By William C. Symonds and Lisa Gonzales

Even as the nation is slowly recovering from the deepest recession since the Great Depression, another problem threatens the long-term health of the U.S. economy. We call it the “forgotten half challenge.” Today, we are failing to prepare millions of our young adults to succeed in the 21st century economy. Unless we find more effective ways to educate and equip this forgotten half population, we will face a more difficult future, with diminished economic prospects and a society in which the American Dream is increasingly out of reach for millions.

This problem is especially pronounced in California. Ironically, as the global capital of high technology, the Golden State helped power the extraordinary boom America enjoyed until recently. Yet this economic success – fueled in good measure by the ability of firms like Cisco, Google and Intel to attract the very best graduates from around the world – stands in sharp contrast to an alarming deterioration in California’s schools and colleges. California ranks near the bottom on the “Nation’s Report Card," the National Assessment of Educational Progress.

In fourth-grade math, for instance, California students came in 44th among the 50 states and the District of Columbia (Baldi et al., 2007). According to the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, California falls below the U.S. average – and far below the top five states – in the percentage of young adults who earn a high school degree (Lee et al., 2007).

Moreover, the budget cuts forced by the recession have hit the state’s community college system hard, reducing its affordability. As a result, California now lags the nation in the percentage of students who complete a post-secondary degree. Indeed, even in San Jose – at the very heart of Silicon Valley – a stunning 56 percent of public high school graduates do not continue on to college (Johnson, 2009).

In an economy in which education has never been more important to economic success, meeting the forgotten half challenge is clearly a huge imperative for California’s school administrators. If we want today’s students to prosper as adults, we must find ways to substantially increase the numbers who complete a meaningful post-secondary degree or credential, and who master the 21st century skills needed to succeed in today’s economy.

Fortunately, a new approach is emerging that shows real promise in meeting this challenge. The approach is based on the belief that high school students must be offered “multiple pathways” to post-secondary education, careers, and a successful adulthood. In this article, we’ll take a closer look at the multiple pathways movement, and how school administrators might employ its principles to help more students succeed.

The emergence of the forgotten half challenge

The challenges we face today stand in sharp contrast to the extraordinary gains we made in educational attainment during the 20th century. In 1910, fewer than 15 percent of Americans over age 25 had a high school degree (Douglass, 2000). By the 1980s, more than 75 percent of adults had a high school diploma, a five-fold increase (National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education, 2008).

Similarly, thanks in good measure to the GI Bill, the percentage of adults with a bachelor’s degree more than quadrupled between 1940 and the 1980s. These gains helped the U.S. emerge as the world leader in educational attainment.

California helped spearhead these gains. Indeed, by the 1970s, California’s K-12 system was widely considered one of the best in the nation. California long led the nation in viewing higher education as a critical tool to promote economic mobility and growth. California was a pioneer in providing access to a community college system that grew to become the world’s largest system of higher education, serving 2.8 million students.

But in recent years, the U.S. has surrendered this leadership. We now have one of the highest high school dropout rates in the industrialized world. Because so many American college students fail to complete their degrees, we have also slipped behind many nations in college attainment. Just over half of four-year college students manage to earn a degree in six years, and at community colleges, just 29 percent earn a degree in a timely fashion. As a result, we have now fallen to 18th among the advanced nations in college graduation rates, down from first in 1995 (OECD, 2008).

At the same time, there is a growing consensus that today’s high schools are obsolete, often failing to equip students with the skills they need to succeed in the 21st century. “Even many of our best schools don’t teach the new survival skills our children need,” argues Tony Wagner in his book, “The Global Achievement Gap." That is also the warning sounded by the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, which includes such prominent California corporations as Apple, Adobe, Intel and Oracle.

If we don’t act to reverse these trends, many of our young adults – not to mention the broader economy – are likely to face an increasingly difficult future. In fact, that’s already happening. Workers under 30 have borne nearly half of the net employment losses since the recession began in late 2007, according to the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University (Sum, 2009).

The Center calculates that in April, a staggering 37 percent of 16-19 year olds were either unemployed or otherwise underutilized, and that 26 percent of 20-24 year olds were in the same boat, far higher than any other age groups. For instance, 13 percent of 45-54 year olds were unemployed or otherwise underutilized. Clearly, we need more effective programs and policies to meet this challenge.

Forging multiple pathways to prosperity

Even after decades of efforts to “reform” our schools, our existing approach is obviously failing many students. Despite the often-heard mantra of “college for all,” only 30 percent of young adults have acquired a bachelor's degree by age 27, meaning that the vast majority fail to reach this standard.

To be sure, we don’t believe that all young adults need to earn a bachelor's degree. But in today’s global economy, most will need a meaningful post-secondary degree or credential. Yet among today’s 27-year-olds, 42 percent have only a high-school degree or less (U.S. Census Bureau, 2008). Clearly, most of them will face very limited employment prospects.

A more promising strategy for improving attainment is to offer young adults “multiple pathways” to success. Gary Hoachlander, president of ConnectEd: The California Center for College and Career, is a leader of this movement. He argues that high quality career technical education is vitally important in reaching students who aren’t thriving in a strictly academic setting.

But Hoachlander draws a sharp distinction between conventional CTE and the 21st century “multiple pathway” approach. While CTE has often been confined to a cluster of four or five courses students take to earn their diplomas, he argues we need a much more integrated approach, in which students complete a rigorous academic core that will prepare them for post-secondary education, and high academic standards are woven into the vocational curriculum (James Irvine Foundation, 2006).

Work-based learning is a vital component of the multiple pathway strategy. The learning directly addresses the most important reason high school students drop out: the feeling that school is boring and irrelevant to their future.

Not surprisingly, the best such programs increase student engagement and attendance, raise high school graduation rates, and encourage persistence into post-secondary education. At the same time, these programs provide invaluable instruction in 21st century skills, as well as meaningful connections to the adult world of work. In fact, the wide availability of vocational education is a major reason why many European countries have leapfrogged the U.S. in educational attainment.

As the name implies, the multiple pathway movement believes students should be offered a system of options and choices, with career education ranging from business to engineering and health care. The key to success is insisting that these programs meet high-quality standards.

Unfortunately, many traditional CTE programs have long been plagued by low academic standards, poor teaching, vocational instruction that is out of date and other problems. But in recent years, a number of promising programs have emerged that offer what we might dub “21st century CTE.”

In late June 2009, the Illinois State Board of Education and the Illinois Business Roundtable convened a summit to explore such 21st century pathway and reform models. The summit stressed the quickest way to achieve meaningful reform is to scale models that have proven successful. Following the summit, several districts – including Chicago Public Schools – agreed to take the lead in scaling up these models.

A similar approach has enormous potential in California. Indeed, four of the six high-school reform models embraced in Illinois are already active in California. They include the Napa-based New Technology High School, the National Academy Foundation, Project Lead the Way and High Schools that Work. All require students to meet rigorous academic standards, even as they provide career-focused programs of study, far more career guidance, and real-world connection with business or other external partners.

These 21st century models also require the active involvement of local business partners, who do everything from offering guidance on curriculum to providing internships, mentoring and opportunities for students to get work experience. In other words, the models assume that the job to prepare young adults for the future doesn’t rest on schools and colleges alone – but rather is a responsibility that must be shared with business and other major employers.

Teaching 21st century skills

The new models also demonstrate how students can be taught the critical 21st century skills. New Technology High School, a model that first opened its doors in Napa in 1996, was created after local business leaders insisted students be prepared for the "New Economy." Students are expected to master eight “learning outcomes,” including technological literacy, oral and written communication, critical thinking, collaboration and ethics. In Napa, students must also complete four courses at Napa Valley College, thus proving they are college ready.

This model has now grown into a network of more than 40 schools across nine states. And in California, New Tech High Schools stretch from Sacramento to Los Angeles.

Meanwhile, in San Diego, High Tech High has also become a national model for teaching 21st century skills. In sharp contrast to most American high schools, High Tech High focuses on teaching students the competencies they will need to succeed, rather than force-feeding the factual “content” they need to pass required tests.

Now a network of charter schools, High Tech High requires students to complete internships and to present digital portfolios of their work to teachers and other adults. And even though admission is non-selective, so far 100 percent of graduates have been accepted to college (Wagner, 2008).

High quality career tech education

The National Academy Foundation – which operates more than 40 career academies in California, and some 500 nationally – offers dramatic evidence of how a pathways approach can increase students’ success as adults. NAF currently offers high school students academies focused on four career themes: finance, hospitality and tourism, information technology and engineering. In addition to taking rigorous courses geared to these themes, students must complete a paid internship that typically lasts six to 10 weeks.

More than 90 percent of NAF students graduate from high school, and most go on to college. Perhaps most impressive, a long-term study of career academies (including NAF) conducted by MDRC found that graduates earned 11 percent more than students who were not enrolled in academies (Orr et al., 2004). The gains were even greater for young men. NAF believes there is enormous potential to expand its academies in California.

Many California high schools are eager to prepare students for careers in the state’s burgeoning high-technology industry. Project Lead the Way offers schools an exceptionally strong national curriculum in engineering and biomedical sciences. Since 1997, PLTW has enjoyed explosive growth, and is now offered in some 3,000 schools, including more than 150 in California.

“Students taking PLTW learn to identify problems, create solutions and test their results using hands-on, project-based learning,” says Duane Crum, California state director for PLTW. What’s more, thanks to excellent professional development, it’s easy for new schools to begin offering PLTW (PLTW, 2008).

Perhaps no company has done more to prepare young adults for tech careers than Cisco, through its Networking Academies. Cisco now has more than 2,000 academies across the country, including more than 170 in California. These academies offer high quality instruction in information technology, math and other competentics over an e-learning platform that students can access 24/7.

In July, President Obama cited Cisco as a premier example of how companies can help “create programs that match curricula in the classroom with the needs of the boardroom … preparing students for jobs ranging from work in broadband to health IT” (White House, 2009).

The critical role of community colleges

Though Cisco offers Networking Academies in high schools, the program is even larger at the community college level. In California, for instance, 57 percent of its Academy students are enrolled in community colleges (Cisco, 2009). This demonstrates how successful pathways must extend from high school into community colleges and beyond.

The need for more such pathways was underscored by the Public Policy Institute of California in its recent report, “Closing the Gap” (Johnson & Segupta, 2009). That report warned, “If current trends continue, California will have one million fewer college graduates than it needs in 2025.” The report added that this “represents a serious impediment to an economically successful future for the state,” and could lead to “substantial declines in per-capita income in California.”

Community colleges are critically important in meeting this challenge, since they serve 58 percent of all college students in California, more than in all but four other states. But for many students, community college becomes a dead end. Many are trapped in remedial courses, and most must juggle courses with jobs. Thus, while community college is viewed as a gateway to the UC and CSU systems, relatively few students ever transfer to a four-year institution.

Undersecretary of Education Martha Kanter, who was previously chancellor of Foothill-DeAnza Community College District in Santa Clara County, admits that community colleges have historically not “done enough to get students through, to move them into the workforce and to get them through the higher-education transfer programs” (CNN Politics, 2009). She hopes to greatly improve this record, partly though the Obama administration's $12 billion American Graduation Initiative, which aims to revitalize community colleges over the coming decade.

In promoting the initiative, President Obama noted, “Jobs requiring at least an associate degree are projected to grow twice as fast as jobs requiring no college experience in coming years” (White House, 2009).

Knitting it all together to create multiple pathways

School administrators have a major obligation and opportunity to help more of their students succeed through multiple pathways. “These programs exist today, and they are demonstrating the power of this approach, but they are few and far between,” says Anne Stanton, director of the Youth Program at the James Irvine Foundation (James Irvine Foundation, 2006). She dreams of a day when multiple pathways programs will be available to young adults across the state.

School administrators who want to become part of this movement can begin by contacting the Coalition for Multiple Pathways, ConnectEd, or the programs mentioned in this article. They can also work to forge partnerships with business leaders in their communities, who can become important allies in promoting this kind of reform.

Even in these tough economic times, multiple pathways offer real hope to high school students.

References

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CNN Politics. (July 14, 2009). Obama: Community Colleges Can Help Boost Ailing Economy. Retrieved August 9, 2009, from CNNPolitics.com, http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/07/14/obama.community.colleges/index.html.

Douglass, John A. (2000). The California Idea and American Higher Education: 1850 to the 1960 Master Plan. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.

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Orr, M.; Bailey, T.; Hughes, K.; Karp, M. & Kienzl, G. (2004). The National Academy Foundation’s Career Academies: Shaping Postsecondary Transitions. New York, NY: Institute on Education and the Economy, Teachers College, Columbia University.

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Wagner, Tony (2008). The Global Achievement Gap. New York: Basic Books.

William C. Symonds is the director of the Pathways to Prosperity Project at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Lisa Gonzales is a coordinator in Curriculum & Instruction at the Santa Clara County Office of Education and is past president and current vice president of membership for ACSA Region 8.