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Career And Technical Education Essay

Decent Essays

Career and Technical Education in High School: Does it Improve Student Outcomes?
Problem
Career and Technical Education (CTE) or “vocational education” provides preparation and skill building for careers. Some high school students will enter the workforce without additional training, but many will receive secondary CTE professional certifications. The goal of CTE is to connect students with growing industries in the American economy and give them the skills and training required for long-term success. However, little is known about CTE. Therefore, students lack access to high-quality secondary CTE.
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to determine whether the students who participated in CTE- especially those “concentrating” by taking a sequence …show more content…

Which students are taking CTE courses? Which courses and how many of them are they taking? (directional)
2. Does greater exposure to CTE improve education and employment outcomes (high school graduation, college enrollment, employment status, and wages)? (nondirectional)
3. Does CTE “concentration” (taking a sequence of three or more courses in an occupationally aligned “program of study”) have benefits for students? Do certain students benefit more than others? (nondirectional)
Research Methods The author uses associational research to investigate relationships between taking CTE courses and improving outcomes for those students. He used causal-comparative methodologies to compare students who participated in CTE and students that did not.
Subjects Involved This study follows three cohorts of students- those who started ninth grade in 2008, 2009, and 2010 (the high school classes of 2012 through 2014)- from ninth grade through the year after they should have graduated high school. These cohorts include over 100,000 individual students and more than 350,000 student-year observations. More specifically, all of these students are enrolled in Arkansas high schools. This study includes all students in Arkansas that are enrolled in CTE courses.

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