This website contains a report based on a study that tested a model for enhancing mathematics instruction in five high school CTE programs (agriculture, auto technology, business/ marketing, health, and information technology). The model consisted of a specific pedagogy and intense teacher professional development.

This paper provides examples of schools that are successfully combining academic and career technical education, and reviews evidence from numerous studies of the student outcomes produced by combining college and career preparation strategies. The evidence, although incomplete, indicates that combining technical and academic curricula can give relevance to high school coursework and increase student motivation while simultaneously preparing students for college and careers.

In 1993, MDRC began a rigorous evaluation of nine high schools to study the Career Academy approach to school reform. Based on survey data from more than 1,400 young people, this report describes how Career Academies affected students’ prospects in the labor market and in postsecondary education programs after their expected graduation from high school.

This 7-page issue brief examines how career technical education can be used to re-engage students and prevent dropouts. This brief explains how quality career technical education can increase student engagement, create positive relationships, and provide relevance to high school education to reduce dropouts.

With California gaining access to nearly $400 million in 2007 for career technical education (CTE), the Little Hoover Commission draws on testimony from public hearings, expert advisory committees, and school visits to make recommendations for improving and expanding California’s CTE programs. It recommends evaluating and replicating successful programs, increasing collaboration between educators and industry leaders, and addressing the lack of qualified CTE teachers. The report also outlines evidence that academically challenging CTE increases student engagement, achievement, and employability skills.

This report presents the results of several researchers’ examination of the graduation rates of students within California, in an attempt to accurately calculate the proportion of ninth graders who graduate “on time” four years later. Various methodologies are applied, and overall rates are disaggregated by race/ethnicity, major school districts, and selected schools within the Los Angeles Unified School District.

This website contains a report, prepared by the Academy for Educational Development, National Institute for Work and Learning (NIWL), on curriculum integration models used to assess the quality of integration-related reforms at the classroom level. The report also documents best practices for promoting desired student outcomes and describes the study findings.

This website presents a report based on a study that used National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 (NLSY:97) data to examine participation in vocational education (now known as CTE) for a recent cohort of youths. The study found that while participation in career-related programs does not generally impede college attendance, higher ratios of CTE-to-academic courses are associated with reductions in the chances of college attendance, even after adjusting for selected characteristics often associated with course trajectories.

Available on this website is a report in which data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1997 were used to examine the association between the CTE-to-academic-coursetaking ratio and the likelihood of dropping out.

This website contains the fourth annual report from a five-year longitudinal project that examines diverse and promising programs for integrating CTE with whole-school reform in schools that serve predominantly disadvantaged students. With respect to English, students from the study schools fared better than students from the control schools. Science results were more mixed, but generally favored students from the study schools.

Released by the National High School Center, this brief summarizes methods of raising student achievement and graduation rates. MDRC studies of high school programs such as Career Academies, Talent Development High Schools, First Things First, and Project Grad form the foundation of this brief.

This report, available on the SREB website, examines three basic questions: What progress has been made in raising the achievement of vocational students to national averages or higher? What things matter in raising student achievement? What actions can states take to improve high schools for students in vocational programs?

This website presents a paper that illustrates the use of a strict standard for evaluating evidence on programs and strategies designed to improve outcomes for high school students. It explains what is meant by “solid evidence,” presents examples from multi-site evaluations of three programs, examines evidence on high school size, and explains why clear inferences about cause and effect remain elusive. The report concludes by recommending more rigorous evaluation and provides a programmatic suggestion.

This 28-page report identifies actions that states, districts, and schools can take to increase collaboration between secondary and postsecondary education systems that will improve student transitions from high school to college and career. The report draws on information from 15 state forums with more than 500 education stakeholders considering methods for improving student transitions in their respective states.

This report presents the results of an evaluation focusing on the first five Philadelphia high schools to use the Talent Development model. In these schools, model implementation included creating small learning communities, modifying the schedule to include longer blocks of time, offering “double doses” of math and English, and developing a Freshman Seminar class. The evaluation followed 20 cohorts of ninth-grade students for up to four years and provides evidence that Talent Development produced positive results in student attendance, credit attainment, and promotion to successive grades.

This website contains links to all of MDRC’s seminal reports on career academies. In 1993, MDRC began conducting the Career Academies Evaluation, a 10-year longitudinal study of career academies in nine schools across the country. The random assignment evaluation included more than 1,700 eighth- and ninth-grade students—half assigned to a career academy and half enrolled in another high school program.

This collection of 15 papers presents the results of a collaboration between UCLA and scholars throughout California to study Multiple Pathways—a new approach to prepare high school students for both college and career, and full involvement in civic life. Multiple Pathways are intended to provide students with many programmatic choices based on students’ interests and the strengths and the opportunities present in their communities and would, therefore, differ in their size, curriculum, organization, on- and off-campus offerings, and connections with colleges and business and industry. In addition to identifying the promise and challenges of Multiple Pathways, the UCLA studies provide a solid policy agenda and set of recommendations.