In September 2005 Senator Scott's vocational education legislation, SB 70, was chaptered into the Education Code (section 88532). The bill focuses on improving the linkages and career-technical pathways between high school and California community colleges. Most of the CCC response to the legislation will occur through programs coordinated directly from the system office, and personnel there have already begun to inform colleges about some of their plans. However, the academic senate for california community colleges will design and implement one project called Statewide Career Pathways: Creating School to College Articulation, and it is this one project that this article will explain.
Statewide Career Pathways: Creating School to College Articulation will provide an opportunity for high school and college faculty to meet, collaborate and develop articulation agreements.
Resulting agreements will vary by discipline and may include alignment of course skills, concepts and sequences, advanced placement possibilities and credit by examination options. While our colleges have already participated in many efforts to align curriculum and develop articulation agreements through Tech Prep programs, faculty have indicated several unmet needs, which this project will address, including the following:
When articulation agreements have been created, educators have not had an effective means to collect and share them regionally or across regions. this program will create and maintain a database of agreements and explore models of articulation that can be replicated in other regions. Furthermore, the program will create a mechanism for faculty to review and update articulation agreements so they remain current.
While there have been opportunities for collaboration between faculty in colleges, schools and Regional Occupation Centers (ROC), they have not always been supported and coordinated sufficiently. there is also a need to coordinate with the efforts of various curriculum and articulation groups (consortia, Tech Prep, IMPAC). this program will support opportunities for faculty participation and seek to coordinate with other projects.
While past articulation agreements have been developed, students, parents, and personnel in schools and colleges did not take advantage of articulation agreements due to lack of information. this program will develop an outreach component to increase student, parent and educators' understanding of the opportunities that students have and highlight the benefits of their participation.
The Statewide Career Pathways: Creating School to College Articulation will begin by forming a steering committee, including representatives from high schools, ROCs and colleges. The work of the project will begin by developing an inventory of existing articulation agreements. The program will then identify the most appropriate disciplines to target initially and will assemble and convene faculty discipline groups (with high school and college faculty). They will create standards for articulation and course acceptance and begin to develop appropriate articulation agreements. Next, a database will be developed. We will create outreach strategies along the way, ensuring we coordinate with existing groups.
The following guiding Principles will inform our articulation project. the project will:
Build upon best practices for articulation and lessons learned
Focus on targeted fields by region
Build upon existing projects (ImPac, tech Prep)
Provide support to high school and community college
faculty
Provide opportunities to collaborate
The Academic Senate is currently collecting a list of individuals who might be interested in participating in this project beginning immediately and continuing through the next academic year. Individuals can notify us of their interest by contacting the Academic Senate office at (916) 445-4753 and asking for an application to serve on the sb 70 articulation project.
The Academic Senate is delighted to have the opportunity, through SB 70, to facilitate the educational pathways for students as they move from high school to postsecondary institutions.