Dive Brief:
- A $77 million dollar career academy high school in California's Oxnard Union High School District is aligning to Common Core and meeting demand for practical career skills simultaneously.
- According to eSchool News, some California districts like Oxnard are now engaging in coordinated programs called "career pathways," based on the Linked Learning approach that combines academic courseloads, career interests, and job shadowing/internships.
- Yet the approach necessitates additional professional development for educators, in order to create a “specially-trained teacher workforce” that can easily explain concepts intrinsic to project-based learning on top of regular subjects.
Dive Insight:
Rancho Campana High School, the subject of the eSchoolNews article, is divided into three separate sections based on a student’s chosen career field: arts and entertainment, health services, or applied engineering. The wider Oxnard Union High School District (OUHSD) has an additional 20 career and college readiness academies. The schools are subsidized by $250 million worth of competitive California state grants called the California Career Pathways Trust.
“OUHSD’s academies are so specifically designed that every course an engineering-focused student takes is aware of her career interests and experience,” eSchoolNews reports. “Thus, her English class might emphasize more technical writing, while her art class might challenge her physical modeling and design skills.”
Another advantage for students is being able to utilize more modern tech in the classroom, which, more than ever, both parents and students see as necessary to both career and college.