Career and technical education (CTE) programs help prepare students for success with industry-specific training, work-based learning, and academic study. However, students may not consider how local CTE programs might align with the jobs that businesses are hiring for, and the available CTE programs may not align with the needs of the local labor market.
The New Hampshire Department of Education (NHED) and the Region 1 Comprehensive Center (R1CC) worked together to create an easy-to-use visual tool that could help schools to better align CTE programming to viable career pathways throughout New Hampshire.
While developing this tool, they brought secondary and postsecondary education leaders together with business and industry groups to discuss ways to better align CTE programs with local job demand.
“The department’s overall mission is to really uncover as many educational pathways as possible and ensure that there’s access for every kid,” said Jeffry Beard, State Director of CTE for NHED. “Live free and learn is the motto for our state. So, we are really interested in providing the best and most up-to-date information for educational decision makers.”
Mapping Bright Futures for New Hampshire
The New Hampshire education and workforce landscape varies across communities and pathways are highly localized. The map was designed to incorporate data elements that helped users focus on the education pathways offered within their community and explore how those pathways align to high wage, high demand occupations locally.
The Mapping Bright Futures for New Hampshire tool is a Geographic Information System (GIS) map that can show users a variety of information about high wage, high demand jobs and CTE programs available in their area. Using the map, users can view a list of the top ten high wage, high demand occupations for their county, find CTE programs aligned to their career pathway of interest, determine the alignment between CTE programs and local high wage, high demand occupations, and see the drive time to CTE programs from each school district in the state.
Exhibit 1 shows an example search for archictectural and engineering managers.
Exhibit 1: Screenshot of the Mapping Bright Futures for New Hampshire tool
The tool was developed over three years and included input from CTE leaders and representatives from businesses and industry, and postsecondary education.
“In New Hampshire, as with most states and most contexts, place really matters. And the thing that's really interesting about New Hampshire is that we tend to have geographical regions that map pretty neatly to businesses, industries, and to the main sources of income.”
– Jeffry Beard
The map displays the number of job openings for each high-demand, high-wage occupation in New Hampshire and where programs are offered in secondary and postsecondary institutions to meet that demand.
However, Beard said that people looking for CTE programs did not always have access to the data they needed to know which businesses were actively recruiting for in their area.
“We had some sources of labor market data that we were looking at, but they were static,” Beard said. “We lacked something that was place-based and needed an easy, dynamic, and highly visual tool for a variety of audiences.”
The Value of Connection
To support the use of the tool, R1CC created teacher and school counselor lesson plans to help students use the map as part of their career exploration efforts.
In addition to providing information to students and families about their pathway choices, the Mapping Bright Futures tool can also align CTE programming with business and industry. During map data analysis discussions, the team recognized opportunities for improving the alignment systems, including education, workforce, business and industry.
Jessica Giffin from R1CC showed Beard an example of a community college located near a manufacturer with numerous job openings, but the college was not offering manufacturing programming.
“I wondered how many times that has happened in the state of New Hampshire, and if there was a way for us to see that,” Beard said.
Exhibit 2. The Value of Connection
Get the Music Going
Once the map was developed and vetted, it became a resource to help the education system collaborate with business and industry and begin to align local programming with local employer needs.
“I used to be a middle school teacher, so I always use the metaphor of a middle school dance,” he said. “There are basically two groups that want to start dancing, but they don’t know how to. They just need someone to get the music going and create an atmosphere where they feel comfortable dancing.”
He said that is the power of the Mapping Bright Futures tool.
“To be able to see that connection visibly and get these groups working together to create new educational pathways for students that fill the needs of employers is a great win-win for all the potential users,” he said.