A r c h i v e d I n f o r m a t i o n

President Clinton's Call to Action for American Education in the 21st Century

Lifelong Learning

Current training and unemployment programs were designed in a very different time to suit a different economy. Today, gaining entry into the labor market requires a higher level of skill, and maintaining membership in the workforce requires continuous learning. In this context, the transition from school to work and opportunities for lifelong training require our attention as never before.

School-to-Work Opportunities

The School-to-Work Opportunities Act, signed by President Clinton in 1994, broadens educational, career and economic opportunities for students in high school, including creating pathways for those not immediately bound for four-year colleges and for the many young people who cannot see the relevance of what they're doing in the classrooms to the world of work, and thus get bored and tune out. When the barrier between academic learning and vocational education is broken, when work-based learning and school-based learning are linked, these students not only stay in school, but they become engaged in learning and do better and continue on to college.

Students at the Oakland Health and Bioscience Academy in Oakland, California learn all aspects of the health care industry. Their knowledge of health care includes planning, management, finance, technical and production skills, technology, labor issues, community issues, safety, and environmental issues. They gain this broad understanding through a variety of learning experiences and teaching techniques. Interactive career explorations and a 200-hour hospital internship in the 11th and 12th grades expose them to the business, administrative, and clinical departments of a health care facility. Students also create work-based learning portfolios, which include reflective journal entries and works samples keyed to health career standards. Projects offer an opportunity to explore different aspects of health care and their relationship. Projects may simulate the decision-making processes of a health care provider--for example, reading a case study of a lead-poisoned child, interpreting the results of lab tests, and creating a medical management plan. Student teams may explore health care delivery systems by planning a school-based clinic, and operating a student-run health education center.

All 50 states have received grants under School-to-Work to plan comprehensive training and education and apprenticeship systems. By late 1996, 37 states had made sufficient progress in their planning efforts to receive 5-year grants for implementing their plans. More than 500,000 young people in 1,800 schools throughout the nation are participating in school-to-work systems that integrate academic and vocational instruction and provide work-based learning, preparing them for one to two years of college or more and careers. More than 135,000 employers have been involved in these efforts.

The support of the business community and state and local governments is essential to maintain local and state school-to-work systems that will help ensure a pathway to the middle class for most Americans.

A G.I. Bill for America's Workers

A centerpiece of President Clinton's G.I. Bill for America's Workers has been our proposal to fundamentally reform the current federal job-training system. We have proposed consolidating at least 70 separate job training programs, replacing them with an integrated system that minimizes red tape and maximizes individual choice in each local community. Unemployed workers and workers in transition from one job to another would receive Skill Grants of up to $3,000 to use as they choose to learn new skills to find new and better jobs.

We would provide these workers access--through computerized networks open to all and One-Stop Career Centers already operating in many states--to reliable information on jobs, careers, skill sets required for those jobs, and the success records of various training institutions, so that they can make informed choices about how best to improve their futures.

For our youth, federal vocational education, as well as training, and employment programs will be reshaped to support the community-based school-to-work activities that have evolved in response to the innovative School-to-Work initiative we began in 1994. These programs enable high schools, colleges, and the private sector to offer all youth academically rigorous school- and work-based learning opportunities so that all youth graduate with the skills and habits of mind necessary to benefit from college education, lifelong learning, and rewarding careers.

For adults with basic literacy skills or for adults who do not have the literacy skills to succeed in the workplace as citizens or as parents, we will revamp the Adult Education Act so it can better meet adult learners' needs and be more accountable for program results.

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Last Updated -- Feb. 13, 1997, (pjk)