Dr. Charles Scott Benson, director and principal investigator of the National Center for Research in Vocational Education and an internationally known economist and expert on the economics of education, died July 2 in Carlsbad, California, while on a weekend visit with relatives. The apparent cause of death was a heart attack. He was 72.
A former associate dean and professor for 30 years at U.C. Berkeley's Graduate School of Education, Benson became director of the NCRVE in 1988 when the University of California at Berkeley received the federal grant. NCRVE, a seven-member consortium of institutions funded by the U.S. Department of Education, is the largest of its kind studying the relationship between education and work.
From 1964 until his retirement from the faculty in 1991, Dr. Benson taught educational and policy analysis at U.C. Berkeley. From 1986 to 1989, he was associate dean for academic affairs at the education school. He was a frequent consultant to institutions including the World Bank, USAID, and the Ford Foundation on educational development planning in countries such as Pakistan, nations in Sub-Saharn Africa, and Eastern Europe.
In his widely used text "The Economics of Education" and in other writings, Benson helped define the economics of education during the 1960s and early 1970s. He also was influential in the school finance reform movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s.
Recently, his activities focused on vocational education and the need for a "new vocationalism"--a plan to integrate academic and vocational studies in secondary schools as an alternative to traditional college preparatory curriculum. The college prep model, he said, has failed to cure the ills of the American educational system, including "the high probability that a person without a B.A. will wander from one minimum wage job to another for about 10 years before finding a place to begin a career." He saw NCRVE as a place to develop high-grade research to facilitate important changes in educational and training institutions.
Born and raised in Atlanta, Benson graduated in 1943 from Princeton University with honors in economics. At Columbia University he earned his M.A. in economics in 1948 and his Ph.D. in economics in 1955.
Before arriving at U.C. Berkeley, Benson taught economics at Bowdoin College from 1950-55 and then, at Harvard University from 1955-63, he taught economics, lectured on education, and did research at its Center for Field Studies.
While at U.C. Berkeley, he led large research projects including, from 1968-70, the New York State Commission on the Quality, Cost, and Financing of Elementary and Secondary Education; the Childhood and Government Project, sponsored by the Ford Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation, from 1972-78; and, beginning in 1978, a project for the National Assessment of Vocational Education. In 1994, he was awarded the Berkeley Citation, an award for exceptional faculty members.
He his survived by his wife, Dorothy Merrick Benson, of Kensington; three children, Michele S. Benson of Berkeley, Charles Scott Benson, Jr., of Pocatello, Idaho, and Sally M. Benson of Richmond; a brother, Lawrence Walker Benson of Monroe, Georgia; and seven grandchildren.
The family has established the Charles S. Benson Memorial Scholarship Fund. Checks may be made payable to the Charles S. Benson Memorial Scholarship Fund and sent to:
The Graduate School of Education
Office of the Dean
1501 Tolman Hall
University of California at Berkeley
Berkeley, California 94720-1670
The economy and the educational system: two top concerns for many Americans. On surveys, "the economy" and "education" are usually listed as two separate items. Yet in actuality they are closely related.
The School-to-Work Opportunities Act (STWO), signed into law in May 1994, addresses the intersection between work and education. The STWO, like Perkins II (1990), emphasizes both academic and occupational skills: both pieces of legislation represent a significant policy shift from the Smith-Hughes Act of 1917. Smith-Hughes, the first federal vocational education legislation, contained several elements which contributed to the creation of a gulf between academic and vocational education.
Now, after 70 years of separation, academic and vocational teachers are asked to work across boundaries, to forge new alliances, to develop new models of teaching and learning. Many educators, as well as legislators and policy makers, agree that it is time for dramatic change in American education. But it is the teachers--and the students--who must actually implement these changes on a daily basis.
What is the daily reality of "the integration of academic and vocational education?" Of "implementing school-to-work transition"? Of "youth apprenticeship"? What do all these phrases mean in the context of every day teaching? And what is "all aspects of the industry"?
A comprehensive conceptual framework
The Perkins Act contains a provision that all students be provided with "strong experience and understanding of all aspects of the industry." Rather than just one more new thing which busy teachers must respond to, "all aspects" can actually provide a conceptual framework which can contain, explain, and drive other elements of recent legislation, such as "school-to-work," "integration," and "tech prep."
An "all aspects" approach links partners in the education enterprise
"All aspects of an industry" includes planning, management, finances, technical and production skills, underlying principles of technology, labor and community issues, and health, safety and environmental issues. Thus, an "all aspects" approach necessitates incorporating the perspective not only of teachers, but of employers, labor, environmentalists, and community residents.
An "all aspects" approach links students to a range of skills and learning opportunities
Developing these kinds of programs can have important benefits for students, including: (1) providing an enriched environment in which academic and vocational integration can occur, (2) providing students with the skills and experiences they need for a variety of workplace tasks and roles, including entrepreneurship and management, (3) facilitating students' school-to-work transition, (4) encouraging community development through collaborative involvement in economic growth activities, (5) providing a rich platform for analysis, problem solving, and utilizing skills in reading, writing, math, science and social science, and (6) helping students to explore a particular field in depth while gaining transferable skills which expand their opportunities to do other things.
The daily reality: collaboration with teachers
NCRVE, in collaboration with the Center for Law and Education, Jobs for the Future, and the Learning Research and Development Center--and each of those organizations' school networks--was awarded a grant by the Joyce Foundation to study the "all aspects" clause. (For a list of participating schools, see the end of this article.) In conversations with teachers around the country, NCRVE found that the "all aspects of the industry" clause is only partially implemented in most schools.
As any teacher knows, learning something new takes time. Changing one's behavior also takes time. As Judith Warren Little says in her book, Two Worlds: Vocational and Academic Teachers in Comprehensive High Schools (MDS-438): the "collegial exchange [between teachers] is both more frequent and varied than outsiders might imagine, and less concentrated and consequential than teachers...require to re-invent their work and their workplace." Therefore, part one of this project has been to document and clarify models where "all aspects" is currently being implemented.
Part two of the project is a series of workshops involving the four partnership members and their representative school teams in intensive cooperation with education, business, and labor. The purpose of these workshops is to:
Programs being explored
In order to identify how elements of the all aspects of the industry approach are already present in established reform programs, the project is exploring several related programs, for example: The Coalition of Essential Schools; Foxfire; REAL Enterprises; Magnet Schools in New York City's District Four; Career Academies; Service Learning Programs; and the City-asSchool/Community-As-School. It is not possible to go into these programs in detail in this article; for more information, please see contact information below.
What next?
This "all aspects" project will conclude with summer institutes for teachers and administrators at each of the Coalition's membersponsored conferences, and a written report about the current state of activity around the country. The report, which will be MDS-885, is expected to be available in January 1995. For more information on this project, please call Erika Nielsen-Andrew at (510) 642-5759 or (800) (old phone deleted).
Participating schools
The schools which participated in this program are listed below, by location.
Oakland, CA--Oakland Technical High School
Cambridge, MA--The Rindge School of Technical Arts
Pittsburgh, PA--Peabody High School, Elizabeth Forward High School, Scheneley High School
Milwaukee, WI--South Division High School
Erika
Nielsen-Andrew
Project Manager
On May 4, 1994, President Clinton signed the School-to-Work Opportunities (STWO) Act. According to its advocates, this bill represents a dramatic departure from traditional education by creating a national school-to-work transition system. To its foes, this legislation is simply an attempt to repackage vocational education and reinforce existing school- and collegiate-level tracking in academic and vocational education. Will a new national STWO system be created? Will the new federal STWO legislation produce real change? Those questions are not easy to answer.
With the federal legislation only a few weeks old, researchers at the National Center for Research in Vocational Education (NCRVE) already have begun to examine the issues surrounding a new STWO system. In 1993-94, a project at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign site, has focused on examining the Role of TwoYear College Work-based Learning Systems in School-to-Work (STW) Transition. This research project is co-sponsored by the National Council for Occupational Education (NCOE), where a Work-Based Learning Task Force has formed to serve in an advisory and support capacity.
The first major task of this study was conducted during the fall of 1993 when all of the nation's 1,100+ two-year community, junior, and technical colleges were involved in a mail questionnaire regarding work-based learning. The questionnaire asked a respondent designated by each college to provide information in the following areas: (a) the scope of work-based learning occurring across the college's curriculum, (b) the characteristics of the college's best work-based learning program in a health-related area, (c) the characteristics of the college's best work-based learning program in a non-health area, (d) the level of support for work-based learning from various stakeholder groups, (e) the general characteristics of the institution, and(f) policy recommendations to help foster additional work-based learning in the two-year college environment.
In the two sections of the survey that asked respondents to describe their best programs, the following criteria were designated: (a) a formal structure linking work-based and college-based learning, (b) a proven track record based on existing evaluation data, (c) a fully operational program with evidence of commitment by the college and local employers, and (d) the existence of new and creative strategies in any of the areas of curriculum and instruction, program administration, and/or partnerships between education, business, labor, or other organizations. Findings from this survey are summarized in a soon-to-be-available NCRVE report entitled Work-Based Learning in the Two-Year College, MDS-713.
A second major task of this study got underway in 1994. Based on the national survey results and additional follow-up with state and local leaders of STW, this task entails site selection and field visits to work-based learning programs in seven U.S., twoyear colleges.
Along with NCRVE staff, four members of the NCOE Work-Based Learning Task Force will be involved in this phase. These participants will attend an orientation to the new STW legislation, conduct field visits, and attend a one-day, project de-briefing at the annual NCOE conference in Chicago in October. The site visits will be conducted during the fall of 1994 with two-year colleges located in various regions of the country in rural and urban locations. Work-based learning policies and practices in such curriculum areas as nursing, radiography technology, culinary arts, manufacturing technologies, formal electrician apprenticeship, hotel management, and early childhood education will be examined. An NCRVE product from this phase of the study will describe the key features of these programs; it will be available in early 1995.
Based on this two-year research study conducted jointly by NCRVE and NCOE, project staff will document the status of work-based learning in U.S. two-year colleges prior to and during the early stages of development of a national school-to-work system with STW. Although this study, in and of itself, cannot answer the question of whether STW is a "real" alternative to traditional education, it can help to establish, along with other NCRVE studies similarly focused, the baseline necessary for answering that crucial question.
For further information about this project, please contact:
Debra D. Bragg
NCRVE Site at
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Champaign, IL 61820
(217) 333-0807
fax (217) 244-5632
OR
Russell Hamm
NCOE Work-Based Learning Task Force
College of Lake County
Grayslake, IL 60030
(708) 223-3606
fax (708) 223-9371
This project attempts to tap into the resourcefulness of individual teachers in providing integrated instruction for their students, with the goal of uncovering genuinely innovative tips and techniques which may be emulated by others. The project identified individual teachers who recognized the advantages of integrating the vocational and academic aspects of their instruction prior to the influence of state or national initiatives such as tech prep. By examining these "early innovators," the project is seeking to locate and describe strategies that truly work and that lie outside of the current body of knowledge on the subject.
Early work concentrated on the process of identifying the "early innovators" to study. A multiple-stage procedure was developed which involved (1) having state-level staff nominate exemplary vocational teachers and/or programs, (2) conducting telephone interviews with nominees to determine if they were "early" integrators and the current level of instructional integration, and (3) selecting a small number of teachers for further study based on telephone interview results. This procedure was pilot tested in Illinois and three teachers were selected for detailed interviews.
Extensive on-site interviews were conducted with the three practitioners in the late fall of 1993 to pilot test the interview procedure. The interview guides were developed by project staff and focused primarily on teaching methods used to achieve integration. Interviews were audio taped and the tapes were transcribed and content analyzed. Narrative reports were developed around the following organizers: teacher background (with integration), their overall view of integration (why it should be done, what its function is, perceived benefits), how integration is achieved in their classrooms (and labs), the level of support they have received and their perceived evidence of the success of their efforts.
Of the three teachers interviewed, one stood out regarding his development and use of a particularly effective teaching strategy in line with current "teacher-as-facilitator" thinking, and developing healthy doses of communication, problem-solving and interpersonal (teaming) skills. This teacher`s techniques were developed based on his 20 years of industry experience prior to becoming a teacher, experiences which went well beyond the standard "employee" orientation. In addition to being an employee, the teacher had been an employer, entrepreneur and independent small businessman. This variety in experience, coupled with an entrepreneurial nature, positively affected his willingness to be innovative and relate to students in a relevant manner.
After some modification, the identification procedure was used to identify potential subjects in five other midwestern states. Telephone interviews have been conducted with the nominated teachers in order to select those to interview in-depth. Two persons from each of the five states will be selected. The project is striving to locate more true innovators like the teacher previously described.
For further information about this project, please contact
Chris Roegge
NCRVE site at University of Illinois,
Urbana-Champaign
Champaign, Illinois, 61820
(217) 333-0807; or FAX (217) 244-5632
The professional development program staff have been busy planning and providing a variety of activities for professionals across the United States. Activities include a national workshop, two national satellite teleconferences, American Vocational Association Annual Convention Pre-sessions, and an NCRVE Professionals-in-Residence Program.
A national workshop entitled "Educators' Roles in School-to-Work Transition" was held at the Holiday Inn in Baltimore, Maryland, on July 14-16, 1994. Over 50 breakout sessions were scheduled focusing on guiding principles of school-to-work systems, models , and implementation strategies. This workshop was co-sponsored by Community Television for Southern California in Los Angeles (KCET).
Two national satellite teleconferences are scheduled to be broadcast live from the Virginia Tech Site this fall. The first teleconference, "All Aspects of the Industry" will be broadcast October 12, 1994. The second teleconference, "Educators` Roles in School-to-Work Transition," will be broadcast November 9, 1994.
Three AVA pre-sessions will be offered by NCRVE on December 9, 1994, at the AVA Annual Convention in Dallas, Texas. George Copa, NCRVE, University of Minnesota Site, will be offering a four-hour pre-session on "New Designs for the Comprehensive High School."
Charles Hopkins, Sherry Schwartz, Jerry Moss, and Lillian McDonald, NCRVE, also from the University of Minnesota Site, are presenting a pre-session on "Leadership Development Programs for Underrepresented Groups in Vocational Education." Carolyn MaddyBernstein and Zipura Burac Matias, NCRVE, University of Illinois Site, are co-sponsoring a pre-session with AVA on "Exemplary Programs: Special Populations, Nontraditional, and Guidance and Counseling."
Persons who have made significant contributions to vocational education currently are being selected to serve as Professionalsin-Residence at one or more of NCRVE's seven sites. Over 100 individuals have requested applications. Applications for participation in the program may be submitted at any time.
For further information about the professional development program, please contact Susan Faulkner or Curt Finch at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, NCRVE Site, Vocational and Technical Education, Blacksburg, Virginia 240610254; (703) 231-5982; fax (703) 231-3292
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Professionals-in-Residence Program Focuses on Education-for-Work The National Center for Research in Vocational Education (NCRVE) has initiated a Professionals-in-Residence program that will run through 1997. NCRVE is seeking applicants from a wide range of career fields related to workforce preparation: policymakers, academic and vocational education professionals, business and labor leaders, international educators, researchers, and analysts. Thus far, over 100 individuals have requested applications. Applications for participation in the program may be submitted at any time. Those selected for the program will spend from one to nine months at one or more of NCRVE's seven sites. Selection is honorary and thus non-salaried. For more information and application forms, contact: The Professional Development Academy |
The following new reports are available from the NCRVE Materials Distribution Service. You may order these documents by phone, (800) 637-7652, by e-mail, msmds@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu (Internet), or by sending your request and/or purchase order to: NCRVE Materials Distribution Service, Western Illinois University, Horrabin Hall 46, Macomb, IL 61455.
The 1994 Agenda for the National Center for Research in Vocational
Education
This material contains summaries of NCRVE's 1994 Research and Development, as well as Dissemination and Training, activities. Additionally, the Center's mission statement is included.
MDS-030 | May 1994 | $4.50
Human Resource Directory
This resource directory lists contact information and the areas of expertise of NCRVE staff.
MDS-209 | May 1994 | $3.50
Breaking the Mold: Tech Prep and the New Paradigm--J. L. Hoerner
Suggesting a new educational paradigm, this article challenges the thinking of educators about the kinds of changes that are necessary for Tech Prep to succeed as an educational reform initiative.
MDS-763 | Reprint | $1.00
Leader Effectiveness Index Manual--J. Moss, Jr., J. Lambrecht, Q.
Jensrud, C. R. Finch
This manual will be of particular interest to potential users of the Leader Effectiveness Index (LEI), as well as to those who study leadership and its measurement. The manual contains (1) the conceptualization of leadership which provides the foundation for the LEI, (2) an explanation of how to use the instrument, (3) a description of LEI's development and psychometric characteristics, and (4) a report of the process used to create an appropriate norm group.
MDS-815 | June 1994 | $4.50
Profiles of the National Industry Skills Standards Projects--M. L.
Rahn (Comp.)
This publication "profiles" each of the twenty-two federally funded National Industry Skills Standards projects, based on project staff responses to several questions (for example: What is the definition of industry for your project? What definition of a standard are you using? How will performance against standards be assessed [e.g., assessment instruments, certification systems]?). While the profiles represent only a snapshot of works in progress, they will be useful for professionals creating such standards as well as to invoke discussions about how these efforts will impact secondary and postsecondary curriculum and instruction.
MDS-881 | Technical Assistance Report | $2.25
CenterWork
National Center for Reserach in Vocational
Education
University of California at Berkeley
Address all comments, questions, and
requests for additional copies
to:
NCRVE
2150 Shattuck Avenue, Suite 1250
Berkeley, CA 94704