This document provides both state-specific and nationwide resources related to career and technical education (CTE), career exploration, and postsecondary education and training, including application procedures, enrollment, financing, and students' projected educational, employment and earnings outcomes. It includes checklists that students,…

The past decade has seen a resurgence of interest in career and technical education (CTE) as a way to engage students, help people build the skills necessary to succeed in a technologically advanced economy, and meet employer demand for workers. MDRC--which has a three-decade history of developing and evaluating CTE programs, including a landmark…

This book disrupts the false dichotomy of college versus career by showing how young people and the programs created to serve them integrate the worlds of college and career readiness as students work to learn against the odds and strive toward lives that matter to them. Work-based learning at each stage of the K-college experience is crucial to…

Based on work with state and local education agencies in dropout prevention for students with disabilities, successful research-based interventions are described along with details of how these interventions have been implemented in middle and high schools across the country. The interventions that have helped students with disabilities graduate…

This evidence guide provides detailed research summaries on the effectiveness of specific afterschool programs for improving outcomes for students in grades K-12. The purpose of the guide is to present information that education agencies, afterschool providers, and others can use as they make decisions about afterschool programming. The guide is a…

This article describes a novel approach for introducing 4-H to non-traditional/diverse audiences using 4-H Food Challenge. Set in a low SES and minority-serving rural school, Food Challenge was presented during the school day to all 7th grade students, with almost half voluntarily participating in an after-school club component. Program design…

Many policymakers, curriculum specialists, teachers and administrators, bloggers and other commentators have raised serious questions about the Common Core State Standards. One set of questions asks whether states and districts have the money for professional development, curriculum materials, planning time, and other logistics that would be…

Middle grades educators may wonder how they can impact students' progress toward postsecondary success and career readiness. They may feel inadequately prepared to foster the knowledge and skill development students need to prepare for postsecondary success in the 21st century, especially for at-risk students (Legum & Hoare, 2004). In…

The current mission mandates of the National 4-H Headquarters are Citizenship, Healthy Living, and Science. Robotics programs are excellent in fulfilling the Science mandate. Robotics engages students in STEM (Science, Engineering, Technology, and Mathematics) fields by providing interactive, hands-on, minds-on, cross-disciplinary learning…

In order to best prepare the U.S. workforce, schools need to focus on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education. However, given the current educational climate of reduced school funding, high teacher turnover, and increasing student diversity, the public school system simply cannot do this alone. This is where businesses…

Dramatic changes in the labor market in the United States over the past 50 years have raised tremendous concern that many of the nation's youth are unprepared for the labor force. Policymakers and youth advocates are looking for strategies to improve the education system so that fewer youth drop out of high school and more have the skills and…

"Next Generation Science Standards" identifies the science all K-12 students should know. These new standards are based on the National Research Council's "A Framework for K-12 Science Education." The National Research Council, the National Science Teachers Association, the American Association for the Advancement of Science,…

The general education curriculum comprises more than just the academic courses students take. The wide range of extracurricular clubs, sports teams, performing arts programs, student government positions, career development activities, service-learning projects, and other school-sponsored activities offered in middle and high schools provide a…

Out-of-school time (OST) science programs, such as the Lang Science Program, play an important role in influencing the trajectory of science learning for many young people. OST programs are especially important for students from groups underrepresented in science, who, more often than not, attend schools with inadequate science education…

California's education system--the largest in the United States--is an essential resource for ensuring strong economic growth in the state. The Career Technical Education Pathways Initiative (the Initiative) became law in 2005 with Senate Bills 70 and 1133 and provided more than $380 million over eight years to improve career technical education…