Diesel Technology Pathway to Postsecondary Certification or Associate Degree

该项目旨在通过创建从中学职业和技术教育（CTE）柴油课程到柴油技术中学后证书或副学士学位课程的新的综合和简化途径，为国家利益服务。我们的目标是解决高中柴油学生在高中CTE水平之后继续接受教育的日益增长的未满足需求。美国的技能差距导致柴油设备行业直接雇用CTE柴油学生进入劳动力市场，但对受过高等教育培训的员工的需求很大。满足这一需求将有助于美国商业卡车运输和工业设备公司保持全球竞争力。此外，改善从CTE到中学后培训的途径也增加了来自服务不足背景的学生和那些在STEM中代表性不足的学生的职业发展和更高终身收入的可能性，因为中学后培训和教育有助于工人保持最新并适应不断变化的技术。该项目将修改目前的高等教育课程，以消除CTE课程的任何冗余，并将承认以前的CTE学习，从而减少学分和每学期的学费需求。其他活动是CTE学生的虚拟职业意识课程，CTE柴油教师的专业发展，以及柴油技能竞赛，以吸引学生到现场。这些活动将加强中学CTE柴油课程，为中学后柴油课程提供支持，并将构成一个可复制的模式，可在其他技术教育领域或其他机构采用。该项目将实施和评估CTE和中学后教育之间的新途径，该途径使用衔接学分，以减少学生对多余内容的需求，因此，一旦他们进入中学后教育方案，就可以最大限度地减少他们的时间和财务投入。宾夕法尼亚理工学院（Penn College）的学生将获得发电或重型建筑设备柴油技术课程的中学后两学期证书或四学期副学士学位。项目目标将通过以下活动来实现：（1）与CTE教师合作，以加强CTE课程和改善教师培训;（2）修订宾夕法尼亚大学柴油课程，使衔接学分授予CTE课程中学到的内容;（3）提高高中生及其家庭、CTE教师、和高中指导顾问关于柴油技术职业和新的CTE中学后途径的长期利益。该项目将为CTE学生举办技能竞赛和新的虚拟研讨会，以提高对重型设备和发电职业的认识，并进一步利用虚拟平台进行生产性学习。项目团队将调查修订后的途径对学生的好处，特别是如果它导致增加程序完成，并将有助于现有的文献，寻求改善途径技术教育。该项目由先进技术教育计划资助，该计划侧重于推动国家经济的先进技术领域的技术人员的教育。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project aims to serve the national interest by creating new integrated and streamlined pathways from secondary career and technical education (CTE) diesel programs to postsecondary certificate or associate degree programs in diesel technology. The goal is to address the growing unmet need for high school diesel students to continue their education beyond the high school CTE level. The skills gap in the U.S. has caused the diesel equipment industry to hire CTE diesel students directly into the workforce, but there is a great need for employees with postsecondary training. Meeting this demand will help U.S. commercial trucking and industrial equipment companies to remain competitive globally. In addition, improving the pathway from CTE to postsecondary training also increases the possibility of career advancement and higher lifetime earnings for students from underserved backgrounds and those underrepresented in STEM, as postsecondary training and education helps workers remain current and adapt to ever-changing technologies. The project will revise the current postsecondary curriculum to remove any redundancy with the CTE programs and will recognize prior CTE learning, thus reducing the number of credits and the tuition needs each semester. Additional activities are a virtual career awareness course for CTE students, professional development for CTE diesel instructors, and a diesel skills competition to attract students to the field. Such activities will strengthen secondary CTE diesel programs that feed into postsecondary diesel offerings and will compose a replicable model that can be adopted in other technician education fields or at other institutions.This project will implement and evaluate a new pathway between CTE and postsecondary education that uses articulation credits to reduce the need for students to take redundant content, thereby minimizing their time and financial commitment once they enter a postsecondary program. Students at Pennsylvania College of Technology (Penn College) will earn a postsecondary two-semester certificate or four-semester associate degree in an electric power generation or heavy construction equipment diesel technology program. Project goals will be accomplished through the following activities: (1) collaborating with CTE instructors toward enhancing CTE programs and improving instructor training; (2) revising Penn College diesel courses to enable articulation credit to be awarded for content learned in CTE programs; and (3) increasing awareness in high school students and their families, CTE instructors, and high school guidance counselors about diesel technology careers and the long-term benefits of the new CTE-postsecondary pathway. The project will implement and evaluate a skills competition and a new virtual workshop for CTE students that will increase awareness of careers in heavy equipment and power generation and further the use of a virtual platform for productive learning. The project team will investigate the benefits of the revised pathway for students, especially if it leads to increased program completion, and will contribute to existing literature that seeks to improve pathways to technical education. This project is funded by the Advanced Technological Education program that focuses on the education of technicians for the advanced-technology fields that drive the Nation’s economy.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.