Effective CTE Results from Collaboration
Throughout this series we have looked at some of the changes shaping Career & Technical Education. We have talked about the continued development of CTE and the lifelong learning journey. We have also looked at the growing role of competencies and credentials. As we continue having conversations with our clients, partners, and team about where CTE is headed, collaboration continues to come up as an essential part of the conversation.
The development of effective CTE does not happen in isolation. It takes educators with expertise in learning methodologies, employers and industry partners who understand the skills needed in the workplace, and curriculum teams that turn those needs into learning experiences. Learners can also provide fresh perspectives, such as what does or does not work and how well they understand the connection between their learning and where it may lead them.
By integrating these perspectives, we have the opportunity to create CTE programs that not only are relevant today but also continue to evolve as industries, technologies, and workforce needs change.
Keeping Industry Part of the Conversation
One challenge in developing CTE curriculum is that the world of work doesn’t stop. Technology evolves, job responsibilities change, and new tools emerge. The skills employers are looking for continue to shift along with them.
That makes ongoing input from employers and industry especially valuable. The Association for Career and Technical Education (ACTE) highlights the importance of partnerships among employers, industry representatives, education providers, and community leaders in helping CTE programs remain rigorous and relevant while preparing learners for education and careers.
Collaboration can happen in numerous ways. Employers and industry experts can help identify changing skill needs, review curriculum and give feedback, participate in advisory groups, and help ensure that what learners are experiencing reflects what is actually happening in the workplace.
Keeping these conversations going is important. Industry engagement shouldn’t happen once at the beginning of a project and then disappear. As quickly as industries are changing, ongoing collaboration helps curriculum and programs change with them.
Bringing Different Expertise Together
Another part of collaboration is recognizing that subject matter expertise and instructional design solve different problems.
Subject matter experts offer current technical and industry knowledge, helping teams identify what learners need to know and be able to do. Instructional designers bring another perspective, thinking about how learners will encounter that knowledge, how concepts should build on one another, and how learners will practice and show those skills.
Neither replaces the other. Perspectives that work together help make technical knowledge easier to understand, learning experiences more engaging, and assessments better aligned with the competencies learners are expected to demonstrate.
This idea applies broadly across CTE development. Strong content by itself doesn’t necessarily create a strong learning experience. Curriculum, competencies, assessments, instructional design, and workforce expectations all need to connect.
Connecting Learning to the Workplace
Collaboration with industry can also help curriculum teams create learning experiences that feel connected to the workplace. Authentic scenarios, projects, problem-solving activities, and other opportunities to apply knowledge can help learners understand not only what they are learning but why it matters.
Work-based experiences such as internships, apprenticeships, and job shadowing can strengthen that connection even further. But even within the curriculum itself, we can provide learners with opportunities to make decisions, solve realistic problems, and practice skills in ways that reflect how they may eventually use them.
The connection between learning and application is an important part of preparing learners for what comes next.
Collaboration Throughout Development
For those of us developing curriculum and learning experiences, collaboration also applies to how the work itself gets done.
CTE development can bring together subject matter experts, instructional designers, writers, editors, assessment developers, alignment and accessibility specialists, designers, production teams, educators, and industry partners. Each provides an important perspective to the work.
The opportunity is not simply to involve everyone, but to bring the right expertise into the development process at the right time. Reviewing curriculum against competencies early, for example, can identify missing concepts, sequencing issues, assumptions about prior knowledge, or gaps between what is being taught and what learners will ultimately be expected to demonstrate. Addressing such challenges early allows teams to solve them together rather than discovering them after development is well underway.
Listening to Learners
Learners also need to be part of the conversation. As we develop programs designed to help them explore careers and build skills, learners’ experiences can tell us whether the connections we are trying to create are actually working.
Do learners understand why they are learning a skill? Can they see how a course or credential connects to a career? Are they getting opportunities to apply what they are learning? Keeping questions like these in mind throughout development can help build learning experiences that are more relevant and meaningful.
Building CTE Together
As CTE evolves, collaboration becomes ever more essential. We are asking programs to connect learning with shifting careers, emerging technologies, credentials, work-based experiences, postsecondary pathways, and a continually changing workforce.
No single perspective can address all of that. Bringing together the people who understand the workforce, the people who understand teaching and learning, the teams building the curriculum, and the learners experiencing the curriculum allows us to create CTE experiences that are relevant, connected, and able to evolve.
For those of us developing CTE programs and learning experiences, that leaves us with an important question to reflect on:
Are we bringing the right people into our conversations at the right time to build the kinds of CTE experiences that learners will need next?
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