Defining Characteristics of Successful Programs | Origin: LC101
This is a general discussion forum for the following learning topic:
Role of CTE in High School Improvement --> Defining Characteristics of Successful Programs
As you think about the characteristics of successful schools, which are the characteristics your school currently exhibits and which are several that you should aspire to?
Take a few minutes to post your response and learn more from your peers.
I support CTE programming across a multi-school network, so when I look at the characteristics of successful schools, I am thinking about the system I support rather than a single building.
What is currently in place:
Human capital is the strongest existing asset. The CTE teachers I work with come from industry — they practiced the trade before they taught it — and that experience translates into instruction students recognize as authentic. Talent acquisition and retention in CTE is harder than in academic content areas, but the teachers who stay are deeply skilled.
Social capital has grown substantially. Our Industry Advisory Council has been restructured so the work is distributed across focused subcommittees covering curriculum, work-based learning, workforce development, and post-secondary pathways. That structure gives schools real access to employers, post-secondary partners, and industry decision-makers, rather than the one-off employer relationships that used to define this work.
Resource capital is uneven but present. Most pathways have functional equipment and dedicated lab space. Some schools have facilities that match or exceed industry standards. Others are still working with equipment that should have been replaced years ago.
What I am working toward:
Programmatic consistency is the largest gap. Some pathways have curriculum maps in teacher feedback. Others are still being built or finalized. Until every pathway has aligned scope and sequence, the student experience varies depending on which school they enrolled in, not which pathway they chose.
Cohesive instruction across CTE and core academic content is the second aspiration. CTE teachers are doing integration well within their own classrooms. The next step is making that integration visible to academic teachers so they pull the same content into algebra, English, and science, rather than treating CTE as a parallel program.
Specialized learning environments at parity across the network is the long-term goal. Two students in the same pathway at different schools can currently have very different access to industry-grade equipment, work-based learning, and certification opportunities. Closing that gap requires sustained capital investment and partnership work. Until it closes, access to high-quality CTE depends too much on which school a student attends.
At my school we have a lot of success but also have a lot we can work on. Every week we have a CTE team meeting and we are very good with our communication, support, respect, compassion, and initiative. We strive to be a great team so we can be what the students needs us to be. I am always looking for ways to help out my teachers with new certs, updated information, and how we can improve or how we can add things into our program to help our students to continue to grow.
Utilizing successful recent graduates has been a very successful strategy. Having them come back, and talk with the current students seems to have an outsized impact on the current students.
As we reflect on the characteristics of successful schools, I believe it’s essential to identify both our strengths and areas for growth. Currently, our school exhibits strong community involvement and a commitment to student engagement. However, we should aspire to enhance our focus on innovative teaching methods and fostering a culture of continuous improvement.
Our school culture is distinguished by the open dialogue and feedback between the staff and administration. TalkSup allows for staff to express concerns directly to the Superintendent without fear of reprisal as no names are used only the issues are addressed. We can do a better job of implementing stretch learning and are in the early phases of making this change. Our Ag classes have joint lessons with our Chemistry and Biology departments. Our English instructors work with our business department to aide students with resume writing. However, we need to place more expectations on all our core courses to expand their PBL with real world scenarios.
Our CTE programs offer stretch engagement for core curriculum that provides real world, hands on learning. Our usage of restorative practices engenders empathy and personal skills.
Culture and climate are the synergy that operates daily with the school. This synergy comes from daily morning get together among all staff for about ten minutes and then every staff member having lunch together. The scheduling of these collaborative teams is made possible because the staff and myself find them valuable.
We currently do an excellent job with school culture and stretch learning in general. Our teachers and staff truly like eachother and enjoy interactions inside and outside of the classroom. We probably need to do a better job of using data schoolwide. Currently we use data fairly well within indiviudual program pathways, however, data pictures for the entire school would help us develop a better understanding of our progress toward developing more well-rounded students with better soft skill development.
Establishing a classroom climate that is inclusive and engaging is key to the success of a CTE program. I think that the challenge lies in moving students from engagement to empowerment- anyone can create activities that will pique students' interests, but moving toward accountability and autonomy in the classroom is the goal. I liked the suggestion to have students record themselves presenting and then review their work with a rubric.
Greenvlle High exhibits the characteristic of teamwork: we promote the idea of global learners working together towards common goals while respecting each other's individuality.
Relationship building has seen an increased focus this year although it's been a part of our values for awhile. Increasing collaboration between subject teachers and collaboration across subject areas also a focus this year
Our core team takes great pride in strong relationships and trust with each other. We spend time at work and outside of work hours to get to know each other and collaborate when possible. We could certainly do better and understanding each other's strengths and capitalizing on those when working on projects.
Something that is successful in my school is the relationships that teachers and administration have with students and vice versa. Something that I think we could do a better job of is the relationship with administration and teachers. Open communication, support, being genuinely curious and involved in what is happening in the classroom. I love going into the different CTE classes to see what is happening and how the kids are interacting with the teachers.
