New state law amends assessment, graduation requirements for technical education students
Many local educators are applauding changes made at the state level to help career technical education students succeed.
Last month, Gov. Tom Wolf signed House Bill 202, also known as Act 6, into law. It amends the requirement for CTE students to take and pass the Keystone Exam in order to graduate; Instead, they’ll have to demonstrate competency based on grades and alternate assessments or industry-based certifications.
Central Pennsylvania Institute of Science and Technology President Richard Makin said CPI students will still be expected to take the Keystone Exam but will have other means of demonstrating readiness for high school graduation.
The two assessment alternatives are the National Occupational Competency Testing Institute and National Institute of Metalworking Skills assessments.
“This makes good sense given students learn in different ways and that they should also be afforded the opportunity to demonstrate what they have learned using alternative pathways,” Makin said in a statement. “We have long believed that passing a one-size-fits-all high school exit exam should not be the sole measure of readiness for post-secondary education or a career.”
In the 2016-17 school year, 43 Philipsburg-Osceola Area students attended the Clearfield County Career and Technical Center, allowing them to work toward their high school diploma while learning a trade.
P-O Superintendent Gregg Paladina, who is also the superintendent of record for the CCCTC, said changes made at the state level for CTE students are a “step in the right direction.”
If I say it one time, I say it a thousand times: we are destroying education by testing students too much
Gregg Paladina
P-O superintendent“If I say it one time, I say it a thousand times: We are destroying education by testing students too much,” he said.
However, Paladina said he agrees with a test like the NOCTI exam, which shows students’ knowledge based on things they learn at a career or technical school.
“It’s far more beneficial than some abstract Keystone Exam for them,” Paladina said.
Makin said NOCTI has a history of developing a battery of assessments for students studying career and technical programs in high schools, career technology centers and technical colleges. The assessments, he said, are based on a job and task analysis process and incorporate input from subject matter experts, as well as business and industry representatives.
The assessments are updated on a regular basis and are aligned with national academic standards — math, science, and language arts, as well as business and industry standards
Richard Makin
CPI president“The assessments are updated on a regular basis and are aligned with national academic standards — math, science and language arts, as well as business and industry standards,” Makin said.
The exam also includes a written and hands-on component that is assessed by outside industry evaluators.
NIMS assessments, on the other hand, are more specific to precision machining, but also incorporate the same principles as NOCTI, including assessment of the student’s work by an outside industry evaluator, Makin said.
NOCTI and NIMS are assessments approved by the state Department of Education and administered at CPI.
Britney Milazzo: 814-231-4648, @M11azzo
Options for students to demonstrate proficiency and post-secondary readiness are:
▪ Achieve an identified composite score, based on performance across all three Keystone exams;
▪ Achieve equivalent score in standards-based subject matter content area on one of the alternate assessment approved by PDE;
▪ Demonstrate competency in standards-based subject matter content through course grades or assessments plus, for students who are identified as career and technical education concentrators, demonstrate evidence of readiness for post-secondary success through the National Occupancy Competency Testing Institute and/or National Institute for Metalworking Skills assessments, or Competency Certificates;
▪ Demonstrate competency in standards-based subject matter content through course grades or assessments plus evidence related to post-secondary plans that demonstrate readiness to meaningfully engage in those plans.
This story was originally published July 5, 2017 at 7:56 PM with the headline "New state law amends assessment, graduation requirements for technical education students."