APPLE VALLEY, Calif. (VVNG.com) — Mountain Desert Career Pathways is excited to announce that its collaborative of high desert school districts have received upwards of $3 million to support Career Technical Education (CTE) programs and the students they serve.
$1.86 million was awarded by the state of California’s Career Technical Education Incentive Grant, with an additional $1.86 million coming from the California Community Colleges’ K12 Strong Workforce Program.
These funds will support the growth and improvement of CTE programs and pathways by providing students with the skills and understanding necessary to thrive in employment and post-secondary education.
This takes place through a variety of touch points including purchasing industry standard equipment for classroom use, placing highly qualified teachers in classrooms, offering those teachers professional development to retain and expand current industry understanding, and offering students a pipeline of opportunities designed to expose them to local industry settings and professionals.
With more and more local companies struggling to find enough employees with the right skills who stick around, Mountain Desert Career Pathways assists in aligning educational programs to local businesses to establish pipelines of students ready for careers. This means companies can stop wasting HR resources and seize opportunities, while High Desert students get great local jobs.
Mountain Desert Career Pathways and its school districts are committed to helping High Desert businesses fill their job openings with talented, High Desert students. With these grant dollars, this dream is not only attainable, but becoming closer to a reality each year.
Mark Smith, CISCO Academy instructor from Oak Hills High School, shared this about the impact that these grant dollars will have on his program:
“In teaching IT skill sets to my students, it is crucial that I stay current in the trends of Information Technology itself. The industry is ever evolving, and I need to teach the latest methodologies, which means the students need to work hands on with current industry-used equipment. This prepares my students to either join the workforce immediately after leaving my program and/or continue through tertiary education. Without the access to grants, I would be unable to achieve this goal.”
To learn more, visit mdcareerpathways.com
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