CTE and the Common Core can address the problem of silos

Integrating Common Core standards with career-technical education would boost learning opportunities for all students.

For Midwesterners, silos are a common sight as one ambles along county roads. They’re taken for granted as part of what one expects to see in a farm scene. Old or new, silos serve the same purpose and that is to hold grain, protecting it from exposure to the elements and eventual rot. They’re necessary for maintaining the quality of the product.

But grain isn’t intended to stay in a silo indefinitely; it’s meant for use. In fact, grain that sits in a silo for too long under the wrong conditions will lose quality, deteriorate, and even build up gases and tragically explode. Ideally, at the end of a harvest period, farmers empty their silos and distribute the grain for a wide variety of uses in animal and human food production.

Over the years, educators have borrowed the concept of silo to describe the seemingly impermeable barriers that prevent educators from integrating for meaningful learning. Educators seem to think it’s necessary to define and protect the core of our respective content — the essential aspects in both academic and career-technical education (CTE). So we build silos with sets of standards and certifications/licensures and other requirements that ensure the quality of our product. We bolster those standards with curriculum, textbooks, instructional materials, and content-specific strategies.

However, there is a time when the grains of knowledge and skills of fields and disciplines should be drawn out of the silos. Educators must be intentional about constructing learning experiences that apply and integrate knowledge and skills. This becomes even more critical if we claim that we’re preparing students for successful transitions into postsecondary education and/or work experiences.

Too much of education is sanitized, having extracted the context from the student learning experience.

The career and technical education community was very optimistic when the Common Core State Standards were introduced. CTE educators were encouraged by the standards’ clear focus on both college- and career-readiness, and many CTE educators viewed the standards as a complement to CTE-academic integration initiatives already underway as a result of the mandate in the federal Perkins legislation.

Although CTE is well-positioned to contribute toward accomplishing the overall goal of the Common Core, the unfortunate remnants of the past seem to be burned into our national psyche: We’re still differentiating the knowledge and skills of CTE from those of academic subjects — both in their separate silos — and we remain challenged in finding common ground.

In a recent publication by Achieve, Common Core State Standards & Career and Technical Education, Meeder and Suddreth write:

The goal of ensuring that all students graduate from high school ready for college, careers and life has taken hold in every state across the nation. Yet all too often, the focus on “college-readiness” and “career-readiness” remains in two distinct silos, even though there is little question that reading, writing, communications, and mathematical reasoning are all core skills for success in postsecondary education, in the workplace, and for citizenship and that all educators should help students develop, deepen and refine these core skills. As such, these literacy and mathematics skills are not, and should not be, the sole domain of the English language arts and mathematics departments but rather should be infused throughout education (2012, p. 6).

Because of this siloed view, CTE frequently resides on the periphery of implementation — the result of an assumption that the Common Core is strictly an academic endeavor (Meeder & Suddreth, 2012), or that “to be college-ready is to be career-ready” (Kendall, 2011). CTE professionals have expressed concern about the consequences of yet another demanding academic initiative that may compromise the futures of students who may or may not be college bound (Kendall, 2011).

What counts?

Standards in both their development and implementation provide an opportunity to engage in a healthy discourse about what counts in public education and beyond. What are we trying to accomplish in classrooms and why? And, what do we hope young people will gain from implementation of the Common Core standards?

Any set of standards is but a collection of codes, categories, and descriptions. Standards are both static and impersonal until they’re put into actions that actualize their intent. Without a driving sense of purpose behind implementation we can be swept away in the technocratic exercise of listing, coding, aligning, reporting, and testing — in essence, forfeiting the very purpose for which the standards were designed. At its worst, implementation becomes an act of compliance, increasing resistance and minimizing the intended effect.

However, standards have their place in both education and the workplace. CTE programs have long addressed technical and occupational standards. In the transportation industry, for instance, standards ensure a minimum level of safety for the traveling public. I’m grateful that pilots must complete a strict training and testing regime before they enter the cockpit. You can be sure I want my nursing assistant to be capable of reading charts when he has to administer a dose of medication.

So, as we think about the Common Core standards, the critical point is this: We should not implement standards for the sake of the standards themselves. Rather, we ought to contemplate the application of the knowledge and skills reflected in the standards, embracing a future-oriented, contextualized lens on behalf of students. How we choose to address the standards through instruction now will establish the foundation for ensuring that students have the necessary ability and competence when they enter adult life.

One way to ensure that standards achieve their intended purpose is by situating learning in meaningful contexts and authentic experiences, and by engaging CTE as a critical partner in process.

Increasing student academic achievement in the context of CTE

Standards themselves don’t increase student achievement. Crosswalks and curriculum maps don’t equate to a successful implementation until the purpose and meaning of the standard comes alive to students through effective and engaging instruction. Ideally, that occurs when the learning experience is situated in real-world, authentic contexts like those in CTE courses and programs.

Over the past decade, the National Research Center for Career and Technical Education (NRCCTE) has conducted a series of scientifically based curriculum integration studies that have shown that students’ academic achievement will increase when they learn academics in the context of CTE courses. A first of its kind, the NRCCTE Math-in-CTE study showed significant improvement in student scores on standardized mathematics tests after just one year of the intervention. This result was accomplished without reducing students‘ occupational knowledge and skills (Stone, Alfeld, & Pearson, 2008). The Authentic Literacy-in-CTE study, which followed soon after, showed significant improvements in reading and comprehension scores when CTE teachers employed literacy strategies (NRCCTE, 2010).

During the Math-in-CTE study, the research team intentionally suspended discussions about standards and testing. Rather, researchers asked teams of CTE and math teachers to examine CTE curricula to locate the naturally embedded mathematics. The teachers mapped these intersections and then used the maps to generate math-enhanced CTE lessons using a seven-element framework. The standards did not drive the process; the lessons remained CTE lessons in which the math was enhanced. Once the interventions were complete, researchers back-mapped the lessons to the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics standards, revealing the wealth of math concepts in the lessons. The process of beginning integration with the CTE curriculum and application of academic content in context retained the authenticity of the experience for teachers and students alike, yet accomplished a significant improvement of math ability as measured by standardized tests (Stone et al., 2007).

CTE courses and programs offer all students a relevant context for learning and applying academic knowledge and skills.

The NRCCTE studies showed that students can flourish academically when academics are taught in the authentic context of CTE. CTE courses and programs are rich with embedded academics. Through extended professional development, teams of teachers can work together to capture the power of contextualized teaching and learning. (For more about the NRCCTE curriculum integration studies, visit www.nrccte.org)

Accessing meaningful context

Too much of education is sanitized, having extracted the context from the student learning experience. The result is a contrived and sterile exercise. CTE departments in schools across the country are the ideal laboratories for authentic application of academic knowledge and skills, but the opportunities are too often underused. As Meeder and Suddreth suggested, educational leaders have opportunities now to “work collectively to find ways to ensure that the new standards rigorously engage all students in both academic and CTE courses” (2012, p. 3). Dare we challenge ourselves to transport the knowledge and skills out of our respective silos and encourage their application, synthesis, and innovation?

Below are three possible actions that states, consortia, or districts may take to begin to tap the rich context of CTE in meeting the Common Core standards:

#1. Bring CTE into Common Core work. Because CTE already is accountable for addressing academics by mandate of Perkins legislation, implementation teams would benefit from its participation (Meeder & Sudderth, 2012). CTE professionals understand real-world applications for math and literacy, making them valuable contributors in the process. A recent piece in Techniques by Wright, Thomas, and Rogers (2014) describes how academic and CTA educators at York County School of Technology (YCST) in Pennsylvania have collaborated to meet the Common Core. Their comprehensive and ongoing effort has involved the alignment of curriculum, integrated lesson development, and professional development for CTE and academic instructors. They also have succeeded in scheduling courses differently for optimum preparation of students for state-mandated testing.

YCST faculty and staff continue to work together to raise the rigor of academic achievement and ensure that each student will have “the ability to choose any option upon graduation, i.e., going into the workforce, attending a two- or four-year postsecondary institution, or enlisting in the military” (p. 37). Implementing the Common Core in this manner is a unique opportunity to forge enduring partnerships among CTE and academic educators that will make a difference for students.

#2. Foster communities of practice among CTE and academic teachers. When teachers are encouraged to work together around a common mission, they will grow to trust, respect, and learn from one another (NRCCTE, 2010). Wenger, McDermott, and Snyder (2002) suggest that communities of practice are best cultivated, not created. Communities of practice will emerge when the conditions are right, such as providing a common planning time when teachers can regularly work together. What might the student experience look like if we unleashed teams of CTE and academic teachers to address the Common Core in the context of authentic, real-world applications of knowledge and skills?

One example can be found in the Oregon Applied Academics Project, a three-year research and development project conducted by Oregon in cooperation with the NRCCTE (Pearson, Richardson, & Sawyer, 2013). Math teachers were partnered with CTE teachers to develop problem-based units of mathematics instruction situated in engineering, manufacturing, and construction. Imagine mathematics classrooms in which students build bridges, test electrical currents, and design energy efficient homes. A key outcome of the project was the community of practice that developed among the math and CTE teachers who collaborated over time to create these unique learning experiences for their students (Pearson, Richardson, & Sawyer, 2013).

#3. Equip academic and CTE teachers with evidence-based instructional methods. The NRCCTE research and technical assistance data have shown that high-quality, extended professional development is paramount to the success of an implementation (Stone et al., 2007). We can’t assume that adoption of standards will improve teacher efficacy. Teachers addressing the Common Core standards will need targeted professional development to acquire evidence-based teaching and learning methods that promote and sustain the application of the academic content in context, such as project-based learning, inquiry, or the NRCCTE curriculum integration models. Partnering CTE and academic teachers together in the professional development will enable them to work in concert to promote the rigor of the academics and situate the learning in meaningful contexts.

Final thoughts

CTE is poised as a viable and valuable partner in the pursuit of college- and career-readiness. CTE courses and programs offer all students a relevant context for learning and applying academic knowledge and skills through experiences that engage and motivate. Furthermore, CTE can provide the authentic occupational and technical experiences that bridge the school experiences to the real world, contributing to students’ successful transition into their postsecondary experiences and life as a productive citizen. Is this not the ultimate goal and intent of the Common Core State Standards?

References

Kendall, J. (2011). Understanding the Common Core State Standards. Denver, CO: McREL.

Meeder, H. & Suddreth, T. (2012). Common Core State Standards & career and technical education: Bridging the divide between college- and career-readiness. Washington, DC: Achieve, Inc.

NRCCTE Curriculum Integration Workgroup. (2010, March). Capitalizing on context: Curriculum integration in career and technical education. Louisville, KY: University of Louisville, National Research Center for Career and Technical Education. www.nrccte.org/sites/default/files/publication-files/nrccte_curriculum_context.pdf

Pearson, D., Richardson, G.B., & Sawyer, J. (2013). Oregon Applied Academics Project: Final report. Louisville, KY: University of Louisville, National Research Center for Career and Technical Education. www.nrccte.org/resources/publications/oregon-applied-academics-project-final-report

Stone, J.R., Alfeld, C., Pearson, D., Lewis, M.V., & Jensen, S. (2007). Rigor and relevance: A model of enhanced math learning in career and technical education. St. Paul, MN: University of Minnesota, National Research Center for Career and Technical Education.

Stone, J.R., Alfeld, C., & Pearson, D., (2008). Rigor and relevance: Testing a model of enhanced math learning in career and technical education. American Educational Research Journal, 45 (3), 767-795.

Wenger, E., McDermott, R., & Snyder, W. (2002). Cultivating communities of practice. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press.

Wright, T., Thomas, D., & Rogers, S. (2014, November/December). CTE academic and technical curriculum integration to meet the Common Core. Techniques: Connecting Education & Careers, 89 (8), 36-41.

CITATION: Pearson, D. (2015). CTE and the Common Core can address the problem of silos. Phi Delta Kappan, 96 (6), 12-16.