But what if our students didn鈥檛 have to choose between the two? Imagine a student who excels in AP English discovering, through an internship at a tech company, how their passion for the written word can lead to a lucrative career in technical writing. Or a student earning a welding certification who enrolls in business classes that challenge them to think beyond employment to entrepreneurship.

As district leaders, we have to ask ourselves: Despite our best intentions, have we unknowingly limited students鈥� potential by creating rigid pathways that separate academic achievement from career exploration? 

For , it鈥檚 a question we needed to answer for our own students. What we discovered in talking with other innovative schools across the country changed our entire approach to career-connected learning . Today, DPS is considered by members of the a model to be studied on a national level; and as its superintendent, I have been named to the to speak on the district鈥檚 approach to career-connected learning.

Today, have CTE programs, and each looks completely different. In some cases, CTE is designed as , giving struggling students an 鈥渙ut鈥� from college preparation. In others, tech-focused, dual-credit courses are reserved for top-performing students.

As home to Connecticut鈥檚 largest high school, DPS understood this divide all too well. The district offered a CTE program, including a successful Certified Nursing Assistant pathway. Despite overwhelming interest, only 60 students could be accepted each year, closing opportunities for many qualified and motivated students. 

Meanwhile, graduation rates and student engagement were on a downward spiral. Recognizing that career  opportunities aligned with students鈥� interests for the future, DPS sought to create an equitable learning experience for all students, not just high achievers.

Building on best practices from National Career Academy Coalition nationwide, DPS launched , the Northeast鈥檚 first wall-to-wall career academy model. With eight academies 鈥� including Clean Energy, Green Design, Information Technology and Cybersecurity 鈥� students can explore 21 career pathways.

The academies are challenging the misconception that career pathways are only for those students heading directly to work after high school. Durable skills built through real-world, hands-on experiences 鈥� like critical thinking, adaptability and conflict management 鈥� are at every level of industry. Employers report that many young workers, including, are missing the critical skills essential for professional success. By equipping students with workplace competencies now, we can give them a meaningful advantage whenever they enter the job market.

Unlike traditional career programs that layer electives into a traditional classroom structure, the new generation of public school academies are built around exploration. There鈥檚 no 鈥済eneral track鈥� here 鈥� every student follows a career-connected pathway that allows for job shadowing, project-based learning, certifications and internships. The model ensures opportunities once reserved for a select group of students are available to everyone, including those who thrive in areas often overlooked by CTE programs, such as the arts and humanities.

Just as important, students are not sorted into pathways by a transcript or test score. They are empowered to discover their own path. In Danbury, freshmen are embedded in a year-long exploration of their interests, career goals and available opportunities. Through a variety of activities, including career fairs and industry field trips, they gain the insights needed to rank the pathways they plan to pursue in grades 10 to 12 based on their passions instead of their GPA. That freedom gives students a sense of ownership over their education, which becomes a powerful catalyst for engagement.

Finally, career exploration should open doors, not lock students into a single pathway. Educators must work with students to switch pathways if needed and adjust electives to meet their evolving interests. 

For example, a student pursuing a CNA certification may discover a hospital setting is not the right fit for them. However, through their Academy pathway, they may uncover aligned opportunities in fields such as social work or biomedical research. By adjusting their plans in high school, students avoid costly major changes in college and the debt that comes with them.

One of the most significant deterrents to building a robust CTE program is the . Investing in advanced instructional technologies, hiring additional staff and retrofitting existing buildings is often out of bounds for districts on tight budgets. 

Ensuring that a highly-trained workforce is ready to solve the requires businesses and trade associations to play a bigger role in preparing tomorrow鈥檚 talent. That includes opening their doors to students and offering mentorships, internships and hands-on learning that bring high school lessons to life.

At the same time, federal and state leaders must invest in the programs that prepare students for the jobs of tomorrow. Despite being one of the lowest-funded districts in Connecticut, DPS has scaled our program with intention, securing grant funding that has enabled us to invest in a new cybersecurity lab, advanced CAD equipment and drafting tables.

Since the launch of The Academies of Danbury High School in 2024, the district is already seeing its impact firsthand. While it will be four years before DPS has a complete picture of graduation trends, the early results are promising. The overall graduation rate rose 6.4 percentage points in one year, from 76.6% in 2024 to 83% in 2025. Among English learners, the increase was even greater: 17.9 percentage points, from 52.8% to 70.7%.

Rates increased by 10.2 percentage points among Hispanic students and male students, 7.1 points among high-needs students, 5.9 points among Black students and 5.4 points among Asian students. These results, alongside improved attendance and engagement, reflect students鈥� stronger connection to school and greater investment in their learning. Student focus groups also report high satisfaction with opportunities to choose and complete meaningful, hands-on work that builds toward a potential career.

As districts across the country grapple with student disengagement and declining test scores, we have to realize no superhero is coming to save the day. We have to put on our own capes 鈥� to be bold enough to reimagine the traditional learning model as a system that centers on every student鈥檚 career aspiration and unlimited potential. When learning is connected to purpose, students don’t just perform better; they become empowered to thrive in both the classroom and their future careers.

The intention is good. But it鈥檚 not good enough.

A strong state policy can create urgency, define expectations and keep attention on what matters. But policies typically don鈥檛 recommend new schedules, establish guidelines for community partnerships, incentivize effective teacher training or help organize limited resources to achieve results.

That work happens in districts and in schools. And if we ignore that work, even the strongest policy will produce uneven results.

from Louisiana shows that states can improve outcomes at scale when they provide clear direction, aligned incentives and sustained attention over time. In other words, states can鈥檛 simply pass better rules and wait for results. States must also provide districts with the nuts and bolts that translate policy into day-to-day practice.

If districts would just 鈥渄o the thing,鈥� so the logic goes, results would follow. My decades of experience helping districts implement ambitious change suggest a different reality: District leaders want more meaningful pathways to college and career. But they lack a workable blueprint to make these changes feasible.

Consider literacy. A state can adopt strong standards aligned with the science of reading, a high-quality curriculum and early screening. But a district still has hard questions to answer: Where will uninterrupted literacy time fit in the day? How will schools know which students need extra help, and when will they get it? Who provides intervention and how will reading specialists, tutors and classroom teachers work together instead of operating in isolation? What professional learning is essential? And 鈥� perhaps most challenging 鈥� what current work has to stop so that teachers aren鈥檛 buried under one more add-on initiative?

Those questions may sound mundane. But they are the difference between a reading policy that changes lives and one that produces new paperwork.

The same challenge is even more visible in high school, where states are increasingly promoting stronger college and career pathways. They鈥檙e asking for industry credentials, work-based learning and dual enrollment. These ideas have real promise. But they鈥檙e as complicated as literacy programs 鈥� maybe even more complicated 鈥� to design well.

In one district my nonprofit organization worked with, scheduling logistics meant that some students couldn鈥檛 participate in a pathway without sacrificing graduation requirements. In another district, the schools were simply too small and too remote to offer the range of pathways their students wanted. In another, it turned out that students鈥� lack of proficiency in reading, writing and math was preventing them from succeeding in career pathways. And in many districts, students must choose between a focus on academics and technical learning.

If states want these reforms to reach more students, especially students who have historically been furthest from opportunity, they need to treat implementation as a design challenge, not a compliance exercise. They must go beyond setting direction to enabling transformation.

That means doing a few things differently.

• State guidance should include frameworks that explicitly address the district-level choices that matter the most. For literacy, there are tough decisions around scheduling, staffing, curriculum, teacher training and progress monitoring. For career pathways, district leaders have to consider course sequences, scheduling, partnerships, transportation, staffing, labor market alignment and an equal focus on strengthening foundational skills.

• States should collect and share work being done in districts that are making progress. Leaders need to see the schedules, staffing models, course sequences, funding strategies and partnership agreements that prove it鈥檚 possible and that can be adapted to each leader鈥檚 unique context.

• States should invest real dollars to support districts in redesigning existing systems 鈥� rather than layering a new initiative on top of old structures. They should provide technical assistance, tools or incentives that reward coherence rather than mere adoption.

• States and districts need a clearer division of labor. States should focus on coherence and establishing guardrails. Districts should take the lead on making it work for their students, their teachers, and their local context.

Researchers have made progress in identifying what works. They know that when high school connects academic learning to life after graduation. They know that a focus on reading, writing and math proficiency in ninth grade . They know that simple credentialing requirements . And we know there鈥檚 still more to learn.

But the next challenge is not just discovering what works. It鈥檚 making what works feasible at scale.

If states and districts want career-pathway investments to change students鈥� lives, they have to pay as much attention to the machinery of implementation as they do to the promise of policy. That machinery may not make for a flashy press conference. But that鈥檚 where reform either becomes real for students鈥攐r doesn鈥檛.

Solving this predicament is one rationale for the strong political support and attention shown to work-based learning and high school career and technical education programs. But leaders running these programs report a quandary of their own: They can’t find enough employers willing to host interested high school students in meaningful roles, or sometimes enough students to fill available spots.

The usual explanation, that one side or the other isn’t trying hard enough, misses what’s really going on. The problem isn’t effort. It’s infrastructure.

That’s the central finding of our new profiling six work-based learning programs: a network of CTE charter schools in South Bend, Indiana; an industry-themed school network in San Antonio; a multi-district rural collaborative in Colorado; a Purdue University-affiliated early college network in Indianapolis and South Bend; a rural alliance of districts in Randolph County, Indiana; and a Philadelphia earn-and-learn training program built around real wage progression.

Six different design choices. Six different communities. But all suggest that rather than treating work-based learning as another elective or an item on a 鈥渃ollege and career readiness鈥� menu, work-based learning requires intentionally designed infrastructure linking schools, employers, postsecondary institutions and community organizations.

After interviewing the leaders of these programs, we identified six conditions that enabled each program to move from a pilot to a permanent part of a redesigned high school experience.

First, school-based programs benefited when their state allowed work-based learning hours to count toward graduation requirements and higher scores for career and technical education on state school accountability ratings. Colorado and Indiana stood out by allowing students to satisfy graduation requirements or earn a distinction on their diploma by completing a capstone project or a career course pathway with relevant work hours. Program officials told us this recognition meant they no longer felt torn between what was best for students and what state policy required. Instead, they could spend the time and resources to create and sustain high-quality work experiences with employers.

Second, these programs relied on government funding as the core of their budgets, including state career-technical education money, state and local workforce development funds and school innovation dollars. For example, the Fremont Multidistrict Initiative, serving rural Colorado, turned a state P-Tech designation into federal P-Tech dollars 鈥� up to two additional years of per-pupil support after graduation. These were layered on top of a state Opportunity Now workforce grant as well as ordinary state and local school funding. By combining sources in this way, all the programs reduced their reliance on philanthropy, which also increased the sustainability of their work. Still, the leaders told us that none of these funding streams fully covered the true cost of their learn-and-earn programs, so philanthropy continued to fill important gaps.

Third, program leaders reported that flexibility in teacher licensure allowing industry-qualified professionals to teach relevant coursework in the classroom and supervise students in the workplace significantly eased staffing challenges. In many states, students can’t earn course credit for either unless the educator or supervisor holds a full license as a K-12 teacher, in addition to whatever certification their industry requires. Indiana’s 鈥渨orkplace specialist鈥� certification for qualified industry professionals eased some of this challenge for programs in that state. But programs across states pointed to licensure itself as an obstacle, and to allowing flexibility as a key action policymakers could take to support their work.

Fourth, fundamental to high-quality work-based learning is the ability to offer students meaningful experiences in their field of choice through employer partnerships. These must be structured to be mutually beneficial, which is best achieved through detailed partnership agreements. Program staff reported that the best partnerships were built on long-term relationships. Many had anchor partnerships with founding employers who helped design the pathway to a specific work experience. This ensured a core number of students could participate, while employers felt more confident that students would be prepared before their work placements.

Fifth, each program had dedicated full-time staffers for recruiting students and employers. The leaders consider these coordinators so essential that funding their positions is a budget line alongside teachers, supplies and transportation. To reach the scale needed to support one or more full-time coordinators, half the programs in our sample pooled school districts across rural counties or a metro area. Program leaders recommended that states earmark funding for these  coordinators and make it easier for school districts to formally collaborate and share resources.

Sixth, transportation plans helping students get to their jobs improved access, especially in low-income or rural areas. Programs solved this challenge in different ways. CAST Schools Network in San Antonio used its partner districts’ school buses. RAZ32 in rural Randolph County, Indiana, leveraged county workforce dollars for transportation. Launchpad Philly gave students tickets for riding public buses. But not all programs could afford to offer transportation, leaving students to find their own way.

All these programs had a final element in common: entrepreneurial leadership willing to work through challenges. But repeatedly, we saw how the underlying infrastructure enabled programs to create life-changing opportunities for students. Participants in Launchpad Philly‘s post-high-school LiftOff track, for example, averaged roughly $15,000 in annualized earnings six months after graduation, moving to nearly $30,000 by nine months and a $50,000 living-wage benchmark at the one-year mark. That’s against a baseline of about $12,500 a year for a young Philadelphian with only a high school diploma. For students planning to pursue a bachelor’s degree, the program shows them what jobs in a field are really like, which helps them choose the right educational path.

As long as work-based learning is filed under 鈥渋nitiative,鈥� it will depend on the allure of a particular principal or the persistence of a particular grant officer. But by filing work-based learning under 鈥渃ore experience,鈥� the integration that makes it work starts to look like something a state or a region is responsible for building, the way it’s responsible for roads or broadband.

Infrastructure and initiatives get treated very differently by the people who fund and govern them. Initiatives get pilot grants, three-year evaluation, and press releases. Infrastructure gets appropriations lines, dedicated staff positions and long-term institutional ownership.

The six programs in our report prove work-based learning can succeed in rural and urban settings alike, using very different designs. The remaining question is whether the country will treat the infrastructure behind them as seriously as it treats the problem itself.

In other sectors, opportunity is booming. Homes, roads, bridges, vehicles, energy grids, water systems and data centers all depend on skilled workers to build and maintain them. Yet demand far outstrips supply: McKinsey & Company that for every new hire in skilled trades like carpentry, electrical work and welding, roughly 20 positions remain unfilled.

This raises a simple question: If the economy urgently needs more skilled trades workers, why aren’t we making a greater investment in our public high schools to help prepare students for these in-demand, well-paying careers?

Unfortunately, the role high schools once played in preparing students for careers has diminished greatly. Traditional shop classes in auto repair, electrical, construction and other hands-on fields have disappeared from many public high schools over the past several decades. Though modern career and technical education programs , they don鈥檛 yet have the reach or capacity to meet demand. Too many high students still don鈥檛 have meaningful exposure to career pathways in the skilled trades.

New conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago and commissioned by Harbor Freight Tools for Schools shows overwhelming support for expanding skilled trades education in public high schools. Students want it. Parents want it. Voters across party lines want it.

The survey of more than 6,000 U.S. voters, parents and public high school students found that 95% of voters and 81% of parents believe more opportunities to study skilled trades in high school would better prepare students for careers; 84% of voters and 73% of parents support increased government funding.

That kind of agreement is rare in American politics, and the strong support among parents reflects their fears about the future labor market. Nearly half of parents surveyed said they are extremely or very concerned that AI will reduce job opportunities for their child.

The AI era only makes modern skilled trades education more urgent. This research shows broad consensus that high school should prepare students not only for college admission but also for careers with stability and purpose..

All high school students should have the opportunity to explore a skilled trade. Some will discover a lifelong career. Many will gain practical skills and confidence. And others will go on to college with a clearer sense of purpose.

The NORC survey found high school students who have taken skilled trades classes report stronger connections to school and greater confidence about their future, even if they don鈥檛 enter the trades. Those students felt more confident collaborating and problem-solving than their peers.

Voters see it clearly, too. They ranked skilled trades as the top elective funding priority for high schools, ahead of STEM, business, healthcare, arts and physical education. That does not mean those subjects are unimportant. It means the public sees a skilled trades gap that has been ignored for too long.

With students, parents and voters all wanting stronger pathways into the skilled trades, public policy should reflect that consensus.

That requires real investment in modern school facilities, up-to-date equipment, trained instructors, career counseling and schedules that allow students to take skilled trades classes that are aligned with core academics. It also requires expanding partnerships with employers and community organizations to provide apprenticeships and opportunities for students to earn industry credentials, accelerating their upon graduation.

Strengthening and expanding skilled trades pathways in public high schools is one of the most forward-looking steps we can take in an economy being reshaped by artificial intelligence, infrastructure needs, and uncertainty about the future of work.

The high school students who will build, repair, power, and maintain the country鈥檚 future are sitting in classrooms right now. They should not have to wait until after graduation to discover what they are capable of doing with their hands, their minds and their ambition.

Gov. Josh Stein, alongside the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) Secretary Dev Sangvai and leadership at Broughton Hospital, within state government on July 16.

The Division of State Operated Healthcare Facilities Skills, Training and Employment Pathways North Carolina (STEP-NC) is a partnership between NCDHHS, , and the (NCBCE), according to .

STEP-NC serves 鈥渉igh school students, adult learners, and new talent,鈥� creating a pipeline for these individuals to enter 鈥渧ital roles in health care to strengthen the workforce in North Carolina鈥檚 health care system, including state health facilities, and meet mental health needs in North Carolina,鈥� said the .

鈥淭his partnership is one example of the efforts underway to boost the health care workforce in our state,鈥� Sangvai said in the press release. 鈥淭his initiative creates pipelines for clinical and non-clinical positions that keep our health systems running, supporting careers spanning from maintenance professionals to nurses.鈥�

This summer, six recent high school graduates participated in the first program cohort by working as pre-apprentices at two Morganton-based facilities: , a state psychiatric hospital, and , a state developmental center. These students are being trained in the behavioral health and maintenance technician fields. Upon their completion of this program, the students may apply for a registered apprenticeship in their desired field.

Health care shortages in NC

Similar to , North Carolina鈥檚 health care capacity is projected to decline over the next several years. Currently, the National Center for Health Workforce Analysis rates the state鈥檚 at 84%, with that adequacy dropping to 78% by 2033.

Furthermore, that North Carolina will have a shortage of nearly 12,500 registered nurses (RN) and 5,000 licensed practical nurses (LPN) by the year 2033. In 2024, NCDHHS designated counties as having a health care professional shortage in the field of mental health.

Apprenticeship programs like STEP-NC help fill those gaps by creating pathways for people looking to enter the field, allowing them to 鈥渆arn while they learn鈥� and gain hands-on experience under the supervision of experienced mentors.

鈥淲e are facing a critical shortage of health care workers in North Carolina, especially in our state-operated facilities. STEP-NC cultivates a sustainable workforce pipeline starting as early as high school,鈥� Stein said in the press release. 鈥淭hrough this program, students can qualify for free tuition, learn new skills, and jump-start their careers 鈥� all while helping North Carolina become safer and healthier.鈥�

The program is also in line with Stein鈥檚 , which committed the state to strengthening the behavioral health crisis and criminal justice systems. It also 鈥渁dvances the goals of the Governor鈥檚 Council on Workforce and Apprenticeships to reduce state vacancy rates and double the number of apprentices statewide,鈥� according to the press release.

What鈥檚 in the future for STEP-NC?

According to the , NCDHHS aims to expand apprenticeship programs across all state-operated facilities.

Right now, the program is only operating at two facilities through , which is a program 鈥渙pen to graduating seniors from Burke County Public Schools sponsored by .鈥� Opt-In combines community mentorship, professional development, and work experience to 鈥渋ncrease post-secondary credential attainment in Burke County.鈥�

鈥淭he apprenticeship model responds to critical workforce needs by creating a tailored pathway supporting both employee growth and long-term retention,鈥� CEO of Broughton Hospital Dr. Timothy Miller said in the press release. 鈥淭his program allows students to find rewarding job opportunities close to home that align with their career interests. Health care facilities like ours offer many different career options, from direct care jobs like nursing to administrative support functions to maintenance.鈥�

Sullivan emphasized the benefit of the program being tuition-free and local, allowing participants to pursue careers in skilled trades and health care in their own communities with no debt. This 鈥渕eans the workforce caring for our neighbors is coming from our neighborhoods,鈥� Sullivan said.

The interest form for STEP-NC is available .

This first appeared on and is republished here under a .

There鈥檚 a long-held misconception that students鈥� opportunities are constrained by the size of their town. In many people鈥檚 minds, rural career and technical education and career-connected learning are synonymous with agriculture and manufacturing, while college prep is limited to a path from the graduation stage to the nearest state school.

Unfortunately, this mentality can be difficult for many school leaders to shake. When and the local tax base is small, investing in new initiatives comes with a high price tag that many districts can鈥檛 afford.

While they face distinct challenges, rural schools are equipped with agility and adaptability that larger districts may find difficult to match. Resourcefulness is a necessity, compelling school leaders to think more creatively, and without bureaucratic red tape, schools that can take large districts years to coordinate. 

In rural Indiana, innovation looks like collaboration between high schools that are competitors on the football field, but partners in opening doors for their students. Through the known as RAZ-32, six neighboring districts share classes, instructors and resources so students can take career-focused courses at any participating school. 

Like many small districts, Randolph Eastern School Corporation wanted to offer more dual credit CTE courses to prepare students for the rigor of college-level coursework. However, with such a small student population, filling these classes with enough students to make them viable was difficult. Conversations with other superintendents revealed they faced a similar problem 鈥� they wanted to offer a broader range of courses but lacked enough students to justify offering niche classes or the budget to bring on new teachers to lead them.

What began as a partnership between three neighboring districts 鈥� Randolph Eastern, Monroe Central and Randolph Central 鈥� in 2024 has grown into a regional example for expanding career education. By creating a formal agreement that allows students to criss-cross district lines, the schools opened the door to opportunities that no single campus could offer on its own. 

Key to the partnership was inviting students, educators and business leaders to shape the experience so that pathways reflected the region鈥檚 workforce needs and the diverse interests of students themselves. With these insights, RAZ-32 stayed true to its districts鈥� rural roots while preparing students for careers whether they stay close to home or pursue opportunities outside Indiana after graduation. 

In addition to traditional CTE pathways like welding and agriculture, the regional alliance has expanded to eight different pathways that align with students鈥� ambitions, such as broadcasting & media production, health care, early childhood education, and marketing & sales. This fall cybersecurity, hospitality and public service pathways will be added due to student interest.

Transforming a vision into curriculum required a high level of collaboration among districts. School leaders had to be candid and transparent regarding their districts鈥� strengths 鈥� and where they needed support from fellow superintendents. Rather than viewing gaps as limitations, they were the starting point for identifying where expertise, instructors and resources could be shared.

All participating districts contribute to a joint funding model by allocating a portion of their CTE dollars to the host school. The host school then directs a share of those funds to RAZ-32, sustaining the alliance鈥檚 collaborative functions such as transportation, executive director salary, equipment,and professional development. RAZ-32 also receives financial support from local county commissioners and is part of the, which funds new competency-based learning models.

Today, students can enroll in career-focused and dual-credit courses at any participating district. If one school doesn鈥檛 offer precision machine technology, for instance, their students can access the program at a nearby school to gain the credentials needed to earn their industry certification. 

Making a regional model like this work requires thoughtful planning. The participating schools are 15 to 40 minutes apart, depending on the route, with most students traveling less than half an hour to reach their host campus. Rather than expecting students to fit transportation around a traditional bell schedule, the districts aligned their academic calendars, coordinated school start times and built three-hour morning and afternoon instructional blocks that include both class time and travel. 

Students do not receive a free period simply because they attend a program at another school, although counselors may incorporate a hybrid or virtual course when needed to ensure they stay on track for graduation while taking advantage of expanded opportunities.

Students who are interested in participating in the program have someone to guide them from day one. RAZ-32鈥檚 executive director works with administrators and counselors in every school to schedule visits between students and program teachers as well as outline their CTE pathways step-by-step. During each district鈥檚, students put in their request to participate.

Helping increase RAZ-32鈥檚 impact are the partnerships with local employers to offer workplace learning, including Ivy Tech Community College and Reid Health. About 82% of students on the RAZ-32 medical assistant pathway earned their Certified Clinical Medical Assistant certification through in-hospital instruction this past school year. In addition, students can participate in a federally-approved apprenticeship with Reid Health their second year and continue to work in the field while completing their associate鈥檚 degree in nursing at Ivy Tech.

During RAZ-32鈥檚 first year, 81 students enrolled in the program: 92%o completed pathways, 83% earned dual-credits, and nine students earned a post-secondary credential. In 2025, shared enrollment in the program increased by 74%, and three more schools 鈥� Randolph Southern School Corporation, Liberty-Perry Community School Corporation, and Northeastern Wayne School Corporation 鈥� joined the initiative.

Beginning this school year, RAZ-32 will also provide at the host schools for participating districts, expanding access and increasing opportunities for students without reliable transportation.

The regional alliance illustrates one approach rural districts can take when working together. At a time when many of rural schools, such alliances offer an alternative. Even with small enrollments and small budgets, rural districts are expanding opportunities for students while building the skilled workforce needed to support Indiana’s long-term economic future.

With every new initiative, rural school districts are challenging the 鈥� that they are isolated, less inclusive and fail to prepare students for a world beyond their town borders. School leaders are successfully leveraging the strengths that are the heart of rural communities, including civic pride, resourcefulness and interdependence, to create new opportunities for every student.

Correction:听An earlier version of this story misidentified one of the school districts participating听in a regional career training collaborative. It is Randolph Southern School Corporation, not Eastern Hancock County Community School Corporation.

If communities continue treating facility investment as a secondary concern, they should not be surprised when families decide those schools are no longer the best place to educate their children.

The American Society of Civil Engineers has given for three consecutive report cards, while the rest of the country’s infrastructure improved. Nearly four in 10 public school buildings were constructed before 1970. The funding gap to bring them up to a functional standard now stands at an estimated $429 billion 鈥� and it keeps growing because communities keep deferring the problem.

On the ground, that deferred maintenance looks like leaking roofs, asbestos ceiling tiles and mold scraped from between wall coverings. It looks like parking lots full of potholes, playgrounds with rusted equipment, and classrooms that are too hot in summer or too cold in winter because the heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems failed years ago.

Another similarity most of these buildings share is a lack of any real technology infrastructure in an era when students cannot learn without one.

The physical condition of a school building is one of the primary drivers of the educational experience delivered inside it. And the research is catching up to what communities have been living with for years.

The economist Julien LaFortune, working with the Public Policy Institute of California, studied school facility investment using data from the Los Angeles Unified School District and in test scores, attendance and surrounding property values after new school buildings were constructed.

What made LaFortune鈥檚 findings notable was that the gains were not primarily explained by changes in class size, teachers, principals or student composition. When researchers stripped away every other variable, what was left was the building. By his analysis, for every dollar invested in school facilities, the program increased housing values.

Research going back two decades has documented a between facility condition and teacher retention. When a school building deteriorates, the teachers with the most options leave first. The ones who stay are often the ones with nowhere else to go.

When a school is modernized, that dynamic reverses. Qualified educators who previously passed over the school begin applying, while teachers who are already there choose to stay. The result is a more experienced, more committed faculty working with better tools in a better environment 鈥� and students who receive stronger instruction as a direct consequence.

That instructional improvement shows up in measurable ways. Students in modernized facilities score higher on standardized assessments and miss fewer days of school. Researchers saw this trend emerge during COVID, when they first noted the correlation between better ventilation and . More recent studies have found that boosted math scores and reduced suspensions in schools 鈥� because student comfort matters. 

When those results become visible, other families in the community begin seeking out the school. As enrollment grows, schools gain the resources that come with a larger student population and the capacity to expand what they offer.

One example of this is the Detroit Public Safety Academy, a dropout recovery program. It鈥檚 a school designed specifically for students who have already left the system or are on the verge of leaving it. The program does not offer a GED. It instead delivers a full, certified high school diploma, the same credential that any other public school confers. Upon graduation, students walk directly into careers in public safety with real wages and real futures. The school now posts a 90% graduation rate among a population that had largely been written off, and Detroit’s public safety workforce has a pipeline it did not have before.

That model wouldn鈥檛 work in a building that is falling apart. The aging building underwent a dramatic renovation, which has enabled its success. Without it, the program wouldn’t exist, and those students wouldn’t have that pathway.

Modern workforce-development programs require modern facilities. A manufacturing lab equipped with computer-controlled machine tools and robotic arms requires purpose-built space that a building from 1963 cannot provide. Forty-seven states . More than 11 million students nationally. The demand exists. In too many communities, the buildings to support it do not.

As enrollment grows and school quality becomes visible to the broader community, the effects extend beyond the school itself. Families relocate to be within a school’s attendance boundary. That increased demand for housing near high-performing schools drives up property values.

By tracking housing markets near improved schools, the National Bureau of Economic Research found that roughly $20 in housing value accumulates for every additional dollar in per-pupil spending 鈥� a signal of how much families are willing to pay to be near a school that works.

We tend to describe declining enrollment as the cause of deteriorating schools, but the arrow may point the other way more often.

Families leave schools that no longer meet their expectations. They move to districts with better facilities or choose alternatives that have multiplied over the past decade. The school loses students, loses funding and deteriorates further. That cycle is not inevitable. Modernize the building, and the sequence can begin running in reverse.

The question is whether communities are willing to treat the building as the starting point rather than the last priority. Children only pass through the education system once. They should not spend those years waiting for adults to decide that the building matters.

Our home state of Ohio has put substantial energy into actively promoting credentials through various policy levers. For example, high school students can use state-approved credentials to meet certain graduation requirements, and schools receive credit in the state鈥檚 accountability system when students attain them. In the most recent state budget, policymakers renewed a that incentivizes those approved credentials that related to state-identified 鈥渉igh-priority鈥� careers such as advanced manufacturing and construction. With these incentives in place, attainment in Ohio has from 53,000 credentials earned by the class of 2019 to 170,000 by the class of 2024. 

But which of these credentials truly add value for students? 

A new examined the labor-market value that various credentials have for Ohio students. In general, credentials are associated with substantial expected wage increases in the early years after high school (almost $2,000 higher earnings in the first year after graduation). However, we found widely differing wage returns depending on field, with male-dominated careers in the skilled trades linked to larger income benefits. Students attaining manufacturing-related credentials, for instance, typically earn about 35% more than their non-credential-earning peers with similar backgrounds.

On the other hand, we also discovered that many credentials yield little to no economic value for students. For example, we found no significant differences in the annual incomes of students earning a nurse’s aide or culinary certificate six years after high school compared with peers who did not attain a credential. A few credentials, such as a cosmetology certificate, were even associated with reduced earnings after students leave high school.

Our findings lead to some important insights about how states can more effectively leverage industry credentials.

First, policymakers should not view credentials as an isolated indicator of career readiness, but rather as a key element within an integrated career pathway. In addition to finding variable wage returns by field, our study revealed that students who both attain credentials and complete a sequence of career-technical coursework reap larger wage returns than students who attain only a credential or do not participate in any career-focused education. This suggests that states’ accountability systems should count students as career-ready only if they both complete coursework and obtain an aligned credential.

Second, states must be selective about which credentials they approve and, in turn, incentivize. Here in Ohio, the credentials that provide the strongest and most enduring wage gains 鈥� lasting into people鈥檚 mid-20s 鈥� are linked to the transportation, manufacturing and construction industries. By contrast, credentials across a dozen other career fields provide no enduring wage returns. Policymakers should prioritize credentials that yield strong long-term economic payoffs. They should also be wary of approving credentials that lack a clear link to a specific occupation 鈥� for instance, a basic job-safety certificate versus a certified welder license 鈥� or those that might inadvertently encourage students to pursue low-paying jobs with limited opportunities for advancement. 

Third, states should create robust frameworks for valuing credentials. Our study focused primarily on wages, which ought to play a central role in systems that identify “high-value” credentials and promote their attainment through policies such as targeted funding. Yet pay isn’t the only factor to take into account. How well credentials align with employers’ needs and labor market demands should also be a priority, because while wages and employer demand for a credential often overlap, that is not always the case. For instance, credentials linked to health care or education might pay modest starting wages but could also lead to employment that opens doors to a better-paying job later on. Policymakers should create tiered systems that place more value on credentials that are both high-wage and high-demand, and then provide secondary consideration to those that meet only measures of industry demand.

Ohio illustrates the promise and pitfalls associated with incentivizing credentials through policy initiatives. On the one hand, more students than ever are earning credentials that might give them an edge in the job market. On the other hand, the state has also struggled to pin down the value of credentials and maintain stringent quality control in the face of proliferating attainment rates.

All students should leave high school with the knowledge and skills needed for their next steps. To support this, make sure industry-recognized credentials benefit students and overall economic growth.

The students’ home districts 鈥� Agua Dulce, Premont, Brooks County, Freer and Benavides 鈥� used to operate separately. They had a shrinking student population, were unable to provide much career and technical education, and struggled with low achievement. But seven years ago, a handshake between the superintendents of the Premont and Freer independent school districts gave rise to what would become the .

Today, the consortium, created to stave off consolidation threats and improve student outcomes, is being lauded as a . And the Texas legislature has encouraged other districts to follow its lead.

The five districts, located 45 to 90 minutes southwest of Corpus Christi and serving a student population that is at least 75% Hispanic, share six academies: Early College, for credit toward an associate degree; Grow Your Own, for future teachers; Ignite Technical Institute, focusing on welding; Next Generation Medical Academy, offering nursing and pharmacy education; Willa Zelaya STEM Discovery Zone, featuring computer technology, drone aviation and robotics; and Trade Winds Academy, for HVAC, construction and electrical.

Students wishing to participate in an academy choose the program they want in eighth grade. They take traditional core classes at their home high school and travel to the academies twice a week and every other Friday 鈥� about 10 times a month. 

Sophomore Juliana Farias catches a 6:45 a.m. van, driven by school staff and internet-equipped, at her high school in Agua Dulce for the 45-minute trip to the Grow Your Own Academy. Her friend Emmerson Perez, also a sophomore, does the same in the small town of Freer, nearly an hour west. 

They meet up at Premont Collegiate High School around 7:30 a.m. and walk to a nearby elementary to begin their day as teacher interns. The two won鈥檛 be in Premont long. They’ll return to their respective high schools by midday to continue their regular classes. 

Mylan Pena, a junior at Falfurrias High School in Brooks County Independent School District, chose the welding academy because it offers the chance to earn a free associate degree as well as industry credentials. When Pena was a child, his uncle and grandfather worked as oil pipeline welders, leaving home for weeks at a time. It鈥檚 a job he wants to pursue after he graduates.

鈥淚’m blessed to even have this opportunity,鈥� he said. 鈥淢y mom is a single mother. I know she wouldn’t have the funds to provide this for me. Getting the opportunity to take college (classes) for free and learning to weld for free means a lot.鈥�

Pathways like these are more commonly found in larger, wealthier metropolitan school districts. Texas has more schools in rural areas than any other state 鈥� about . As families flock to more densely populated communities, rural schools are left with scarce resources and sometimes merge as they struggle to serve isolated towns. 

That was the situation in 2019, when the Rural Schools Innovation Zone officially launched. 

The districts had to find something innovative to keep the doors open, said Michael Gonzalez, Rural Schools Innovation Zone director. 鈥淲e had no opportunities for kids,鈥� he said. 鈥淲e needed to do something about it.鈥�

The Premont and Freer districts obtained grant funding and partnered with Brooks County Independent School District to form the consortium. It expanded to include the Agua Dulce and Benavides districts in 2023. The five districts together have about 3,250 students.

Last year, 424 students were enrolled in the academies. Now, there are nearly 600. Gonzalez said 680 are projected to participate in the 2026-27 school year.

It 鈥渨as phenomenal鈥� how the Rural Schools Innovation Zone turned trends around for the communities in south Texas, Gonzalez said. He鈥檚 been the consortium’s director since it was created and was the sole employee for five years, before recently hiring a liaison to help coordinate between the districts and their college partners.

Premont, which had the worst of the partner school districts, increased its student population from 570 students in 2012 to in 2024. From 2018-19 to 2023-24, the school districts the percentage of their graduating students who pass the state鈥檚 in both math and reading from 30% to 51%. The percentage of seniors with dual credit jumped from 16% to 50%, while those with industry certifications increased from 8% to 38%.

Based on the program鈥檚 success, Texas legislators in 2023 to create a that funds similar collaborations among rural districts. The Rural Schools Innovation Zone is such partnerships across Texas. Last year, lawmakers for career technical and education programs, including the rural collaborations, and promoted them as a key strategy for economic growth in the state. 

Here’s a look inside some of the academies, and what their students have to say about their experiences.

Grow Your Own Educator Academy 

Farias chose the Grow Your Own Educator Academy at Premont Collegiate High School to fulfill dreams she鈥檚 had since she was a little girl.

鈥淢y mom was an aide for special education students and some of my best friends are autistic, and as a little kid, you don’t realize the differences until you grow up,鈥� she said. 鈥淚 get a lot of, 鈥榊ou don’t want to do special education. It’s a hard place to be and it’s a lot of work.鈥� But that’s what I want to do, so looking into the program, I was like, 鈥業 need to be in this. It’s something I want to do and I get to start early on in my life.鈥欌��

It was initially intimidating for Farias to travel to Premont, because she was the only Agua Dulce High School student in the teaching academy. But soon she met Perez, from Freer High School, and Ava Gutierrez, a Premont senior.

鈥淭hey’ve made it so much more than just the program, and I think that’s what keeps our programs going 鈥� because we all have relationships within the program that make it so much more than just college hours,鈥� Perez said. 鈥淚t’s cool because we’re from different districts, but we’re still friends.鈥�

The trio assist classes at Premont鈥檚 elementary school and day care before taking college courses at the high school. Premont High School staff teach some of the classes, while others are in person at colleges closer to Corpus Christi, like Texas A&M University’s campus in Kingsville, about 30 miles away.

鈥淥n Tuesdays and Thursdays, I was traveling to Kingsville, and then on Monday, Wednesdays and every other Friday, I was in the classroom in Premont,鈥� Gutierrez said. 鈥淚t was pretty overwhelming for a while, having to travel back and forth, but you get used to it. After a while, it just kind of starts becoming part of your routine.鈥�

Will Zelaya STEM Discovery Zone 

Andrew Herrera, 16, is a junior firefighter for a Brooks County volunteer fire department. He has been known to stay up until 5 a.m. at the station fixing equipment and changing the oil in the fire trucks.

His dad, the department chief, encouraged the Premont sophomore to enroll in the school鈥檚 science, technology, engineering and mathematics academy because of his passion for drones and fire truck mechanics. The program offers instruction in computer technology, engineering, oil and gas drilling, robotics and drone aviation. 

Herrera is pursuing a drone pilot license to assist with fire department calls. 

鈥淚 want to do it because nowadays it’s been getting a lot more difficult for ranch (owners), since they’re building so many houses and stuff like that,鈥� he said. 鈥淚f there’s ever a fire, I’ll be able to fly (the drone) up and I can do 3D mapping or I can find better routes for the trucks to take.鈥�

Haven Farias, a Premont senior, earned his drone pilot license this year. He said he鈥檚 also proud of his work building a life-size robot in one of his academy classes. The two passions are something he wants to continue to follow when he pursues a mechanical engineering degree in the fall at Schreiner University in Kerrville, Texas.

鈥淚’m licensed to fly, so I’ll have more opportunities with jobs and everything for the drone side,鈥� Farias said. 鈥淚 think it’s a great opportunity. Even though I’m in, like, 10,000 sports, and I’m doing five college classes, and then I have to do all my high school classes, it鈥檚 not really difficult. It’s all about time management.鈥�

Ignite Technical Institute 

For Amber Garcia, a commitment to achieving an associate degree is what鈥檚 kept her going at Ignite Technical Institute, the welding pathway at Falfurrias High School in Brooks County Independent School District. 

The Premont senior works two part-time jobs 鈥� sometimes overnight until 6 a.m. 鈥� while taking her regular classes, pursuing pathway courses and gaining college credit. Garcia was in the foster system when she was introduced to the Rural Schools Innovation Zone. Now she鈥檚 one of the best welders in the program, Gonzalez said, and one of the few female students.

鈥淚n my eighth grade year, my older brothers were doing it, and I was kind of inspired by it, but they didn’t like it,鈥� she said. 鈥淚 wanted to do it. I fell in love with it.鈥�

Garcia said it鈥檚 sometimes hard to get up in the mornings and make it to school, but she always attends her welding classes. Gonzalez said he calls her on days she doesn鈥檛 travel to Falfurrias to make sure she鈥檚 still going to Premont High School. The work has paid off, she said, because soon she鈥檒l go straight into the workforce as a welder.

鈥淎 lot of kids are lazy, and our generation is horrible, but you just have to want it,鈥� she said. 鈥淵ou鈥檝e got to push yourself. You have to say, 鈥業’m going to do it.鈥� And no matter how frustrated you get, you just have to keep going. It’s just the growth mindset, but a lot of people don’t have that.鈥�

Next Generation Medical Academy

Mary Alice Cantu was admiring neighborhood Christmas lights with her children and Freer High School鈥檚 curriculum director in 2016 when she heard the school had landed a grant to build a health science pathway. She was the school nurse at the time.

鈥淚 said, 鈥業 really would love to do that,鈥� 鈥� Cantu said. 鈥�(My co-worker) turns around and goes, 鈥榊ou’re running it.鈥� And I’m like, 鈥業’m what?鈥� So I went from the school nurse to this, which was a totally different hat that I wasn’t expecting, but I’ve loved it ever since.鈥�

Cantu began teaching classes at what would become the Next Generation Academy without an education degree. She soon pursued a master鈥檚 program to have the credentials under her belt and entered her district鈥檚 new teacher academy. 

鈥淚 realized it’s one thing to be a teacher and another to be a nurse,鈥� she said. 鈥淭here鈥檚 behavior management, pedagogy 鈥� all these terms. I was like, 鈥榊ou want me to do a lesson plan?鈥� It’s like a patient care plan, but it’s for your class.鈥�

The nearest college program and hospital is close to an hour away, so it鈥檚 important that the medical academy be equipped as closely to a professional setting as possible, Cantu said. The high school鈥檚 home economics kitchen was into a model hospital, complete with a reception desk, patient beds, drug administration carts, IV stands and dummy patients. 

Students wear blue scrubs, clock into class with timecards and poke needles into silicone arms to draw synthetic blood before they practice on each other. There are multiple 7-foot-long touchscreen tables with digital replicas of bodies donated to science. Cantu can peel back layers of the cadavers and simulate health conditions for her anatomy or physiology classes.

Students can earn certifications in phlebotomy, electrocardiogram testing, patient care and medical assistance that can be used in the workplace. The academy got so popular that Freer鈥檚 next school nurse was hired as a second educator.

鈥淚t’s a good problem to have that we’re going to have so many students with certifications, and I don’t mind it, the numbers are growing, and we’ll just figure it out,鈥� Cantu said. 鈥淭here’s just so much opportunity for these students, whether they decide to go into nursing or not, they’re going to have the confidence and the people skills to be able to step into any setting and succeed.鈥�

This growing enrollment is a double-edged sword, Gonzalez said. As more students join academies like Next Generation, teachers have to play a game of Tetris with class schedules and schools have to consider hiring more staff in a remote area that鈥檚 hard to recruit for. 

Student attendance can also be tricky. Gonzalez said some teachers and coaches value athletics or extracurriculars over their academy programs, and students may miss a class they get only twice a week if their team has to travel for a game or conference. 

The number of educators who were present during the zone鈥檚 creation is also dwindling. The partner districts have gone through five superintendents in the past three years together, meaning more people are coming in who are unfamiliar with the model and how it works, Gonzalez said.

A couple of districts have the traditional eight class periods, while the others have block schedules, making it difficult to coordinate transportation between schools. And then there are the students who switch academies or decide to leave a program altogether. The STEM academy has the lowest retention rate, at 86%. Next Generation Medical Academy retains more than 96% of its students.

鈥淚t’s crucial that we have 鈥榢id magnets,鈥� or teachers who have a relationship with these youngsters,鈥� Gonzalez said. 鈥淭hey keep them in there, right? I’m not going to lie 鈥� we lose kids all the time.鈥�

Gonzalez鈥檚 own job keeps him working all hours of the day. That dedication earned him a from South by Southwest last year.

鈥淚 didn’t realize the magnitude of it,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t’s pretty neat. You know, I just try to stay the course, try to stay on it. I use the word 鈥榞rinder’ a lot because that’s just the way I was raised.鈥�

Gonzalez said the Rural Schools Innovation Zone allows the remote, small districts of south Texas to remain operating and, in turn, keep their communities alive. 

Each town can still gather under bright stadium lights on autumn Fridays to cheer on its football team. Students can continue to walk to their neighborhood school. And families stay because their children can still get big-city opportunities, he said.

鈥淲hy do kids pick schools? Usually for programs. They don’t go because they have the best English teacher, right?鈥� he said. 鈥淭hey have the best nursing program, the best baseball program, the best football program. They go for programming and then the 鈥榢id magnet鈥� teachers running the program. So if I can allow you to be involved with the best program in the world and you don’t have to leave your school district, it’s a no-brainer. That’s what we did.鈥�

We worked hard to address the knowledge gap between what students and their families knew and the viable career pathways that were available to them. In many schools, however, these gaps are not addressed, a challenge that is particularly acute for students considering non-college pathways. While opportunities exist, the systems designed to help students find and access them often fall short. 

That鈥檚 why as president of New Visions for Public Schools, a nonprofit organization that has supported NYC schools for over 35 years, I鈥檝e led an effort to create a to ensure that students can access opportunities by design, rather than by chance. 

Today, as students increasingly seek postsecondary pathways beyond the two- and four-year degrees that educators are most familiar with, we must rethink how we support young people to navigate their choices with clarity and confidence. College remains a powerful and important route. For most students, it is the right choice, and we should continue to prepare them well for it. But a substantial share of students are also considering vocational training, industry certifications and apprenticeships, either as a path directly into a good job or as a first step on their educational and career journey.

The challenge is that reliable, comprehensive, publicly accessible information about these opportunities is extraordinarily hard to find. In many cases, if a young person plans to pursue career training, they and their counselors are left to navigate a maze of websites that present information in ways that are incomplete, confusing or inconsistent.

The was created to make the full range of free or low-cost postsecondary career training opportunities in New York City visible, comparable and accessible to everyone. Launched in 2024 with support from The Heckscher Foundation for Children, the Career Directory is a free, open-access digital platform that compiles over 300 programs across the city: from medical assisting to carpentry, commercial driving to cosmetology, information technology to early childhood education.

What makes it transformative is not just the number of programs it includes, but the clarity it provides. Each listing is verified and standardized, with key details such as eligibility, cost and aid, program duration, credential earned and location.

To build it, our team began with a review of existing tools in the field. We then held dozens of conversations with counselors, workforce providers and community partners to understand the information students need to make decisions about which programs are the best fit for their interests, priorities, and long-term goals. 

We built relationships with providers so we could call them directly, confirm details and translate their information into a format students and counselors can use to evaluate their options. Maintaining accuracy isn鈥檛 a one-time task, but an ongoing commitment. 

We iterated on the design and conducted user research to help us understand what kind of support students and counselors need to explore career training options with the same clarity and rigor as they approach the college selection process. We鈥檝e now trained hundreds of educators and expanded our work beyond the tool itself, developing lesson plans, one-on-one advising worksheets, quick-start videos and professional learning for counselors so the Career Directory is a platform for learning and guidance.

The response from educators has been remarkable. One counselor noted, “For students that are not interested in going to college or are unsure about college as their pathway, it gives them lots of information at their fingertips to find and explore. There is no way I could give them all these options to search.”

The directory has gained significant traction since we launched it. We鈥檝e now reached over 38,000 users, and thanks to a new grant from the CD&R Foundation, we have committed funding for maintenance through summer 2027. This support means that tens of thousands of young people will continue to have access to clear, actionable and up-to-date information about the landscape of opportunities available to them after high school. 

As proud as I am of the project, I also know it is only one piece of what the field needs. Too often, students stumble onto job-training programs or career pathways by accident 鈥� through a chance conversation, a lucky internship or a personal connection that limits access to those who already know about them. If we want every young person to navigate their postsecondary path with intention, we need to build systems that don鈥檛 leave their futures up to chance. 

There is more work to do, and doing that work requires partnership across schools, government agencies, community-based organizations, employers, funders, and the broader public. No single institution can solve this alone. 

New Visions for Public Schools and 社区黑料 both receive financial support from The Heckscher Foundation for Children.

Does this sound familiar? It could describe what we are facing right now. But back then, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein approached IBM to see how the company might be able to assist. IBM was interested but made clear that it would not hire  large numbers of young people with only a high school diploma 鈥� and neither would any other Fortune 500 company.

Across nine entry-level job categories, in areas involving hardware, software and consulting, IBM needed people with degrees in subjects like computer science and electromechanical engineering, along with solid workplace skills. Bloomberg and Klein asked the company to outline what a partnership could look like, and IBM responded with a blueprint for what would ultimately become P-TECH schools.

It would involve breaking down the barrier between high school and college, creating a dual-enrollment model where students would complete both a high school diploma and an associate degree in computer science or electromechanical engineering within four to six years. The company would provide volunteer mentors and paid internships, and ensure successful graduates were first in line for available positions.

The initial P-TECH school, located in a distressed Brooklyn neighborhood, opened in fall 2011. Today, some 15 years later, there are more than 600 P-TECH schools in 16 cities and 28 countries, having graduated tens of thousands of low-income students.

The original P-TECH school was recently named the in New York City based on its reading and math scores, even with a population that is 99% low-income students of color. This verified the findings of an that concluded Black male students who attended P-TECH were more likely to obtain a than similar students attending other NYC high schools. 

But even before these results, other cities and even countries became interested in replicating the P-TECH model, with additional industry partners such as Thomson Reuters, American Airlines, Cisco, Northwell Health, Micron and the New York Power Authority. When Rahm Emanuel was elected mayor of Chicago in 2011, he moved quickly to open five schools modeled after the P-TECH Brooklyn success. Then, governors in both red and blue states like New York, Connecticut, Colorado, Rhode Island, Maryland and Texas opened P-TECH schools after then-President Barack Obama highlighted the model in his in 2013 and later that year.

In addition, heads of states in countries like Australia and Ireland similarly launched P-TECH schools, expanding the model from dozens of schools to over 100 in just five years. 

At the end of the initial school’s sixth year, 74% of graduates had achieved both a high school diploma and an associate degree 鈥� and that success in Brooklyn is mirrored across the U.S. In Colorado, a recent report commissioned by the state legislature concluded that “data confirm significant improvement in attendance, persistent and postsecondary persistence and outstanding student outcomes.” In Colorado’s St. Vrain Valley School District, P-TECH students had “higher GPA’s, PSAT scores, and reading, math and writing achievement, plus stronger college completion and career success.”  In Dallas, a P-TECH school within a school is located in every high school in the city, and 2 of every 5 students districtwide graduate with both an associate degree and a high school diploma concurrently in only four years. Last year, Dallas had over 1,000 dual graduates.

P-TECH’s success is grounded in a laser-like focus not just on college readiness, but college completion, coupled with an emphasis on workplace skills and career opportunity 鈥� whether through stand-alone classes or enriched lesson plans in existing courses. These are reinforced during structured workplace visits where students and employees work collaboratively.

Nationwide, only 11% of graduates from high schools with large numbers of low-income students and students of color complete a college degree in science, technology, engineering or math, and the rate drops to only 8% among graduates of schools in . If the P-TECH model were brought to scale serving this low-income minority population, college completion rates would dramatically increase, and far more young people from disadvantaged backgrounds could move into high-paying careers. 

The P-TECH model offers benefits to students and families, employers across all sectors and the nation’s economy. Having more students completing college in high-demand fields will produce significant returns across the board. P-TECH is an innovation that needs to be replicated, and not slowly. The nation needs to move forward with a sense of true urgency toward the future, and P-TECH is a key part of the solution.

Employers struggle to find skilled workers. Families increasingly question the cost and payoff of a traditional college education. And young people are entering a labor market reshaped by artificial intelligence and rising credential requirements. Entry-level jobs that once served as stepping stones now demand prior experience, and skills grow obsolete faster than ever.

For much of the past half-century, education policy rested on a simple promise: Prepare students for college, and opportunity will follow. That formula has weakened. College completion remains uneven, student debt burdens are widespread and too many graduates leave school without clear routes into stable, well-paying work.

Research reinforces this unease. The Lumina Foundation that the economic payoff of postsecondary education varies widely by school, degree level and field. As a result, the central question families ask is no longer 鈥淐ollege or not?鈥� but 鈥淲hich pathway pays off 鈥� and when?鈥�

Career and technical education has much to contribute to this conversation. No longer a specialized option or a consolation prize, CTE has become central to preparing young people for work, adulthood and economic mobility.

It also reflects a broader shift in how Americans think about success, away from a single, linear path toward 鈥� the idea that there are multiple legitimate routes to a good life, and that education systems should support many ways forward.

In fact, enrollment in CTE programs 鈥� which The National Center for Education Statistics as high school classes and post-secondary career-focused courses that lead to credentials other than a four-year degree 鈥� is rising steadily. Education Week鈥檚 Research Center that K-12 CTE participation rose roughly 10% between the 2022-23 and 2023-24 school years, reflecting expanded offerings and rising student demand.

And the shift toward career-focused post-secondary education is even more pronounced, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.

More students are signing up for undergraduate certificates and associate degrees than for bachelor’s degrees, with growing by 1.9% and 2.2%, respectively, compared with 0.9% for bachelor鈥檚 programs. Community colleges now have approximately 752,000 students in undergraduate certificate programs, a 28.3% increase since fall 2021.

Public opinion has also shifted. Surveys show a growing willingness among parents and the general public for and other of technical and trade education for high school graduates. Families and students are voting with their feet, applying a return-on-investment lens to decisions about education and work.  

Today鈥檚 CTE looks very different from the vocational education of the past. Historically, vocational tracks typically functioned as sorting mechanisms, steering low-income students and students of color away from academic options into job pathways with limited mobility. A 1992 of high school vocational education characterized it as 鈥渓ow esteem, little clout.鈥�

Modern CTE breaks from that legacy. It emphasizes career pathways that integrate academic learning, technical skills, work-based experience and postsecondary education. The goal is not to force students to choose between college and career, but to blend the two to preserve choice and enhance advancement.

supports this shift. EdResearch for Action that the strongest CTE pathways align academic content with occupational skill development rather than treating the two as competing priorities. When done well, integration raises, not lowers, academic expectations.

This approach aligns closely with opportunity pluralism. Rather than treating a four-year degree as the sole marker of success, it acknowledges that people acquire knowledge, skills, identities and economic stability in different ways. It treats work as a legitimate place for learning, not a fallback for those who in the past would have been declared 鈥渘ot college material.鈥�

CTE today is best understood not as an alternative to college but as a system that connects secondary education to credentials, degrees and careers. Roughly 85% of public and private high school graduates at least one CTE course, reflecting how mainstream this approach has become.

But as participation expands, quality becomes the defining issue. An Advance CTE 50-state concludes, 鈥渢oo many states lack robust systems, policies and data to ensure true quality and value.鈥�

Research identifies several design principles that distinguish strong CTE programs from weak ones.  

Labor-market alignment. Strong programs begin with real demand in regional economies and adapt as industries evolve, rather than relying on static course catalogs. This is important for continuous improvement.

Academic and technical integration. Students shouldn鈥檛 have to choose between mastering algebra and learning advanced manufacturing, health sciences or cybersecurity. Effective programs show how academic knowledge functions in the workplace.

Work-based learning is core infrastructure. Internships, apprenticeships and paid work experiences are not add-ons. They help students understand professional norms and expand social capital by connecting them to adults who translate effort into opportunity.

Ladders, not dead ends. Course credit should be portable and transfer across education and training organizations and employers. Credentials should build on one another so that learners are on career pathways to better jobs. The goal is sustained mobility through multiple on-ramps that keep individuals moving through an opportunity-pluralist system.

Persistent gaps remain. There is insufficient funding, outdated equipment, limited space and little evidence of effectiveness. There is an acute shortage of qualified instructors, especially in fast-moving fields. But opportunity pluralism depends not only on offering multiple pathways, but on ensuring they are credible and worth pursuing.

Career and technical education matters more than ever. Whether it fulfills its promise depends on what happens next. Here are four suggestions.

• Treat CTE as core infrastructure. Align K-12, postsecondary and workforce systems so students experience a coherent continuum rather than a maze.
  
• Match investment to demand. Facilities, equipment and instructor compensation must reflect CTE鈥檚 central role in economic mobility.
  
• Make quality and evidence central. Track outcomes, set standards and improve 鈥� or end 鈥� weak programs.
  
• Embrace opportunity pluralism. Value multiple pathways to jobs in addition to college and design systems that allow movement between education and work without penalty.

CTE matters more than ever because the old promises about education and work are no longer sufficient. National CTE Month is a reminder that the challenge is not whether CTE will grow, but whether it will grow well, connecting learning to opportunity at scale.

There is no shortage of credentials in the U.S. labor market. There is a shortage of matched skills and reliable pathways. Job openings remain despite cooling in some places. Even so, a persistent share of young adults are , signaling weak attachment to both employment and further training.

This gap is not a 2025 phenomenon. For decades, policymakers have invested in education while assuming that labor market integration would follow. The evidence suggests otherwise. The impacts of education by field, institution and completion status; and many credentials deliver little labor market value relative to their cost. Treating enrollment and completion as success metrics has obscured whether programs actually improve employment and earnings.

CTE was intended to create clearer routes into work. The shows positive effects on several high school outcomes, limited and uneven evidence on postsecondary and earnings outcomes, and large gaps in what has been rigorously evaluated.

Many CTE programs are well intentioned and well funded, yet weakly connected to labor demand. Program offerings frequently lag local employer needs. Credentials are not always portable across firms or regions. Accountability focuses on compliance and participation rather than job placement and earnings. Students complete programs without clear signals about whether those credentials will translate into work. Employers remain skeptical of what certificates represent.

These outcomes are not accidental. They reflect governance. The Department of Education was designed to administer grants, regulate institutions and ensure access. These are necessary functions, but they are not sufficient for building labor market pathways. Education agencies are not structured to continuously track employer demand, validate occupational skill standards or adjust programs based on employment outcomes. 

By contrast, the Department of Labor already operates systems that define success in labor market terms, including placement, earnings and retention under the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act.

Shifting CTE administration toward Labor aligns authority with objective. To ensure that this move is not just symbolic, policy should be governed by institutions that measure and manage those outcomes. The lesson for CTE is not ideological. It is operational. Here are three design choices.

First, employer leadership must be real, not advisory in name only. Employers should hold decision-making authority over occupational standards, credential validation and program relevance, with transparent governance and conflict of interest rules. Without employer control and input into the curriculum, pathways drift toward provider convenience.

Second, funding must be tied to outcomes that matter. Completion alone is insufficient. Programs should be evaluated on job placement, earnings, retention and progression, adjusted for local labor markets. Chronic underperformance should lead to canceling or revising programs.

Third, the system must allow for competition among multiple providers. Community colleges, employer consortia, nonprofits, high-schools and high quality private providers should operate on equal footing 鈥� even if they pursue the goals differently. 

Of course, pathway rules should be periodically reviewed and reauthorized, and the Labor Department is well-suited to provide review. Labor markets change faster than education systems. Sunset provisions force adaptation and prevent regulatory accumulation that freezes outdated models in place.

Critics often argue that tighter alignment with labor markets narrows education and reduces flexibility. The evidence suggests the opposite. The current system narrows options by steering students toward with uncertain payoffs while offering limited transparency about outcomes. expand choice by allowing students to compare pathways based on real consequences rather than marketing or tradition.

A well-designed pathway system does not lock individuals into a single occupation. It creates stackable credentials, portable skills and bridges to further education. It treats employment not as the endpoint of learning but as a core component of it.

The on education governance offers a cautionary lesson: Incentives matter. Systems respond to what is measured and rewarded. When accountability emphasizes inputs and compliance, organizations optimize for those metrics, even when outcomes suffer. 

The federal transition to Labor creates a rare policy opening. It acknowledges that education policy cannot substitute for labor market policy when the objective is work. Whether that acknowledgment leads to better outcomes depends on follow through. Structure matters. Incentives matter. Governance matters.

If CTE continues to be governed as education with different labels, results will not change. If it is governed as labor market infrastructure, it can finally function as intended.

Consequently, by the time many students have reached high school, they鈥檝e already effectively ruled out entire fields of study and career paths 鈥� not due to any lack of innate talent, but because of a lack of exposure.

It might surprise many people to hear that the U.S. military, of all things, offers a powerful example of how structured aptitude testing can guide young people toward more meaningful career paths. Prospective recruits in all the military鈥檚 branches are required to take something called the, which assesses each candidate鈥檚 strengths across a range of domains 鈥� from mechanical comprehension to verbal reasoning.

Results aren鈥檛 just used to determine enlistment eligibility; they鈥檙e applied to match individuals with roles that align with their aptitudes and interests. It鈥檚 a model of personalized guidance that America鈥檚 schools could emulate 鈥� starting not in high school, but in seventh and eighth grade.

During my own time in the military, I witnessed the power of aptitude testing firsthand. As an Army artillery officer, I was continually struck by how well young soldiers, many of whom had struggled in traditional academic settings, excelled in military occupational specialties that matched their strengths. The ASVAB didn鈥檛 just measure ability; it revealed potential, which the military then developed through training, mentorship and clear pathways for advancement.

Imagine a nationwide framework modeled on the ASVAB but deliberately tailored to the civilian economy and introduced in middle school. Such a system could help students discover hidden talents in areas like coding, design, logistics, manufacturing or health care 鈥� fields they might never have considered. It could also help educators and counselors provide more targeted support and connect learning with purpose.

Other countries already do this fairly well. In Germany, students undergo aptitude assessments as part of their dual education system, which channels them into vocational or academic tracks based on strengths and interests 鈥� a model credited with supporting Germany鈥檚 robust manufacturing and engineering sectors.

In Australia, subject-specific aptitude exams help students identify suitable academic and career paths early on, especially in competitive fields like medicine and engineering. In Illinois and Texas, school systems have begun integrating vocational aptitude testing into broader educational assessments. While not yet as comprehensive as the ASVAB, these pilots reflect growing recognition of the need to align education with individual strengths.

The costs of the current misalignment are staggering. Nationally, about one in five high school students fails to graduate on time, and those who do often struggle to connect their education to meaningful work.

Among young men especially, college enrollment has , and completion rates are even lower. Today, nearly one in ten prime-age men in the U.S. are neither employed nor seeking work 鈥� a troubling indicator of disconnection and unrealized potential. A national aptitude initiative could help reverse these trends by giving young people earlier insight into their strengths and connecting them to motivating study and career paths.

It鈥檚 an ironic reality that even as the United States leads the world in innovation 鈥� in fields from artificial intelligence to clean energy 鈥� too few students can see themselves as part of these industries because they aren鈥檛 exposed to the skills or pathways early enough.

A national aptitude and career-exposure program for middle schoolers could help close opportunity gaps by identifying talents in underserved communities, reduce dropout rates by linking education to purpose, and strengthen the future workforce by aligning education with emerging economic needs.

Of course, any approach to expanding aptitude testing in American schools should be geared to expanding opportunity, not limiting it. The goal shouldn鈥檛 be to track or label students, but to open more doors by helping every child 鈥� especially those from under-resourced communities 鈥� discover a wider range of possibilities and pathways they might otherwise never have encountered.

Done right, aptitude testing can actually decrease the likelihood of tracking by revealing previously hidden strengths and ensuring that potential, not privilege, is what guides opportunity.

If we want to prepare America鈥檚 students not just to graduate, but to thrive, we must start earlier. Let鈥檚 give them the tools to discover who they are and what they can become鈥攂efore they鈥檝e already decided what they鈥檙e not.

But it took months for some states to access millions of dollars for career and technical education this year after the Department of Labor , part of the Trump administration鈥檚 plan to splinter and ultimately dismantle the Department of Education. The Labor Department鈥檚 grant system didn鈥檛 recognize state education agencies鈥� bank accounts. 

鈥淲e were in this endless loop of having to re-verify our account number,鈥� said Richard Kincaid, assistant state superintendent of college and career pathways at the Maryland State Department of Education. 鈥淚t never seemed to take in the system.鈥�

Maryland used state funds to fill the gap while it waited on $22 million in reimbursements. But the glitch, some argue, doesn鈥檛 bode well for when the Labor Department begins dispersing funds from Title I, the largest federal education program. The annual budget for Title I is $18 billion, compared to $1.4 billion for , which funds CTE. Title I serves 26 million low-income students, covering salaries, tutoring programs and classroom materials. 

An , obtained by the website Government Executive, underscored the difficulties, calling the shift of CTE a 鈥渕iniscule鈥� task compared to what lies ahead. 鈥淟arger formula grants and competitive grants are going to be much more difficult to migrate,鈥� the document said.

Beyond technical difficulties, educators say the Labor and Education departments have such vastly different missions that they worry about the message the Trump administration is sending by putting K-12 programs in an agency focused on getting jobless adults into the workforce. 

鈥淲e’re not talking about how to support a 28-year-old walking into an American job center looking for the next thing,鈥� Kinkaid said. 鈥淲e’re talking about kids.鈥� 

The Education Department last week unveiled six interagency agreements with four other federal agencies as part of the Trump administration鈥檚 plan to wind down an agency that it argues was unconstitutional to begin with. 

鈥淟et’s make sure that that grant money that’s coming from the federal government is getting in [states鈥橾 hands as efficiently as possible,鈥� Education Secretary Linda McMahon said during a White House briefing Thursday. 鈥淲e don’t want teachers having to spend their time and money on regulatory compliance.鈥� 

But for some state directors like Kinkaid, the result has been frustrating.

The administration, he said, has 鈥渁sked state CTE programs to essentially fly for the past six months without air traffic control.”

鈥楩ruitful partnership鈥�

Officials downplayed the initial rough spots, saying the transition of CTE, adult education and family literacy programs to the Labor Department has been relatively smooth. They worked with nine states to resolve the account number problem. During a call with reporters Tuesday, a senior department official said the administration expects a 鈥渟imilar fruitful partnership鈥� when it merges other K-12 programs into the Labor Department.

State leaders, the official promised, would still be able to rely on 鈥渢he expertise and concierge-level service鈥� they expect. As of Thursday, staff housed in the Labor Department had processed 568 payment requests totaling over $227 million for 40 unique states and territories, according to an email from a Labor official.

But at least one state, Rhode Island, was still hitting roadblocks as of Friday.

鈥淲e are receiving error messages indicating that our organization name does not match the name on record,鈥� said Rhode Island Department of Education spokesman Victor Morente. He said he expected the issue to be fixed this week. 鈥淭his situation underscores the challenges that abrupt changes within federal departments can create.鈥�

Lawmakers heard about the rocky start last week.

鈥淥perationally, it is a muddle,鈥� Braden Goetz told the . He spent 26 years in the Office of Career, Technical and Adult Education and now works as a senior policy advisor at New America, a left-leaning think tank. 鈥淚 don’t understand how the work gets done. When Secretary McMahon makes decisions, does she call the Secretary of Labor and ask her to communicate that down the chain?鈥�

An Education Department spokesperson said staff reached out to all grantees about requesting CTE funds from the new grant system and has yet to hear from five of them. 

鈥淚t is common for states to not draw down funds for several months for a variety of state-driven reasons,鈥� the official said. The California, Michigan and Wyoming education departments told 社区黑料 they haven鈥檛 had any trouble getting their CTE funds.

鈥楤ureaucracy will remain鈥�

John Pallasch served as assistant secretary of the Employment and Training Administration, the Labor office to which K-12 programs are moving, during Trump鈥檚 first term. He said any hiccups are likely to be temporary and that the Labor Department 鈥渋s pretty good at grants management.鈥� 

Some observers said shuffling staff and programs from one agency to another doesn鈥檛 go far enough. 

鈥淭he Education Department still retains many functions,鈥� Neal McCluskey, director of the Center for Educational Freedom at the libertarian Cato Institute, wrote in . 鈥淪o bureaucracy will remain, and the Constitution will continue to be violated.鈥�

From Kinkaid鈥檚 perspective in Maryland, states have lost the strong working relationship they had with CTE staff at the Education Department. The team is down from 15 staffers to about five. There鈥檚 been 鈥渓ittle to no communication since the movement happened,鈥� he said. In addition, a lot of state CTE directors are relatively new and need guidance on how to comply with regulations, said Amy Loyd, former assistant secretary for the CTE and adult education office during the Biden administration.

The Employment and Training Administration manages about $3 to $4 billion in grants annually 鈥� a fraction of the $28 billion the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education administers.

In a , Angela Hanks, acting assistant secretary of that division from 2021 to 2022, described moving K-12 programs into the office like 鈥渉aving a frog carry a camel on its back.鈥�

A few of the office鈥檚 existing grants focus on youth, but those target teens and young adults who fit 鈥渜uite a different profile from the students who are served by Title I,鈥� Hanks, now at the left-leaning Century Foundation, told 社区黑料. Job Corps helps 16- to 24-year-olds find employment, while teaches vocational skills for 鈥渋n-demand industries鈥� like construction and hospitality. 

Loyd, now CEO at All4Ed, an advocacy organization, sees a similar mismatch with moving adult education programs to the Labor Department.

鈥淢any of these older adults came to adult education services to strengthen their own literacy because they 鈥� want to be able to help their grandkids with homework,鈥� she said. 鈥淭hey’re 72; they don’t want a workforce credential. They want to be better readers so they can read to their grandkids.鈥� 

Several of the federal K-12 grants are complicated and depend on calculations year to year to ensure payments to districts are accurate. , for example, requires annual counts of military-connected students who attend schools on or near bases.

鈥淭he suggestion that these programs are on autopilot and [the Education Department] just flips a switch to flow the money to states and districts is a fundamental misunderstanding,鈥� said Danny Carlson, who served as deputy assistant secretary of policy and programs in the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education during the Biden administration. He鈥檚 now executive director of Learning First Alliance, a network that includes administrator associations, teachers unions and the National PTA.

In addition, McMahon tried to lay off 132 of the 185 remaining elementary and secondary employees during the shutdown. A the layoffs, and the agreement to reopen the government forced the secretary to bring the employees back to work, at least until the end of January. But it鈥檚 unclear whether she plans to try to terminate them again. 

After 10 months of canceled grants, temporary funding freezes and other disruptions, some district leaders are growing accustomed to the uncertainty. 

鈥淚 expect Labor will have a hard time managing Title I allocations for next year, but the administration is trying to do that,鈥� said Jeremy Vidito, chief financial officer for the Detroit Public Schools. 鈥淭hey want the system to fail so they can 鈥� shift funds to private schools or just give the money back to taxpayers.鈥�

Pallasch, the former assistant labor secretary, said he supports integrating not just CTE, but all education programs into the Labor Department.

鈥淲e’re all pulling in the same direction,鈥� he said. 鈥淲hether we’re talking K-12, community college or, quite frankly, Harvard and Yale, those are just job training programs. We are training folks to have the skills to be able to function in an organization.鈥� 

But Kinkaid and fear that the move to the Labor Department takes the field back to a time when some students were 鈥渢racked鈥� into vocational courses without rigorous academic content. 

There are growing efforts to expand apprenticeships and other opportunities for students who might not want to go to college. But for decades, Kinkaid said, the CTE field has tried to 鈥渟hrug off鈥� the stigma that career-focused instruction was only for lower-performing students.

鈥淲e may intentionally or unintentionally recreate that old system where low-income students and students of color were funneled into limited, low-mobility job paths,鈥� he said. 鈥淭his is exactly what the modern CTE system was designed to prevent.鈥�