De Blasio: Career And Technical Schools Are Not Preparing Students For The Future
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- Public Advocate Bill De Blasio is taking aim at the Big Apple's career and technical schools.
A report by De Blasio's office has found that the schools aren't preparing students for college or the workforce.
"Almost 80 percent of our kids are being trained in subject matter that is not statistically proven to be where the New York economy is going," de Blasio said.
According to the report, 50 percent of career and technical high schools with three years of academic data available have made the State's Persistently Low-Achieving list since 2009.
Now, de Blasio is looking to make some improvements.
"We're calling for a systematic reform, calling for reorienting our career and technical education system to the modern economy, we're calling for reaching every child, not just the children privileged enough to be in the new, small schools," de Blasio said.
De Blasio is planning to introduce a task force that will keep an eye on the latest job trends, new internship programs and the creation of a public-private scholarship fund.
"It's astounding to me that we're teaching the wrong things right now and that we know where the trends are going but we're not adjusting the curriculum. Why? Because the whole area has been treated as an afterthought," de Blasio said.
De Blasio's 6-Point Plan To Reform Career and Technical Education:
1. New City legislation introduced by the Public Advocate to mandate an interagency task force that assesses the latest job trends and whether CTE programs match up.
2. New internship programs at City agencies—including one launched by the Public Advocate—to prepare students for jobs in human services and public administration.
3. Ensure the 12 new CTE schools announced in the State of the City match growing industries such as Information Technology and Health Sciences.
4. Partner the most successful CTE programs with the poorest performing ones in order to share resources and best practices.
5. Create a public-private scholarship fund to help finance CTE students' industry certification following graduation.
6. Track the academic and career progress of CTE students during school and after graduation to hold programs accountable for success.
