Academic Skills in the Industry Skill Standards

The industry skill standards developed by the pilot projects represented a wide variety of designs and forms.[6] At one extreme are skill standards that simply list all of the tasks that workers are expected to be able to perform for the relevant occupations. No particular work context is included. While academic skills may be necessary, these are also simply listed. At the other extreme are standards that focus on the critical functions required for the job and define them within the context of the industry. Success at the job (and achieving the standards) requires that the individual be able to carry out those functions. Particular academic skills are embedded within those functions. In these standards, the academic and industry skills are integrated within the industrial context.
Academic skills in various forms appear throughout the industry skill standards. Some standards simply call for knowledge of academic skills. For example, the Electronic Industries Foundation (EIF) standards suggest that entry-level electronic technicians need to be able to "simplify and solve algebraic expressions and formulas" to "use properties of exponents and logarithms" (Electronic Industries Association and Electronic Industries Foundation, 1994, p. 5-3). They must also "understand fundamental principles of mechanics," "understand fundamental principles of hydraulics," and demonstrate many more proficiencies in physics (p. 5-3). But these are very general standards and no level of knowledge is specified. Other standards tie the academic skills to particular work tasks. For example, the National Automobile Technician Education Foundation (NATEF) (1995) technical tasks lists include the following: "Add two or more whole numbers, fractions, or decimals to determine component conformance of multiple measurements with the manufacturer's specifications" and "Use Centigrade or Fahrenheit measurement scales to determine the existing temperature of substances such as a coolant or lubricant" (p. 1). The NATEF standards also include a "crosswalk" which lists academic skills such as "calculates/evaluates mean/median/mode" and then indicates which specialty areas make use of these skills. This particular academic skill is used in the "electrical" specialty area (p. 1).
The standards developed by the American Electronic Association (AEA) include three components, one of which is referred to as the "foundation for workplace success." These include academic skills such as communication skills that include reading, writing, listening, and speaking/presenting. Mathematics skills are considered to be those used "in everyday business situations" such as "estimating discounts, monitoring expenditures, using statistical process and control procedures" (AEA, 1997 [brochure])
The bioscience standards explicitly tie academic skills to a series of complex "scenarios" which must be mastered by the students. For example, Scenario 13 is stated as follows:

You are responsible for following the protocol for purifying your company's product. Demonstrate the steps you take in product purification. The 2 liters of the crude product has a calculated yield of 10 grams per liter. You expect an 80 percent yield. After running the column, you calculate the purified total sample yield as 22 grams per liter. Show how you would handle this result. (Education Development Center, 1995, p. 39)

In the "scenarios" developed in the bioscience standards, the academic skills are embedded in the tasks themselves rather than appearing as separate lists. The document describing the bioscience standards then lists specific academic and industry-related skills that are illustrated by each scenario (Education Development Center, 1995).
Thus, academic skills are clearly called for in the industry skill standards, although in most cases, the standards simply list at an abstract level some required academic skills. Even in the most sophisticated cases, the academic skills are defined in service to the required industry knowledge. Therefore, there is no comprehensive coverage of academic knowledge, nor did anyone expect there to be. Until recently, there has been no attempt to coordinate the industry skill standards with the academic frameworks or to specific curricula. Moreover, the levels of academic skills suggested by many of the industry skill standards tend to be rather low--often significantly below the high school graduation level.