Career and Technical Education enrollment in K through 12 schools is up by five percent in the state since 2015.
Enrollment has increased from roughly 104-thousand to over 109 thousand students between 2015 and 2017.
State officials said career and technical education has been a priority.
Bill DiSessa is a spokesperson for the Michigan Department of Education (MDE).
“The idea is simply to provide more career and college pathways to success for students in Michigan. Not all students want to go to college,” he said. “Not all students simply want to go to a vocational program. But we want to make sure we’re providing on a state level in our public educations and schools.”
DiSessa said the department’s chief goal is to implement a top 10 in 10 plan.
“It’s a plan to become a top education state within the next 10 years. The department has been working very hard to work on this plan,” he said. “We are in the early stages of starting to put it into action in various places. The first part of this plan is to collaborate with many types of stakeholders to get their feedback and or buy in to the plan.”
DiSessa also said there has been an emphasis, on the state level, to continue this momentum.
“Governor Rick Snyder is partnering with our department, specifically State Superintendent Brian Winston, with Talent and Economic Development Director Roger Curtis on an emphasis in Career Tech Education, and they’ve been doing that for a while,” he said. “The idea is, simply for, to provide more career pathways to success in Michigan.”
The Department of Ed. wants to make sure they are providing opportunities for students to find the career path they’re interested in.