By Brent Haken
CareerTech: Oklahoma’s Workforce Solution
Many of my greatest experiences stem from my adventures as a CareerTech student and teacher. My time as a CareerTech student gave me a good baseline for a career in agriculture and education. It was a license to learn more about my interests and passions.
One of my passions is CareerTech education. After a successful and rewarding career as a teacher, principal and superintendent, I am grateful for the opportunity to grow and advance the mission of Oklahoma CareerTech as the system’s new state director.
While Oklahoma CareerTech is regularly recognized as one of the best CareerTech systems in the nation, the need for educational opportunities that emphasize career readiness is growing. Oklahoma CareerTech provides technical training to nearly half a million enrollments each year, but more can be done to reach more students and meet the labor demands of Oklahoma businesses.
Several Oklahoma industries – broadband, aerospace, health care, automotive and construction – are struggling amid a shortage of skilled workers.
Our goal is to integrate academic skills into a real-world context by providing career-oriented courses, internships, apprenticeships and in-school programs that promote work readiness. The skills obtained in these programs equip students with immediately employable skills and valuable knowledge to build on as they enter the workforce.
Across the nation, more lawmakers, policymakers and educators are coming to realize they should be creating more opportunities for students to take industry-specific courses, empowering them to explore their career interests and make informed career choices. In Oklahoma, we hope our decision makers will make this a high priority during the state’s next legislative session, which begins next month.
A strong system of career and technology training built on a base of academic education gives students the option to go right to work from high school or into another postsecondary opportunity such as a university to gain a broad and deep education that enables them to adapt to changes in technology and workforce needs.
In fiscal 2021, Oklahoma CareerTech had a 91% positive placement rate, which means nearly all CareerTech graduates found employment, entered the military or continued their education.
Since becoming an independent agency in 1968 under then State Director Francis Tuttle, Oklahoma CareerTech has built a reputation for pursuing innovative ideas that break from tradition and the accepted paradigm. Thanks to our flexibility to respond quickly to workforce needs, Oklahoma CareerTech has been able to reach more students by providing training developed in tandem with Oklahoma businesses.
This pioneering spirit continues today, as CareerTech invests in emerging technologies and new learning methods to provide an education for our times. These efforts require a broad approach that reaches adults, secondary students, postsecondary students and inmates.
By design, career and technical education exists to break down barriers in education by building bridges between secondary schools, postsecondary schools and business and industry. This is the tenet behind career and technical education.
Just ask Abigail Shannon about the benefits of a CareerTech education.
Shannon said her CareerTech instructors and advisers taught her leadership skills, how to express empathy and the value of teamwork. Those skills drew the attention of Langston University administrators, who invited her to study in the university’s Edwin P. McCabe Honors Program. The invitation came with a $100,000 scholarship to cover tuition, fees, room and board and a text-book stipend.
Shannon is majoring in elementary education. She said the skills she learned through FFA, HOSA and Meridian Technology Center have been invaluable.
“CareerTech is an incredible experience,” Shannon said. “It will benefit you in more ways than you realize.”
If you would like to learn more, visit our website at okcareertech.org.
Brent Haken is the state director of the Oklahoma Department of Career and Technology Education.
