As the nation’s
economy has moved beyond mass production toward the information age,
the demands of the workplace have also evolved. These changes have
created a new role for education, especially career and technical
education. In an effort to address these, the National Association
of State Directors for Career Technical Education (NASDCTE)
Consortium assumed the lead in supporting the development of a set
of "career clusters" and pathways that could be used to create a
student’s academic map to success.
In
1999, the Office of Vocational and Adult Education (OVAE)
released a list of
career clusters
developed by using industrial
and
occupational approaches. This seemed the
logical method because there are professions that are not industry
specific and must be grouped by occupation.
The 16 career
clusters include:
-
Agriculture,
Food & Natural Resources
-
Architecture
& Construction
-
Arts, A/V
Technology & Communications
-
Business,
Management & Administration
-
Education &
Training
-
Finance
-
Government &
Public Administration
-
Health
Science
-
Hospitality
& Tourism
-
Human Services
-
Information
Technology
-
Law, Public
Safety, Corrections & Security
-
Manufacturing
-
Marketing,
Sales & Service
-
Science,
Technology, Engineering & Mathematics
-
Transportation, Distribution & Logistics
Each of the 16
career clusters encompasses a large number of career opportunities
related to that field. An individual student’s career pathway can
easily be designed by identifying career possibilities and the
skills necessary for the student’s eventual success.
The strengths of the Career Connections series are
many. The most obvious features are those related to career
exploration. Each Career Pathway Unit engages students in
interactive, research-based activities and projects. These
experiences give students the feeling of being involved in the
career field they are studying.
Because CPUs can be grouped in a laboratory setting or used
stand-alone in a classroom, applications are unlimited. Now physics
teachers can implement the Aerodynamics
and Structural Engineering
CPUs to supplement their curriculum, or business education teachers
might want to add a couple of stand-alone stations to introduce
computer repair or
networking. When implementing
the Career Clusters Initiative, career exploration and related skill
development should be intertwined throughout the entire curriculum
and in every content area. Career Pathway Units provide a simple,
proven solution to address those careers and occupations not easily
addressed before.
The chart displayed below identifies correlations of CPUs to the 16
Career Clusters identified by the Office of Vocational and Adult
Education. In some cases, CPUs represent specific career fields, and
in some cases they represent occupations that may reside under
multiple cluster areas. For instance, notice that most information
technology related CPUs belong under every career cluster. Each
cluster contains careers that require, at the very least, some IT
skills. Click the chart for a larger version.
