The Ohio Association of Career Technical Superintendents

Response to the University System of Ohio Strategic Plan for Higher Education: 2008-2017

Submitted by the Ohio Association of Career Technical Superintendents 10/29/2008 October 29, 2008

Eric D. Fingerhut Chancellor The Ohio Board of Regents 30 E. Broad Street, 36th Floor Columbus, Ohio 43215

Re: The Ohio Association of Career Technical Superintendents Response to The University System of Ohio Strategic Plan for Higher Education: 2008-2017

Dear Chancellor Fingerhut:

As Ohio moves to more strategically connect higher education to the economy, we are increasingly confronting the challenge of high numbers of low-skill working adults. It is well researched that nearly one out of four working adults’ proficiencies do not match the requirements that our state’s knowledge economy businesses and industries are seeking to retain and attract.

The purpose of this document is to provide you with a plan for how Ohio’s 49 career technical school districts, with their emphasis on contextual learning, and technical and occupational training, are determined to address these important challenges and contribute to the University’s System of Ohio’s Strategic Plan.

The key question is how to bolster the educational attainment of all Ohioans? While aspirations are high, we know that not every Ohioan will pursue baccalaureate or even sub-baccalaureate education, despite our collective desire for many more Ohioans to earn these degrees. The important role for the career- technical school districts is to offer skill development and a broad array of sub-associate degree offerings for both high school students transitioning into work and for thousands of adult learners. The Ohio Association of Career Technical Superintendents (OACTS) is deeply committed to the important goals of the University System of Ohio (USO) Plan and believes that the transition of the state’s 49 career- technical school districts represents a set of unprecedented opportunities to more readily connect our students, our qualified instructors, and our world class assets into a linked system of higher education.

Chancellor Fingerhut, the Association proposes several ways the state’s career-technical education providers, as a sector, can support the overall Plan. We have prepared a response to highlight and illustrate those aspects of the Plan we can uniquely impact.

2 | P a g e The Association’s response is presented in four sections, (1), an introduction, (2) an overall response from the Association, (3) how the career-technical school districts can support selected metrics; and (4) an appendix with a set of policy recommendations to be contemplated as the Plan and the transition of the sector progresses over time.

We look forward to meeting with you soon to have a productive dialogue as well as being full partners with you to support these critically important imperatives. We hope that you find this response to be helpful and constructive.

Sincerely,

Kip Crain President, Ohio Association of Career Technical Thomas N. Applegate Superintendents Executive Director Ohio Association of Career Technical Superintendent, Superintendents Wayne County Career Center

3 | P a g e I: Introduction

For over a century, educators and employers have worked to develop courses of study to facilitate students’ matriculation into the workforce. Ohio’s own vocational workforce development history is entrenched in our strong vocational education movement. In 1822 Cincinnati opened the Mechanics Institute as a viable choice for high school students and broadened the standard curriculum to include courses of study supporting the state’s economic role as an industrial region.1 The advent of the national vocational education movement was largely influenced by Ohio’s prominent status in industry and the state has never looked back.

Of Ohio’s 610 public school districts, nearly 500 are represented by career-technical school districts, also referred as Joint Vocational School Districts. These important districts service thousands of high school students in grades 9-12 in more than 50 career and technical programs.

The adult education component in the state’s vocational movement evolved in the 1940’s and essentially reflects the same value on preparing adult learners for the workforce, knowing there are close to 1.2 million working poor in Ohio in need of a full spectrum of education and training to acquire sustainable wages. The career-technical sector has historically served and continues to serve an important population of older adult learners (over 80% of the career-technical adult sector is comprised of students 25 and older).

Most of the state’s career-technical school districts developed an Adult Education component to fully utilize the public investment into the physical assets while also promoting education and training for a non-traditional, post high school population. As such, the sector includes extensive physical assets; such as medical laboratories, heavy equipment laboratories, chemistry and physics laboratories, welding fabrication laboratories, robotics equipment, and an extensive high tech infrastructure (wireless campuses, etc.). The career-technical adult learner, as a result, is fully immersed into 21st century technology via the sector.

As background, the state’s career-technical planning districts serve high school students in grades 9-12 in a very diverse set of programs anchored in contextual learning, extensive use of technology, all aimed at career development. Additionally, each of these districts includes programming for the adult learner, managed by Adult Career Center Directors, with an adult- focused curriculum designed to support workforce skills.

The Association believes that career-technical school districts, and the close to 100,000 students it serves, will significantly contribute to the state’s Strategic Plan, and can support features of the USO Plan with policy and programming from both its important high school population, as well as the thousands of adult learners who are part of the sector.

1 Shoemaker, B. and Parks, D., 2007. A History of Vocational and Career Education in Ohio: 1828-2000. iUniverse, Inc.

4 | P a g e II: The Ohio Association of Career Technical Superintendents Response to the USO Plan

The Ohio Association of Career Technical Superintendents, the “Association,” recognizes the University System of Ohio (the “Plan”) represents a new and exciting opportunity for the postsecondary community to come together to meet the varied educational and training needs of Ohioans. The Association especially notes the following aspects of the Plan which will enhance the ability of our sector to have even greater impact:

 In a matter of weeks the state’s 49 adult career education centers will transition into the University System of Ohio, bringing over 100,000 students. This infusion supports the Plan’s primary goal of enrolling an additional 230,000 students by 2017. The association fully supports the strategies for opening new markets of students by enhancing transition opportunities to and from our career-technical school districts. The Plan recognizes the value of the integration of Adult Basic and Literacy Education (ABLE) and career- technical education among these historically fragmented sectors, which will ease barriers and improve the transfer rates of students into increasingly higher levels of learning.

 The Plan’s emphasis on efficiency and credit acquisition for high schools students, via dual and concurrent enrollment, is firmly supported by the sector. When talking about high school students, our career-technical school districts deliver more college credit than any other program in the state.

 The development of the Ohio Skills Bank, which will operationalize career pathways and strengthen regional partnerships with business, provides career-technical school districts with an incredible opportunity to partner with more employer consortiums to access thousands of incumbent workers (working for those employers) and draw them into education and training, further supporting the Plan’s enrollment goal of 230,000 students.

III. How Ohio’s Career-Technical Education sector can support selected metrics

Access The most prominent goal within the Plan is to enroll an additional 230,000 students by 2017, a 49% system-wide increase. In order to reach this number, we must be able to attract and retain a much larger percentage of adult learners, first-generation college going students, and other non-traditional populations not easily drawn into higher education. Our career-technical school districts are well–positioned to realize these goals and are able to step up and assume some responsibility for reaching these important access metrics, assuming the metric is quantifying students enrolled in for-credit programs and other credentialing programs that meet credit requirements from Regents.

 Large scale enrollment support: We know the adult learner will comprise a disproportionately high percentage of new enrollment growth to meet the Plan’s educational attainment goals. The adult learner is highly mobile, more likely to work full-

5 | P a g e time while enrolled, have dependents other than a spouse, rely more heavily on employer tuition assistance, and comprise a larger percentage of students enrolled in industry driven certificate or credentialing programs than traditional students. The Association believes that the sector will significantly contribute to the large-scale enrollment metric by specifically engaging adults 25 years or older (over 80% of all adult career center enrollment is older adults), first generation students, and Hispanic students.

 Workforce development: These adult learners are, in reality, our incumbent workforce. We want to acknowledge the role the sector plays in the state’s workforce development needs. The contribution the sector makes toward the production of certificates and postsecondary credentials (other than degrees) in technical training, healthcare, skilled trades, and public safety, among so many other occupations, clearly contributes to a vibrant economy. The Association firmly supports the link between workforce development and economic growth at a time when Ohio is boldly promoting state agency regional advancement initiatives with the Ohio Skills Bank and the Department of Development Strategic Plan.

 Stackable Certificates: Career-technical school districts play a prominent role in the development of the state’s stackable certificates initiative by being the nexus between completion of basic literacy and numeracy skills and providing education and training while “tipping” students into collegiate learning. The sector’s major focus is to foster technical coursework leading to an industry recognized credential. Also the sector aligns pre-collegiate training with the stackables concept, i.e., the LPN credential could transition to RN to BSN and all courses delivered in career technical education are part of Career-Technical Transfer Credit (CT2) and eventually count for college credit.

 Commitment to Alignment: The integration of ABLE and adult career-technical education centers into the University System of Ohio will create a completely integrated workforce education system. It means that the GED is now the starting point, not the stopping point. This transition makes greater use of the quality facilities available in the adult career center network to further expand the locations at which higher education can be offered in Ohio and clearly assists the community college sector with a stronger pipeline of students. We fully support this effort.

Affordability and Efficiency Career-technical school districts provide a quality education at an affordable cost to the student and to the state. The Plan includes several goals related to dual or concurrent enrollment of students, especially encouraging traditional age students to enter a bachelor’s program with at least a year of credit earned from a community college or high school students earning college credit. These goals relate to the effective use of time and resources. The adult career centers have several exemplary college credit acquisition models and other innovative college credit earning partnerships which will contribute to these metrics.

In particular, those concurrent enrollment strategies as outlined in the Affordability/Efficiency section of the Plan which help accelerate students’ ability to accumulate college credit are this sector’s strength.

6 | P a g e  Mission-focused: To us, affordability also means a management and operational approach which maximizes our resources and facilities with flexible and focused competency based programming utilizing the tremendous assets we have on-site.

 Expand the concept of concurrent enrollment: The Plan’s dual enrollment strategies currently focuses on high school students’ college credit acquisition and encourages baccalaureate students to earn at least a year of college credit from a community college. This is very positive. However, a full spectrum of concurrent enrollment strategies across the entire system with ABLE and career-technical school districts will accelerate more students’ educational attainment in less time. We believe that in order for the state to make the kind of impact needed to efficiently advance the large-scale number of students needed for a talented workforce and to keep our graduates in Ohio, the concurrent enrollment of students should not be solely focused on just two transition points, but rather on the entire University System of Ohio. We strongly support concurrent enrollment strategies for those adult learners to co-enroll in GED/ABLE and career technical education, as well as local community colleges.

 Pilot programs between adult career centers and community colleges (via OACC): The Association is eager and willing to partner with the Ohio Association of Community Colleges to pilot various concurrent enrollment strategies to strengthen student transition rates from the career-technical school districts to community and technical colleges. The Association is fully supportive of the exploration of ways to accelerate college credit acquisition, believing that college credit should and could be granted to students at any USO education site.

 e-Learning and advancing technologies: The state’s career-technical school districts have employed cutting edge technologies with exceptionally qualified instructors to offer exemplary e-learning courses for students state-wide, and which draw students from other states. This capability will only continue to grow. e-Learning from this sector is now offered at work-based sites, in learning centers, etc. and is one of the most cost- effective instructional modalities available and which lowers the cost of instruction for a growing percentage of students. Importantly, the sector stays current with the e-learning needs of business.

 Maximize financial aid and unmet student need: While the Plan fully supports the integration of Ohio Department of Education assets, a more explicit set of entrance and exit criteria between ABLE, Career-technical education and the community colleges could maximize students’ available financial aid as they matriculate between sectors.

Quality

 Career-Technical Credit Transfer (CT2): Critical to the development of Ohio’s talent pipeline is the ability of the adult learner to be able to take what credit they have earned in their education and training and build on that when pursuing higher levels of learning. Adult learners now have clear linkages between technical or skilled trades offered among regional adult career centers, developmental education offered at the community colleges, academic and occupational programs, and easy articulation of credits across institutions. Because the USO plan values an effective articulation and transfer process, CT2 now ensures that those courses taught within the region at any adult career center, and which are determined to be of sufficient rigor, to be granted college credit.

7 | P a g e  Investment into Career Technical Education: Even though Ohio’s postsecondary tuition rates are suspended, there is a long-term need to keep tuition costs low. However, this is coming at a time when less state funding is available and the career- technical school districts (as well as community and technical colleges) will be expected to play an even greater role educating many more under-prepared students. Capital expenditures and resources aimed at building the capacity for this sector are essential. The Plan doesn’t necessarily address how funding for facilities and other important assets will unfold, especially as the need and capacity will grow when serving under- prepared adult learners.

Economic Leadership

 Sector and institutional performance and accountability: The Association believes the career-technical school districts have a strong and long-term track record of performance, both with student success and responding to business. We believe the Plan’s performance metrics and other accountability mechanisms should be transparent to students and other community stakeholders.

 Track record of business responsiveness: This career and technical education sector has historically been able to more readily respond to the needs of business and in more flexible ways than other sectors. The Association believes that the sector has an unparalleled opportunity to significantly impact those metrics related to regional economic growth, especially those related to business satisfaction and improved rates of participation for apprenticeships, co-ops, and internships since it is our core work.

 The Ohio Skills Bank and the engagement of the state’s adult career centers with multiple career pathways, facilitates the interaction of the career technical education sector with employers to set regional priorities, such as more apprenticeships. The Business Compact highlighted in their response to the Strategic Plan, included in the plan’s Appendix, the attractiveness of internships and apprenticeships as an employment recruitment tool. Further, by playing a central role in the career pathway movement, adult career centers will form deeper working relationships with employers in those selected career pathways industries and more acutely influence employer satisfaction.

8 | P a g e IV: Appendix: Policy recommendations

The following policy recommendations are presented as a starting point for current and future discussions as the Plan unfolds and/or is modified as circumstances change. The Association believes that these policy recommendations can help mitigate and ease constraints for the sector to fully support the USO and make the Plan work.

Workforce development: The USO plan must acknowledge and support the central role that workforce development plays in the state’s economic development efforts. Clearly the state’s commitment to economic development and the inextricable link to education and training are under-represented in the current Plan. The sector has, and will continue to play, a strong role in workforce development and will contribute to the state’s ability to advance economically. The extent to which the Plan can eventually acknowledge and financially support this component will strengthen the role this sector can play.

Focused state support for concurrent enrollment: This sector can significantly contribute to enrollment growth via stated concurrent enrollment strategies. However, the current funding formula does not support extensive concurrent enrollment growth. We recommend, and offer Association driven leadership to support revising the financial funding policies to encourage state-wide incentives for credit granting institutions to partner and offer college credit within the network of career-technical school districts. This minor revising will surely strengthen those affordability and efficiency metrics. As it stands now, too many institutional partnerships are personality driven and largely dependent upon individual institutions to negotiate transfer agreements, concurrent enrollments, etc. which is extremely time-intensive and inconsistent at best.

Strategic enrollment growth: The call to increase enrollment by 230,000 students is a goal the sector can readily embrace, but to do so requires two recommendations. 1) the overall goal can be more fully supported with an economic development framing which takes into account not just an overall 230,000 increase, but rather to encourage large numbers of students to enroll into those career-technical education subject areas leading to certificates and then to degrees which align with state economic development goals, such as Bio Sciences, healthcare, and STEM, etc. and 2) we recommend capitalizing on the Ohio Skills Bank career pathways initiative as a means to help drive enrollment growth in our sector in strategic ways. This strategic enrollment strategy encourages building pathways for more incumbent workers, adult learners and other non-traditional students, to enter the system. This strategic enrollment must drive the process to get to 230,000 students while at the same time working to fill critical skill shortages and contribute to regional economic growth.

Business satisfaction survey representation and addition of workforce development: The Association would welcome the opportunity to provide representation when the Business Satisfaction Survey is developed, and specifically recommends that workforce development goals and accountability metrics should be developed reflective of the business to postsecondary education relationship.

Resource allocation: In order to meet the Plan’s goals, and to build needed capacity to serve the state’s learners, we recommend that significant resources be directed to high-performing districts. These high performing districts will include and represent both large and small operations which are essential to their communities. We recommend funding potentially allocated differently and with more flexibility for the sector, especially as we consider

9 | P a g e foundational funding for managing capital expenditures and the enrollment growth will require when capacity is considered to meet these goals.

End of report

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