Building career tech programs into career academies: in Manatee County, Florida, not only did they build career tech programs into career academies, but they also developed an evaluation process to ensure these career academies were credible.

Educators in Manatee County, Fla., are serious about establishing small learning communities within their high schools. In Manatee, career and technical education (CTE) is at the forefront of this movement. Key figures are Doug Warner, director for adult, career and technical education, Angie Grasberger, career and technical education counselor, and Trish Litton, secondary vocational specialist. They realize that, to grow and prosper, CTE needs to become more academically centered. So in this county, career academies have the full support of the CTE leadership.

In fact, all eight of the career academies in Manatee County have evolved from career tech programs over the last eight years. During this period, Warner's team provided modest challenge grants to high schools in the district that wanted to bring their CTE programs into career academies. Each participating school formed a team of academic and CTE teachers, integrated contextual lessons into the academic curriculum and got support from the master schedule in building their small learning communities.

But Manatee County didn't stop there. Last year, Warner authorized funding to evaluate the six career academies in the county.

"You can't just say, 'I'm going to have an academy,' and put a sign on the wall," Warner explains. "There really needs to be some integrity behind it when you say you have an academy."

The District Academic Team created the "Documentation of Academy Assessment Criteria" with 12 core components and a rubric that helps evaluators determine the level of mastery of each component. Board members of the National Career Academy Coalition (NCAC) were asked to help evaluate the Manatee Academies, and the NCAC board welcomed this opportunity.

"If a school's career academy is evaluated and shows itself proficient, it should have higher graduation rates, higher GPAs, increased attendance and more students going on to postsecondary education," according to Rick Delano, a businessman on the board of NCAC. "Having regular evaluations will help everyone involved--school leadership, advisory boards and the career academy team--identify areas of improvement."

The January 2004 evaluation determined that four of the six academies were indeed academies and that the other two were programs. The two programs were informed that they had to remove the name academy from their title. This was a difficult decision that the district made, but it shows their commitment to excellence.

The district also made the resolution that the academies would be re-evaluated each year with the expectation that improvements to the academies would show up in the evaluations. Thus, "No Child Left Behind" is more than rhetoric in Manatee County.

Following this initial evaluation, the Manatee "evaluation rubric" has found a national following and evolved accordingly. An informal group of career academy veterans who call themselves simply "Career Academy Conversations" got involved. They used the Manatee rubric as the basis for the new, nationally recognized evaluation tool.

This group is composed of all the national groups that support career academies and smaller learning communities, including the Association for Career and Technical Education (ACTE), the Career Academy Support Network, the National Academy Foundation, the National Career Academy Coalition, High Schools That Work, the Institute for Educational Leadership, the American Youth Policy Forum and Talent Development at John Hopkins University.

In January 2005, the evaluation teams returned to Manatee County armed with the original rubric and the new national document. One team consisted of Rick Delano, who has visited hundreds of academies across the country and assisted the business community in supporting these programs, and Sandy Mittelsteadt, an educator with almost 20 years of academy experience, who is also an educational liaison with ACTE and one of the co-authors of The Career Academy Toolkit: A Think It Through, Get It Going, and Make It Happen Planning Guide for Career Academies and Small Learning Communities.

This year's evaluation indicated that all of the four academies visited by this team had improved. One of the four was rated a three (the highest rating) on the national rubric, one was rated a two, and two were rated a one. The academy rated a three was Bayshore Business Academy, the academy rated a two was the Medical Arts and Sciences Academy at Manatee High School, and the two academies rated a one were the Early Education Academy and the Agriscience Academy at Palmetto High School.

The program that had to remove the name "academy" from its title in 2004 may now proudly add that name again to the title. In addition, three new academies have been added to bring the total number of "true academies" in Manatee County to eight.

"True academies foster a close-knit atmosphere, a safe environment where academic and career and technical education teachers share in the education of students," states Grasberger. "These academy students receive the best education possible, one that is real-world and hands-on."

ACTE is pleased to have had a part in helping Manatee County raise the bar, ensuring that no child would be left behind.

For more information contact Sandy Mittelsteadt at [e-mail].

Career Academy/Smaller Learning Community Model

The Career Academy /Smaller Learning Community Model includes:

* small, safe and supportive learning environments that are personalized and inclusive of all students;

* challenging, rigorous and relevant curricula that prepares students for college, careers and productive citizenship; and

* collaborative partnerships among educators, parents, businesses and other community resources that broaden learning opportunities.

ACTE's COP for Career Academies and Smaller Learning Communities

ACTE is proud to announce the Community of Practice for Career Academies and Smaller Learning Communities. This is an online forum that allows ACTE members to network, learn about career academies/smaller learning communities, and discuss current issues and concerns.

ACTE has developed within its organizational Web structure a way to accommodate members interested in this field and to promote a more active way for them to connect and tap into their collective body of professional knowledge. In fact, this is a one-stop professional practice resource where members can learn from one another.

The online forum allows for threaded discussion forums, chat rooms, access to, news and most importantly, entrance to an online body of knowledge from practitioners. ACTE invites you to join the Community of Practice for Career Academies and Smaller Learning Communities. For more information, visit http://cop.acteonline.org/cop.

RELATED ARTICLE: How the standards of practice led to the development of the evaluation tool.

It is worth noting that, for the past several years, the "conversations" group has been discussing the phenomenal growth of career academies/smaller learning communities. In fact, the U.S. Department of Education estimates that 24 percent of all high schools in America have a career academy. Those in the career academy movement know that many of these academies are academies in name only, as it is the popular trend to have a career academy on the school campus.

Concerned that the "name only" academies would deflate the prestige of the career academies that were truly making a difference in the lives of students, the "conversations" group decided to create an evaluation document to assess career academies. They understood that setting the benchmark would force academies and smaller learning communities to beef up their activities and instruction to meet the standards of practice.

The document, National Standards of Practice for Career Academies, is intended to help educators and other interested persons analyze and provide a thorough and accurate portrait of an academy. Ten key components with three or more sub-criteria help the evaluation team assess how well the career academy is being implemented and its effectiveness and weaknesses. This document was released December 1, 2004, at a press conference in Washington, D.C.

The National Standards are crucial to the evaluation; this document is not a tool that evaluators can use to decide the level of the academy's mastery of successful implementation. As a practitioner at the local level, Angle Grasberger immediately recognized the need of a rubric based on the National Standards of Practice. She used the rubric she helped develop for Manatee County and cross-walked it to the National Standards to create the new rubric. This rubric was used for the first time at the beginning of February to evaluate the four career academies in Manatee County.