The Role of Leadership | Origin: LC101
This is a general discussion forum for the following learning topic:
Role of CTE in High School Improvement --> The Role of Leadership
What are the leadership actions which would facilitate closer collaboration among CTE and other teachers?
Take a few minutes to post your response and learn more from your peers.
Leadership is the variable that determines whether CTE-academic integration becomes a schoolwide practice or remains isolated in individual teacher initiative. Teachers can create strong examples on their own, but those examples rarely scale without leadership creating the conditions for the work to become routine.
The first condition is protected planning time. This is the most concrete structural lever. When CTE and academic teachers have shared time in the master schedule, collaboration becomes part of the instructional system rather than an extra task. Without that time, integration depends on informal relationships, personal bandwidth, and whichever teachers are willing to coordinate outside the normal workday.
Leadership also has to position CTE as part of school improvement, not as an adjacent program. If principals and district leaders consistently connect CTE to academic achievement, attendance, student engagement, and postsecondary readiness, academic teachers are more likely to see CTE as part of the school’s instructional strategy. That framing has to show up in faculty meetings, improvement plans, data conversations, and the way outcomes are reported.
Another important leadership move is creating expectations for cross-departmental design. This does not mean forcing every teacher into artificial collaboration. It means identifying places where the connection is authentic and building from there: geometry with construction, technical writing with welding, data analysis with manufacturing, physics with engineering. The goal is not integration for its own sake. The goal is stronger learning because students are applying academic skills in a context where those skills matter.
Shared metrics matter as well. If schools look at attendance, credit accumulation, graduation progress, credential attainment, and postsecondary outcomes as separate CTE and academic data points, the work stays divided. When leaders use those metrics as shared indicators of student success, teachers can see that they are working toward the same outcomes from different instructional entry points.
Finally, leadership has to address status and resource gaps. CTE teachers need equal access to professional development, planning support, instructional coaching, conference opportunities, and leadership pathways. If CTE is treated as useful but peripheral, integration will feel like something academic teachers are being asked to “help with” rather than a shared instructional responsibility.
The question I am still working through is whether integration is more sustainable when it begins through formal structures or through teacher relationships. My current view is that relationships make the work better, but structure is what makes it scalable. Without protected time, shared expectations, and visible leadership support, even strong collaboration tends to stay local instead of becoming part of the school’s instructional culture.
I love the idea of Gen Ed teachers and CTE teacher's co-planning/teaching so that students can get that knowledge and better understanding with the hands-on experience.
Comment on Margaret Coate's post: I love the idea of co-teaching opportunities!!
Most schools would benefit from having teachers cross teach with CTE educators using their topic. This benefits both parties.
As we strive to foster closer collaboration between our Career and Technical Education (CTE) program and other teaching areas, I believe we can implement several leadership actions. These may include organizing joint planning sessions, encouraging co-teaching opportunities, and establishing regular communication channels for sharing resources and best practices.
Leadership action steps:
- Create time in schedules to allow collaboration amongst CTE and Gen Ed teachers.
- Hi lite successes noted in CTE and gen Ed teachers' collaborations to all staff, the board and community.
- Establish expectations among administrative team to support efforts of collaboration.
- All PD days should include sessions on how to incorporate CTE into the Gen Ed classroom
My district is a comprehensive K-12 Dsitrict. We have begun several cohorts centered around PBL and Pathways. One way leadership works to ensure collaboration between teachers of all content areas is to select teachers to be a part of these cohorts from each area. During meetings we create seating charts where CTE teachers are pair with teachers from other content areas.
At my middle school, we are given the freedom to horizontally plan with core teachers. Often this type of plan is extraordinarily difficult or hard to manage as alignment isn’t perfect. Still the results can be very fruitful.
Permitting time for academic and CTE instructors to work on a joint student project together would be very benificial to the process. Students would learn how to apply concepts while also experiencing authentic workplace applications.
At our school we have started by building a culture of collaboartion first. We share PD expereinces whenever it is appropriate and we get togther for shared staff parties and celebrations. Being togther helps teachers work togther.
I'm intruiged by the statistic about "summer melt" and I am wondering how many of those students eventually attended a post-secondary institution. I think there is a lot of value in the "gap year" and hope to see it become more accepted, but I wonder if there is data indicating that taking a year off between high school and college can create a barrier to post-secondary attendance.
The leadership actions that could foster c;oser collaboration of CTE and teacher is creating opportunities for CTE, teachers, and administrators to work together on a schoolwide project that will help promote social emotion learning and vultural awareness.
collaboration between content areas, incorporating the relevance for students in core classes with how information is used in real world situations, using data to make gains towards the end result of being college/career ready...horizontal leadership rather than vertical provides a sense of ownership and team building which can make for stronger programs...
My schools have a long way to go in terms of collaboration with CTE and core. There is some effort being made, but there is still a lot of 'siloing' and folks working alone. We could beneift the student learning and engagement by working more together!
I think that my school district does a great job of allowing the CTE teachers and academic teachers time to collaborate. We have 6 scheduled collaborations for all teachers and then monthly collaboration for just the CTE teachers. I think the curriculum (common core) tries to help the academic teachers bring in real-life experiences into their classrooms and this helps the CTE because for those students we can show them.
