Addressing equity in middle-skills jobs is essential for the growth of the nation’s businesses, economy and workers. In order to advance racial equity, the National Skills Coalition recommends nine steps that states can take to increase the diversity in the workforce. These recommendations include adopting racial equity goals; investing in local infrastructure, technical assistance and guidance; providing support services; developing stackable credentials; removing barriers to educational entry; and utilizing industry and business partnerships to advance racial equity.
The report presents several recommendations specific to CTE. The first recommendation is to include racial equity goals in the new Perkins V state plans. The publication encourages states to build on federal requirements by adding specific goals for racial equity through access and outcomes measures. Other recommendations include increasing funding for classes that contextualize English language learning within CTE, increasing the diversity and inclusion practices of industry and business partnerships, and helping students find a career path more quickly. To achieve this, secondary CTE programs should combine high school credentials with postsecondary, industry-recognized credentials. Schools and programs need to invest more and increase technical assistance to enhance diversity and inclusion to achieve success.
Perkins V also addresses racial equity through the comprehensive local needs assessment (CLNA), for which local recipients must review their data to find and address equity gaps for a number of students groups, including by race and ethnicity. Additionally, local recipients and states must report data disaggregated by gender, race and ethnicity, and special population status for federal accountability purposes.
To support CLNA, ACTE has developed a local guide to CLNA, which includes guiding questions to ask, materials to review and stakeholders to consult as part of evaluating the root causes of access and performance gaps and developing strategies to increase access and equity in CTE programs. In addition, Access and Equity is one of the 12 elements of high-quality CTE in ACTE’s Quality CTE Program of Study Framework. Our related High-quality CTE Tools online library includes resources ranging from toolkits to reports, addressing topics such as inclusivity in promotional materials and strategies for equity gap and root cause analysis.
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