Single Subject Teaching, Accounting and Financial/Business Planning, and Engineering Pathways

The Fresno Unified School District (FUSD) project is to support the success of guided pathways that lead to seamless student transitions, dual enrollment credit, work-based learning opportunities, and aligned education with regional workforce needs.

This support is to be leveraged with robust curriculum and instruction, shared professional learning with high school and post-secondary educators, integrated programs of study that effectively communicate the required wrap-around services for students in transition, and student-centered opportunities designed to provide high quality experiences for students in the Fresno Unified School District.

Key Collaborative Partners are to be instrumental in various roles, including: guest speaking, industry-specific summer camps on college campuses, industry tours, mentoring, job shadowing, design thinking professional learning and innovative approaches to teaching and learning, advisory board support and shared best practices for curriculum development and alignment. Career pathway students will be mentored by individuals that have knowledge and skills that are important to a balanced and robust education. Identified pathways within STEM related fields, including: engineering, agriculture, education, advanced manufacturing, finance, and technology will offer students the unique opportunities outlined in this proposal. The key elements addressed in this application directly reflect student needs when addressing our community’s demographics, including a focus on disproportionately impacted students. It is necessary to expand this specific support to offer the highest quality career pathway experiences to our students and to meet the priorities and metrics of our region.

Sampling of the work being done by FUSD in partnership with the Fresno K-16 Collaborative:

This project is creating a more focused emphasis on dual enrollment offerings that are aligned with college and career pathways in engineering, teaching and accounting & fiscal management. As a start, English and math dual enrollment classes are foundational to post-secondary General Education for a majority of majors.

Equity

• Lead involvement with the P16 C2C Data Collaborative
• Leadership with the Virtual Dual Enrollment HUB workgroup and technical support Canvas piloting
• Upskilling Masters Pathway: To achieve greater equity for dual enrollment offerings, FUSD is currently supporting the upskilling of 26 of their teachers to obtain their masters to be eligible to teach dual enrollment (as adjunct SCCCD faculty) – 14 in English Masters and 12 in the Math Masters programs.
  • Fall 2018 FUSD data shows about a third of the FUSD seniors (2256/6691) applied to Fresno State; and only approximately 13% of the seniors had any early college credit (e.g. middle college (2%), dual enrollment (6%), enrichment (5%).
  • Of the 16 high schools within Central USD, Clovis USD, Fresno USD, and Sanger USD, only two high schools have DuE Community College math courses:
    • SUSD -Sanger HS
    • FUSD -Design Science
  • In FUSD, various high schools offer English 1A depending on availability of a teacher with a Masters in English. Central USD and Clovis USD don’t offer English 1A at this time. Sanger USD has a full Reedley Community College Associates Degree.
• In Fall 2020 there was the alignment and training of FUSD DuE teachers in Canvas and Simple
  Syllabus. The trainings were presented by Fresno City College (FCC) and allowed for better
  alignment and understanding of required course documentation.
• Expanded STEM experiences and opportunities will broaden a student’s understanding of
• specific career paths available in local colleges and create an understanding of employment
• opportunities in STEM.
• Taking steps to ensure all foster and homeless youth have access to programs that introduce
• them to these career pathway options will help close these equity gaps.
• Through targeted recruitment, focused and specific marketing materials, and the CTE site supports of Coordinators, Job Developers & Career Centers, an expanded focus for foster youth, African Americans, English learners, and low-income students will provide these students with validated high-quality CTE Pathways that will engage them through dual enrollment, industry certifications and expanded work-based learning opportunities with the goals of teaching students to access resources and empowering them to be better self-advocates in their educational journey.

Accounting and Financial Business Planning Pathway

• Business and Financial Planning cohorts on their way to obtaining an associate degree and transfer to a university. Students will complete over 15 units in this pathway prior to graduating high school. The new, cohorted pathway began in Spring 2021 with two cohorts of 15 students (McLane and Bullard High Schools). Four additional cohorts to be added at FUSD high schools in Fall 2021.
• FCC and FUSD have designed a curriculum maps (course sequencing) for accounting and financial business management minded students starting with DuE and leading to a certificate of completion. In addition, there is also an added option of obtaining an American Payroll Association certification.
  
  This dual enrollment project designed to attract students who traditionally may not be thinking of attending college post-high school. Goal is to encourage students to follow a bachelor’s degree pathway, but provide programming that will allow students to earn an entry-level certificate in accounting Bookkeeping Fundamentals before high school graduation.
  
  The following courses will help students complete a certificate of completion while still in high school:
  • BA-10 Intro to business,
  • CIT-15 Computer Concepts,
  • BT-24 Beginning Excel, and
  • BT-131 Applied accounting.
    
    Students will take at least one of the accounting/business classes and will add a general education course to their schedule as part of the pathways. The student should have completed the certificate pathway courses, and about 12 additional general education units along with the certificate. This will allow the students to be almost one year into their Accounting degree at Fresno City College. English will be taken during their senior year and our goal is to offer mathematics the summer after high school graduation.

• Winter and Summer Accounting Boot Camps have been extensively attended by FUSD students seeking additional assistance to prepare for transition to FCC. ACCTG 4A – Financial Accounting is a challenging entry-level course that is often advised for the second-year Business student. Students successfully completing dual enrollment courses and boot camp will have a strong foundation to be prepared to take Accounting 4A in their first year of studies.
• English 1A, Communications 4, Ethnic Studies (Chicano/Latino Studies and/or African American Studies), and other general education courses along with the business and accounting classes that are related to this pathway. Students will have an opportunity to take pathway classes and English and Math before they start their first year of college.
• Virtual internship opportunities specific to technology and start-up elements associated with Accounting/Business
• Staff is continuing to meet with strategic district partners to identify groups of students who have historically been marginalized. Our goal is to expand their participation so that students become better self-advocates for their education and receive relevant and meaningful experiences.
• Current students enrolled in Accounting and Financial/Business Planning Pathway – 3-5% growth target, plus increased or introduction of DuE courses: Patino HS: 267 students; McLane HS: 353 students; Bullard HS: 200 students; Roosevelt HS: 73 students. (3-5% growth= 27-45)

Engineering Pathway

• Expanded STEM experiences and opportunities will broaden a student’s understanding of specific career paths available in local colleges and create an understanding of employment opportunities in STEM.
• Extensive coordination and communication with FCC engineering faculty to prepare students for engineering pathways.
• Virtual internship opportunities for approximately 71 students specific to engineering which provided students time with professors at both Fresno State and Fresno Pacific University during the summer
• Current students enrolled in Engineering Pathway – 3-5% growth target, plus increased or introduction of DuE courses: Edison HS: 231 students (3-5% growth= 7-12)

Collaborative-level Engineering Pathway Working Groups/Communities of Practice Work:

• Outreach Subcommittee
  • FUSD Invited all partners to attend FUSD virtual college/career fair that was held April 2021
  • FUSD provided all contacts for K12 counselors, principals, job developers, CTE coordinators,
    etc.
  • FUSD shared and distributed K16 Collab flyers for camps, opportunities, etc. with district
  • FUSD representatives have participated in subcommittee meetings
• Curriculum Subcommittee
  • FUSD reviewed and provided course info for Engineering crosswalks for FUSD
  • FUSD representatives have participated in subcommittee meetings
  • FUSD has mapped out with FCC 9-12 curriculum maps for engineering minded students at Sunnyside, Hoover, Fresno, Duncan, CART, Bullard High Schools
• Guided Pathways Subcommittee
  • FUSD representatives have participated in subcommittee meetings and provided info where
    needed.
• Tutoring Subcommittee
  • No participation as of yet

Single Subject Teaching Pathway

• Efforts to begin dual enrollment (DuE) offerings of Math and English 1A lay the foundation for transferable General Education (GE) necessary for and an Associate’s Degree-Transfer (ADT) in Education/Liberal Studies.
• Current students enrolled in Education Pathway – 3-5% growth target, plus increased or introduction of DuE courses: Sunnyside HS: 100 students; McLane HS: 60 students; Roosevelt HS: 60 students; Edison HS: 20 students (3-5% growth= 7-12)
• Enseñamos counselors are embedded in reg-to-go and other college outreach activities as a direct resource for students to speak with if they are interesting in teaching as an educational path.

Anticipated Outcomes:

Targeted growth for this work would be 3-5% per year overall. Current student participating in the targeted pathways is 1,364 students (9-12). We are targeting a growth of 40 to 60 students participating in the pathways. Additionally, we will provide an increase of 5% of students participating in dual enrollment offerings aligned to the pathways with supports for success while in person (5% of 1,364 =68).

Metrics to be measured in the pathways:

• Completed 2+CTE courses in high school in the same program of study that include:
• Completed college credit, work-based learning, and/or industry-recognized certification
• Graduated high school
• Enrollment in summer camp experiences
• Enrolled in a California Community College within one year of leaving secondary school
• Enrolled in four-year university
• Enrolled in another form of job or vocational training (other than California Community College)

Anticipated quantitative outcomes:

• Increased enrollment in identified CTE courses (related to the industry sectors identified in the proposal)
• Increased number of college credits earned by our high school students
• Increased number of college applications to the State Center Community College District and four-year universities Higher graduation rates
• Increased number of work-based learning experiences for students
• Increased enrollment in summer camp experiences
• Increased entry-level employment opportunities upon graduation from Fresno Unified School District

Anticipated qualitative outcomes:

• High school teachers who offer dual enrollment opportunities will have a better understanding of post-secondary curriculum and content expectations
• Collaboration between high school and college instructors will improve instructional strategies across the Central Valley
• Collaboration between high school and college counselors will improve application and acceptance rates based on a better understanding of roles and responsibilities
• Students will gain confidence in approaching the college matriculation process
• Students will be better advocates for their educational opportunities
• Students will be more successful in post-secondary programs and accelerate to college graduation
• Students will want to contribute back to our community and expand and improve opportunities of future students
• Identify and address barriers to dual enrollment classes
• Seek to better understand barriers: interview people or hold focus group discussions to dig deeper into problems that students, teachers, and sites experience with dual enrollment.
• Investigate what is happening at sites with higher dual enrollment numbers that could be replicated in other places
• Learn how to best support students and teachers in the dual enrollment process Learn how to best support students and families in the matriculation process