As mentioned, much of the information presented in this report is based on a conference convened in 1996 by NCRVE to discuss the relationship between academic and industry skill standards. The purpose of the conference was to bring together people who had worked on the two types of standards to analyze the relationship between the standards; make recommendations regarding how they should interact; and, ultimately, determine how both sets of standards should be designed and used to improve education.
The conference focused on standards developed for seven industries and five academic disciplines. These sets of standards in effect represent the sample that is considered in this report. The majority of the conference participants had been directly involved in developing these particular academic and industry skill standards.[2] Much of the discussion at the conference was based on an examination and analysis of the actual published standards.
The conference focused on the standards developed in electronics, retail, bioscience, photonics, automotive repair, health care, and metalworking. Although they represent seven industries, the conference actually considered eight industry projects since two sets of standards were developed for the electronics industry. The eight industry projects were chosen so as to include a wide variety of industries and approaches to standards design. These were chosen from among 22 industry skill standard pilot projects started in 1992 and 1993 with funding from the U.S. Departments of Education and Labor. Most of these projects set out to define the knowledge and skills required for "entry-level" workers in the relevant industries, although some projects did develop standards for higher-level workers.
The conference examined academic standards in mathematics, English/language arts, social studies, science, and history. Over the past several years, educators have developed frameworks for standards for these disciplines. These standards are meant to define what students at different grade levels should be able to master in each of the academic subject areas, although some of the frameworks have not defined grade levels or assessments at this point. The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) developed the first set of standards in 1989. Since then, frameworks have been developed by the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and International Reading Association (English/language arts standards), the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) (social studies standards), the National Research Council (science standards), the National Center for History under the guidance of the National Council for History Standards (history standards), and several others.
The report summarizes the central areas of consensus that emerged from the conference, although it does not necessarily reflect the views of all the conference participants. The report also relies on additional material published before and after the conference. Since the conference, NCRVE has conducted several workshops in conjunction with its publication Getting to Work, which includes curriculum materials designed to help teachers integrate academic and vocational education. Building on the discussions and experience at the conference, the Getting to Work workshops have used academic and industry skill standards to develop projects and curricula that integrate academic and vocational education. Some of the examples generated at these workshops are used in this report.