Career Technical Education

Whereas, Within the Economic and Workforce Development Division of the California Community College System, there are ten initiatives that develop workforce instruction, funded at an amount of $46 million;

Whereas, The level of interaction between the initiatives and local college programs, departments, senates and faculty varies widely across the state;

Whereas, The level of awareness of local faculty about the work of the Economic and Workforce Development initiatives varies widely across the state; and

Whereas, Some colleges have undergone reorganization since the recent budget cuts;

Whereas, In some cases, career technical education (CTE) programs are no longer organized in exclusively CTE departments or divisions but rather are mixed in with non-CTE programs and faculty; and

Whereas, The concerns and issues of CTE faculty and programs are different from those in other disciplines and CTE programs may not be getting the specific attention and support that are needed;

Whereas, The federal government has drafted language requiring Perkins funding to be based upon new definitions and indicators, creating new and onerous requirements that will not improve teaching and learning for students enrolled in career technical education programs in California community colleges;

Whereas, These federally designed mandates impinge on areas of academic and professional matters, and such "oversight strategies" have, in the past, notoriously reduced and impeded the educational quality of the programs they have sought to improve;

Whereas, Many California community colleges delay granting credit for articulated occupational courses that students have taken while in high school until they have completed some minimum number of units at the community college, a practice sometimes referred to as "credit in escrow";

Whereas, National research suggests that the students who do not immediately receive the credit they earned while still in high school never end up taking advantage of the credit, so the intended benefits of this credit are lost; and

Whereas, The Department of Education and the System Office have initiated a collaborative process to develop a state plan for career technical education, and a Perkins IV funding implementation plan;

Whereas, Many of the items under discussion address areas of faculty primacy (CCR Title 5 53200) such as curriculum, program development, student success, budgeting, staff development, and faculty minimum qualifications;

Whereas, Occupational Programs are an integral part of the California Community College System;

Whereas, Over the past two years, the Governor, through his budget, and the Legislature have funded many career and technical education and other economic development projects and initiatives;

Whereas, Local senates, curriculum committees and all faculty need to be aware of issues affecting occupational programs; and

Whereas, The public and governing bodies often have inaccurate perceptions of occupational programs and students;

Whereas, There are many statewide community college issues that impact vocational programs, faculty and students;

Whereas, Vocational faculty have difficulty participating in governance locally and statewide;

Whereas, Vocational faculty participate in the Academic Senate for California Community Colleges Vocational Leadership Institute and this would provide a resource list of names to start creating an email listserv; and

Whereas, The requirements for the use of Carl D. Perkins Vocational Technical Education Act (VTEA) funding, Federal Bill S250, have recently been substantially revised and will require major changes in the way vocational programs can receive and spend VTEA dollars;

Whereas, The VTEA changes as well as the California measure AB1802 were enacted so recently that local college personnel may not even be aware of the changes and how they will affect their programs; and

Whereas, Because today's jobs have become more complex and the need for workers to have higher levels of knowledge, skills and thinking abilities has increased; and

Whereas, Some people argue that students in some occupational certificate and degree programs do not need the same levels of knowledge and skills of students in other certificate and degree programs;

Whereas, Vocational programs have specific curriculum that is mandated by external agencies;

Whereas, Outside accrediting agencies mandate specific hours of practical application; and

Whereas, Compressed calendar schedules force students to remain in classes for unreasonably long periods of time (e.g. 6 hours and 40 minutes per day), which is not conducive to learning;