body comprised of 17 agency heads set up by former Gov. Eliot Spitzer last summer — has made strides on several initiatives and has “lots of energy” behind it from Gov. David Paterson.

Some of the initiatives that the cabinet plans to further hone and implement include:

  • A new $5 million career pathways program — The 2008-09 enacted state budget will include an additional $2.5 million for a new career pathways program, bringing the grand funding total to $5 million. Funding will support partnerships between non-profit community-based organizations and employers in certain sectors to provide the credential, degree or diploma needed for job entry and advancement. The request for proposals (RFP) is currently in development and will be released this summer.
  • Improved access to literacy services - Sykes said that OTDA is committed to integrating basic education and skills training, with job placement and retention activities. The agency expects to issue a policy amendment soon that would require that a minimum number of public assistance recipients are enrolled in adult basic education and contextualized literacy activities.
  • Sector strategies — New York joins just six other states selected to participate in the National Governors Association’s Sector Strategies Academy. The Academy will enable New York to further develop programs targeting specific industry sectors. OTDA also plans to integrate sectoral approaches into TANF activities.
  • Streamlined college programs — The Cabinet is working with the SUNY/CUNY systems to help colleges design shorter vocational training programs.
  • An online benefits calculator and food stamp application - OTDA provided an early look at “myBenefits,” an online benefi ts eligibility calculator, which will be rolled out in 6 to 12 months and will include online applications for food stamps, HEAP and other programs.
  • A new collaboration between OTDA and the Empire State Development Corporation - They are developing an on-site benefits enrollment package that employers can use to sign their eligible employees up for certain work supports.
  • A new collaboration between OTDA and the NYS Banking Department - The agencies are striving to connect low-income individuals with financial literacy and asset development services.

And, besides the new career pathways program, providers should watch for these other funding opportunities coming soon:

  • A $3 million food stamp employment and training RFP will be released next month to expand access to work-focused education and training offered by nonprofits to food stamp work registrants;
  • A $4 million wage subsidy RFP will be released later this month; and
  • In the fall, an educational resources RFP will be released to support vocational education, adult literacy, workplace literacy, and family literacy services that also include a job placement and retention component. The total funding level is unknown at this time, but is expected to be upwards of $10 million.

“This is not the full package of (education and training-related) changes,” explained Sykes. “We do hope to announce more in the next few months.”

Posted by CTW at 20:47:38 | Permalink | Comments Off