PBEA is working hard to impact legislation. Watch this page as we bring you important information about the state of business education in Pennsylvania.

Read the White Paper prepared by Donna Gavitt for presentation to PA legislators.

PLEASE ACT NOW - November 29, 2009

Legislation has been written for recognition of NBEA standards for BCIT teachers in PA. House Bill 870 is currently in the House Appropriations Committee. There are 5 days left in Dec. 2009 for us to act!  Please call your representatives and ask them to support HB870 without the amendments attached.

It is the position of PBEA that standards exist in our National Business Education Association Standards and will not cost anything since the standards book exists and can be purchased at www.nbea.org .

NBEA Standards are current, and are cross-referenced with Pa Academic Standards. These standards are critical for maintaining a choice of business and computer courses for our students in PA public schools. The certification exists as Business, Computer, Information Technology and colleges in PENNA prepare teachers for this certification.

The fear is that this valuable 21st century teaching certification will  eventually fade away at a time when we need more of these skilled teachers, preparing students for business, computer, and information technology careers.

The problem: school administrators are phasing out these valuable courses because, they say, there are no standards for BCIT. Can we really afford to let our students get farther behind when they need these skills to get ahead?

PLEASE ACT NOW

BCIT Instructors need to pull together to get PDE to recognize the standards that we use in our curriculum.

Go to www.legis.state.pa.us to get to the legislation and your representatives.

Tech Literacy Skills from Education Week. A draft has been unveiled on Technology Literacy for NAEP. The draft is avabile at the above link. This may help you to determine what to teach and what benchmarks to use.

This discussion draft of the framework for the national assessment of technological literacy, the first to gauge students’ understanding of and skill in using a range of tools, has been presented to the board that oversees the testing program.

The computer-based National Assessment of Educational Progress in technological literacy, scheduled to be administered to a representative sample of the nation’s 4th, 8th, and 12th graders for the first time in 2012, will evaluate students’ understanding of technology tools and their design, the ways they can be used to gather information and communicate ideas, and their impact on society.

The PA Chamber of Business and Industry has a great deal of information concerning business in Pennsylvania.

The Total View newsletter - great information like the best places to work in PA.

PDE link to National Business Education Standards

Career Education & Work Academic Standards: Crosswalks

Programs of Study
The path to the link is PDE website, pre K-12 tab, Career and Technical Education.

Perkins IV
The path to the link is PDE website, pre K-12 tab, Career and Technical Education.

2008-2009 Approved Program Evaluation Checklist Self-Assessment aligned with Chapter 339
The path is PDE website, pre K-12 tab, Career and Technical Education, Publications.

Crossover Standards
Pennsylvania Academic Standards Cross-Referenced With National Business Education Standards

Legislative Update - Volunteers needed - Contact Donna Gavitt and BCTE to help in the crosswalk task mentioned below under Career Education.

In House Committee action:

Teacher Certifications – The House Education Committee amended HB 2427 but could not hold a final vote on it due to a lack of quorum. This legislation amends the Public School Code to exempt certified teachers from other states applying to certification in Pennsylvania from having to take the assessment exams, otherwise known as PRAXIS, used to evaluate an applicant’s basic skills, professional knowledge and practice and subject matter knowledge. The bill further deems the PRAXIS results of a certified teacher to be valid indefinitely. Starting with the undergraduate students matriculating in the fall of 2008, an applicant who has maintained a GPA of at least 3.25 in all required core and elective courses for the major academic area in which he or she intends to teach is exempt from taking the PRAXIS. The amendment adopted by the committee requires out-of-state teachers to have graduated with a GPA of 3.25 or more in order to opt out of the PRAXIS.

PSBA has not taken a position on HB 2427.

Career and technical education – The board also heard an update from Dr. Lee Burket, director of the Bureau of Career and Technical Education, regarding the bureau’s work to develop various programs of study considered “high-priority occupations” as identified by the state Department of Labor and Industry. The programs must include rigorous content aligned with both the state academic standards and relevant career and technical education content. Each program of study will include the aligned content so that it is integrated in a progression of courses to prepare students to succeed in secondary and/or postsecondary education.

A total of 64 programs currently have been identified. The bureau has completed the first seven programs: 1) Ag Mechanization, General; 2) Childcare/Support Services Management; 3) Carpentry/Carpenter; 4) Welding Technology/Welder; 5) Dental Assistant; 6) Health/Medical Assistants, Other; and 7) Accounting Technician. An additional 24 programs are expected to be completed by December 2008, and the remaining 33 will be completed by December 2009.

Burket also said that the bureau is working to “place crosswalks” in the academic and vocational education curriculum to better incorporate the academic standards and help CTC students improve their scores on the state PSSA assessments. The work includes the sharing of lesson plans from best practices across the state. In addition, the bureau is developing curriculum glossaries that link terminology used in various vocational courses with the same terms used in academic courses that are used on the PSSA tests. For example, the construction carpentry glossary defines the term “pitch” and equates it with the math term “slope” that might appear on a math PSSA test.