Career Education Curriculum, History Of

Differing conceptions of desirable goals for secondary education persisted during the 1960s and into the 1970s. A differing conception of goals for secondary education curricular studies was characteristic of the back-to-basics advocates of the 1970s. They saw the goals of schools as teaching the three R's supplemented by formal teaching of separate subject matter content. Their views often reflected their predecessors', who conceived of secondary education as a vehicle for meeting college entrance requirements. Another major group of critics of education during this period focused on the high school in particular and advocated a marked increase in the use of the community in secondary education. The committees and commissions that supported reforms of secondary education in the mid-1970s stressed community-conscious schooling, new transitions to adulthood, and less time on academic instruction. The sponsors reflected earlier emphases on vocational [Page 100]curriculum and community participation. Their emphasis on the socially useful was similar to that fostered by the U.S. Office of Education during the 1970s—career education. Sidney P. Marland, former U.S. Commissioner of Education, pointed out that career education has had a long and honorable ancestry, dating back to Benjamin Franklin's advocacy of more useful education. Career education advocates urged that schools' curricula orient and equip young people to earn a living in a personally significant and satisfying career field. However, they contended that more than vocational education was needed; career education should be an integral part of general curricular study by young people in all courses throughout both elementary and secondary school years.

Career education has become one of the most diversified program areas in the secondary school. Often referred to today as career pathways, a quick glance at the program areas of concentration under the career education rubric of a secondary school illustrates that diversity: agriculture; architecture, construction, communications, and transportation; business and computer science; culinary arts; education; engineering and technology; family and consumer sciences; healthcare science; marketing, sales, and service. Under each of these program areas exists a number of varied courses.

In 1974, career education received its first official federal dollars, as part of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act Amendments. Even though the allocations were not earmarked for program implementation, approximately $40 million was spent supporting career education initiatives at over 400 sites throughout the country. The U.S. Office of Education had finally made career education a priority. In 1976, another focus on career education with a number of guided research studies laid the groundwork for today's school-to-work planning.

Although career education was a curriculum model originally proposed for the total school program, it has been more widely accepted by vocationally oriented subject areas. Within career education, two of the four career education models developed by the U.S. Office of Education have been used. These are the school-based model developed at the Center for Vocational and Technical Education at the Ohio State University and the employer-based model developed jointly by the Far West Laboratory for Educational Research and Development in San Francisco.

In the school-based model, there are eight areas of educational experience that form the basic conceptual elements of career education: career awareness, self-awareness, appreciations and attitudes, decision-making skills, economic awareness, beginning competency, employability skills, and educational awareness. These eight elements were then translated to eight educational outcomes. Primary among these were career identity, self-identity, employment skills, and career placement. Career educators have used this model in their attempts to blend together student pressures for self-fulfillment and business's demand for a skilled workforce. The model lends itself both to the general education function and to the preparation of students for postsecondary schooling.

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