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

     FOR RELEASE: 1 p.m. EDT                Contact:  Ivette Rodriguez      April 12, 1996                                   (202) 401-1576

The competition finalists, representing each U.S. Department of Education region, will be honored by the secretary at a National Press Club ceremony April 12.

The Secretary's Awards for Outstanding Vocational-Technical Education Programs recognize excellence in local school to work and vocational technical education programs, services and activities under the Carl D. Perkins Vocational and Applied Technology Education Act.

Riley said the winning programs represent the cutting edge in connecting young people to quality education and a better future. He added that he hopes other communities will examine these exceptional efforts and consider adopting the successful practices.

This year's winners provide participants with instruction in such diverse fields as mechanical engineering technology, automotive technology and health occupations. Approximately 10 million students participate in vocational-technical education programs annually.

"The strength of our nation depends on education," Riley said. "The vocational technical education programs honored this year serve as models of how best to prepare students with the knowledge and skills needed to succeed in the workplace, prepare for college and pursue promising careers.

"These programs demonstrate how vocational technical educators are forging new partnerships -- among high schools, colleges and the business community -- to equip students for responsible citizenship, further learning and productive employment."

Vocational technical education programs conducted by local education agencies and community colleges across the nation competed for these awards. The Education Department invited state vocational technical education directors in each state to nominate up to two programs. A panel of outside, non-federal experts reviewed 54 nominations submitted by 34 states and identified 21 semifinalists.

Staff from the department's Office of Vocational and Adult Education and the secretary's awards team conducted semifinalist site visits and selected 12 final program winners based on the following criteria:

1. Local partnerships -- The program maintains strong articulation among secondary, postsecondary and adult education levels. Strong ties are established and maintained with business, industry and the community.

2. Coordinated reforms -- Well defined reform efforts to improve the whole system, including coordination with state and local policies and initiatives, and alignment with national education reform initiatives, such as the Perkins Act, Goals 2000: Educate America Act, Improving America's Schools Act and the School-to-Work Opportunities Act.

3. Strong linkages between academic and vocational technical education -- Planned coordination and sequencing of courses, curricula and/or programs that combine academic and vocational-technical competencies and contextual learning.

4. Positive results -- Use of performance indicators to evaluate program quality.

5. Real-life experience in industry -- Students have strong experience in, and an understanding of, all aspects of the industry they are preparing to enter.

6. Broad participation -- Evidence of program participation by members of special populations and/or activities that promote the elimination of sex bias and stereotyping.

7. Promise as a model -- The program incorporates effective strategies that can be replicated.

NOTE TO EDITORS: Descriptions of the winning programs are attached.

CALIFORNIA
(Concord)
Serendipity/Diablo Valley College Tech-Prep Program in Food Service and Hospitality
Contact: Judy Moon (510) 798-0882
Food service and hospitality is California's fastest growing industry, yet it is an industry that has a reputation for low-skill, low-wage work, especially in the youth job market. This tech prep program in food service and hospitality aims to improve that reputation by putting students on high-skill career paths with a coherent curriculum from grades nine through community college. Serendipity, a school based enterprise, is a full-service restaurant and bakery where students learn in a real-work environment. The program depends on interdisciplinary team instruction to integrate home economics vocational-technical material with academics in the classroom, as well as to develop cross-curricular special projects, such as a project on chocolate that incorporated science, history, practical application, "savory evaluation," art and math. Instructor teams also have helped to fill a crucial gap in career counseling, since the school has no counselors and only one career coordinator.

COLORADO
(Loveland)
Career/Academic Plan
Contact: Nancy Wear (970) 669-3940 ext. 359
The Thompson R2-J School District took a bold step in education reform by instituting ambitious district standards and assessments seven years ago. The Career/Academic Plan, a K through 16 school-to-work initiative, developed within this reform framework. The plan includes comprehensive counseling, integration of vocational-technical education, skill building in six broad career clusters, tech prep articulation and a certified graduate process that assesses student achievement through well defined benchmarks in the third, fifth, eighth and eleventh grades. Students explore all aspects of an industry through job shadowing, mentoring, paid and unpaid internships, service learning and apprenticeship programs. The district-wide emphasis on high standards has inspired a realignment of the vocational-technical curriculum to meet industry standards in the regional job market.

HAWAII
(Honolulu)
Farrington Health Academy
Contact: Lillian Chang (808) 832-3577
The Farrington Health Academy is a "school within a school" and tech-prep program connecting Hawaii's largest high school, Farrington High, with Kapiolani Community College, and the University of Hawaii (UH) School of Medicine. Other partners include the University of Hawaii community college system, the Hawaii Department of Education, Kaiser Permanente, Queen's Medical Center, and Castle Medical Center. The academy emphasizes high academic and occupational standards and skills including math and science; prepares students with critical thinking and problem solving competencies for lifelong learning, responsible citizenship and productive employment; provides for work-based learning including paid work experience and workplace mentoring; includes school based learning that provides career exploration and career counseling in a career cluster; and offers a sequential program of study that leads to employment and postsecondary education. The academy serves a large number of minority students, including 77 percent of the student body that is Filipino.

IOWA
(Council Bluffs)
General Health Occupations Education
Contact: Colleen Hunt (712) 325-3396
This program focuses the resources of a community college on the region's secondary school population. Iowa Western Community College administers the program, hires the instructors and designs the curriculum for students from area school districts and the local parochial system. The general health occupations education program is also coordinated with the Council Bluffs school district and the community college. Students benefit not only from this secondary and postsecondary partnership, but also from an agreement with an area hospital that offers them non-paid work experience, job shadowing, mentoring and hands-on learning in 16 different areas of the hospital. In the classroom, students keep journals and make presentations on their work experience. The program's benefits for the hospital include positive community relations, recruitment and training of potential employees and improved employee morale. The program strives to eliminate gender stereotyping by providing mentors who are non traditional workers, including a male nurse and a female surgeon.

MASSACHUSETTS
(Springfield)
Mechanical Engineering Technology Program
Contact: John Warner (413) 781-7822 ext. 3427
The Mechanical Engineering Technology Program addresses a skill shortage in the American machine tool industry -- the need for employees trained in advanced computer technologies. This two-year associate degree program provides intensive instruction in computer-assisted drafting and manufacturing to students enrolled at the community college, and works with high school faculty from 12 area high schools to design tech-prep math, science and English courses for over 600 students, ensuring a smooth transition to college level work and enabling students to earn college credits. Co-op placements are a key component, and local business support is strong. One company sponsors students with co-op employment and tuition assistance from high school, to community college, to completion of an engineering degree at an area four-year college. The program is a designated IBM Computer-Integrated Manufacturing Center and has received $2 million in hardware, software and technical support from IBM.

MICHIGAN
(Flint)
Health Science and Medicine Platform
Contact: Jan Dean (810) 760-1444 ext. 176
The Genesee Area Skill Center (GAS) is part of a county-wide school-to-work and tech prep initiative for 21 school districts. The Health Science and Medicine Platform emphasizes the academic excellence, career exploration, mentoring, postsecondary education and work-based learning. Students in the nursing, careers in health, medical assisting and health care services programs progress from the classroom to clinical sites in hospitals, nursing homes, managed care companies and physicians' offices. At the clinical sites, instructors evaluate students daily, and hospital staff give weekly assessments. The clinical sites provide a wide range of career possibilities, particularly for students with physical and mental disabilities. There have been many special needs students, including hearing impaired students, who have successfully completed the program.

NEW JERSEY
(Toms River)
Telecommunications Youth Transitions Program
Contact: Jeanne Andrews (908) 349-8425
This program delivers state-of-the-art high tech skills in the telecommunications industry to students in a school-to-work initiative. Fifty mentors and volunteers from Bell Atlantic help students acquire entry-level skills for employment, as well as the lifelong learning skills needed to chart a career course for the future. Through extended day instruction, work-based learning experiences and a summer work program, students strive to achieve academic competencies that are based on skill standards set by industry. A curriculum called ComLink emphasizes all aspects of the industry, including safety, customer relations, reliability, hand tool training, fiber optics and computer applications. Ocean County Vocational Tech School has a tech-prep partnership with Ocean County College which, in turn, has an agreement with Rutgers University. These partnerships create a telecommunications career path straight to a master's degree.

OKLAHOMA
(Altus)
Agricultural Education/Agri-science Program
Contact: Bruce Farquhar (405) 481-2165
This program is more than 50 years old, yet has managed to stay on the cutting edge of the highly technological agriculture industry. The diverse nature of agriculture, which includes over 200 career areas, demands a curriculum that explores all aspects of the industry. Altus High School's school-to-work transition model uses cooperative teaching, especially among the agriculture, math, English and science departments, to foster student success in the classroom and a variety of work experiences to connect classroom to career. Recently, students started a pork sausage business, owned by student shareholders. In making and selling sausages, students have honed their agriculture and management skills and discovered a real-world motivator -- financial success.

PENNSYLVANIA
(Leesport)
Automotive Technology Program
Contact: Robert Runkle (610) 378-4884
The automotive technology program is part of a county-wide initiative to prepare all students to meet national standards in academics, employability skills and technical competence for successful entry into high-wage employment and postsecondary education. Program partners in business, counseling and teaching make their high expectations clear by integrating the automotive program activities with state academic learning goals and monitoring students' coursetaking patterns to boost the percentage of math, science and English classes in their academic curriculum. Students choose from ten entry-level automotive specialties and pursue higher education through partnerships with seven postsecondary institutions. Six months after graduation, 77 percent of respondents in the class of 1994 were working in the automotive field or enrolled in postsecondary education. The program has earned much industry recognition, with school and teacher of the year awards from Mitsubishi, General Motors and Valvoline.

SOUTH CAROLINA
(Swansea)
Swansea High Tech-Prep Initiative
Contact: Sandra Sarvis (803) 568-1000
This initiative exemplifies systemic reform in vocational education. The general track was eliminated in 1991, so that now all students are encouraged to pursue postsecondary education. In addition, the school has implemented block scheduling and mentoring for every student. In setting high standards for its students, Swansea High has also achieved better results from its staff, with improved curricula, teaching strategies and assessment practices. Students choose from four program areas: allied health services, automotive technology, drafting and business. Programs are coordinated between middle and high school. Results include a 15 percent increase in postsecondary enrollment, a dramatic drop in the pregnancy rate among students and a one percent dropout rate.

TEXAS
(Mercedes)
South Texas High School for Health Professions
Contact: Ronald Schraer (210) 565-2454
A health sciences magnet school known as "Med High," this high school draws students from 28 school districts in a predominantly Hispanic region marked by high unemployment and low educational achievement. A rigorous curriculum and real-world applications in the classroom are combined with dynamic work experiences in hospitals, veterinary clinics, dentists' offices and nursing homes. Staff development is a crucial component, enabling the Med High staff and students to stay on the leading edge of skills for the health professions. Med High teachers participate in 80-90 hours of staff development each year, far more than the state requirement of 20 hours. The school's dropout rate is less than one percent, despite a majority of students who are economically disadvantaged, disabled or limited English proficient. Of the 124 Med High graduates in 1994, 113 are attending college.