Essay Sample on Equip Students for a Bright Future: Benefits of Career and Technical Education

Introduction

Career and Technical Education is an education program aimed at equipping students with knowledge and skills of their future career. Industry based knowledge and skills are provided to the student through an introduction to workplace competencies, making academic materials available and exposing students to their jobs. Students of all ages, both from high school and college, are the primary beneficiaries of these educational programs. Most states in the United States of America have enacted and implemented legislation to facilitate the growth of this program since its establishment in 1926 (Goode, Chapman & Margolis, 2012). Various countries have modified the program, but I will be focusing on the state of Oregon concerning Louisiana on how legislations have been made to support the CTE program.

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Critical Issues

The main issues in the CTE programs are enrollment, attainment, eligibility, funding, educators & learning as well as training industries. Oregon State has grouped career learning areas into six groupings. They are; agriculture, arts, business management, human resource, health sciences and industrial engineering systems (Goode, Chapman & Margolis, 2012). The teachers of these programs come from a traditional teacher education program and should be equipped with knowledge and understanding of the industry they are teaching. Louisiana has invested ineffective teachers and student leader set to monitor the attainment of educational goals and standards. These elements can facilitate industrial based learning directly.

Oregon funds its CTE program through grant resources through the Perkins Act of 2016. They use it in the development of the education through funding student's fees, technical assistance and student leadership organization on application. Louisiana, on the other hand, takes its students through Free Application for Federal Student Aid. This determines the amount of money a student will contribute alongside the share the state will fund through grants of loans. Each school is awarded $25000 through the Minimum Foundation Program (MFP) (Meeder & Suddreth, 2012).

Eligibility for the CTE program is the availability of post-secondary requirements or be of 16 years and with complete course requirements. Dual enrollment is available for both states where students can study two courses or study in two different institutions. However, in Oregon state, the student/parent program allows notification of parents when a student makes changes by applying dual enrollment, transfers and an award of funds to their child.

Post-secondary CTE is offered in Oregon State, where students are exposed directly to their career workplace to enable gaining of technical skills. Through BUILD (Building, Understanding, Investment, Learning and Development) which is a Career and Technical Education Act of 2013, the state has partnered with businesses and industries that can facilitate the process of learning (Meeder & Suddreth, 2012).

In 2012, Louisiana, the government started cooperation with companies and industries to strategize in the professional growth of their students.The education program will affect various stakeholders; for example, businesses and industries. They are subjected to take in students for training even though they do not know the work, which is a burden. Students are impacted positively as they are equipped with career-building skills to jump-start their future. Teachers are expected to have industrial-based knowledge which subjects them to seek the required experience and qualifications.

Conclusion

In conclusion, career and technical education are an essential element in a student's professional growth and states should put up legislations to facilitate necessary component for the program's growth. This program has changed the career growth of student and has opened up opportunities for students to focus on their career paths.

References

Goode, J., Chapman, G., & Margolis, J. (2012). Beyond curriculum: the exploring computer science program. ACM Inroads, 3(2), 47-53.Retrieved from https://dl.acm.org/ft_gateway.cfm?ftid=1266176&id=2189835#page=48

Meeder, H., & Suddreth, T. (2012). Common Core State Standards & Career and Technical Education: Bridging the Divide between College and Career Readiness. Achieve, Inc. Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED532391