College or Career Ready, But Not Both? Heterogeneity of Career and Technical Education (CTE) Programs and Income-Based Inequality in Access and Participation

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Pentious

Career and technical education (CTE) is designed to prepare students for both college and careers, yet inequalities in K–12 schooling may shape who can access and participate in different CTE offerings. Using a non-parametric clustering approach, the study reduces CTE into two types—career-focused and college-focused—each linked to divergent postsecondary opportunities. Regression analyses show school district income predicts access to college-focused CTE and that access inequality drives participation inequality. The work also finds participation differences despite similar likelihood of offering career-focused CTE.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages13

Reading Time33 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

CTE and readiness frameworks

Motivation: inequalities in access and participation

Conceptual reasons for variation across districts

Heterogeneity in CTE program focus

Inequality across school districts

Study approach and analytic plan

Non-parametric clustering of CTE types

Regression analyses of income and access/participation

Findings (overview)

AERA Open January-December 2025, Vol. 11, No. 1, pp. 1–13 DOI: 10. 1177/23328584251334378 Article reuse guidelines: [sagepub.com/journals-permissions](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)[ ](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)© The Author(s) 2025. [https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero](https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero) College or Career Ready, But Not Both? Heterogeneity of Career and Technical Education (CTE) Programs and Income-Based Inequality in Access and Participation Jane Furey University of Michigan, Ann Arbor Career and technical education (CTE) programs aim to prepare students for college and careers in a wide range of occupations and industries. However, it is necessary to examine how existing inequalities in the K–12 education system structure access to and participation in different types of CTE. Using a non-parametric clustering approach to categorize CTE programs, I demonstrate that CTE can be reduced to two types—career-focused or college-focused. These two types of CTE offer participants divergent postsecondary opportunities. I then use regression analyses to show that there is apositive association between school district income level and access to college-focused CTE, and inequality in access shapes inequality in participation. However, school districts are similarly likely to offer career-focused CTE, but students in higher-income districts are less likely to participate. These findings highlight how income inequality between school districts influences CTE access and participation. Keywords: educational policy, high schools, social stratification, vocational education, disparities, descriptive analysis, regression analyses, secondary data analysis, career and technical education, nonparametric analysis Policymakers and researchers alike have called for more robust postsecondary pathways that prepare students for a wide range of opportunities (J. E. Rosenbaum, 2001; J. Rosenbaum et al., 2015) . These calls have contributed to movement toward a “college and career readiness” focus in secondary schools (Conley, 2012) . Career and technical education (CTE), an updated approach to vocational education, has emerged as an integral piece of the “career and college readiness” framework. While previous models of vocational education tracked students out of academic coursework and into career-specific courses, CTE aims to combine academic rigor with career-relevant skills to prepare students for additional education and higher-skilled employment in a variety of industries (Holzer et al., 2013). However, as CTE expands, increased attention to how various inequalities in the education system shape students’CTE experiences is necessary. A recent report states that the “history of differences in experience and access to CTE based on race, class, and gender make it incredibly important for studies of CTE impacts to include explicit checks on whether access and impacts are equitable”(Dougherty et al., 2020). A growing body of literature focuses on how students’ individual sociodemographic attributes shape access to and participation in CTE, but inequality between school districts can also play a role in shaping educational inequality. The current study explicitly analyzes how access to and participation in CTE is shaped by existing forms of socioeconomic inequality between districts in the K–12 education system. There are two primary reasons access to and participation in CTE might vary across school districts: growing heterogeneity in CTE programs and rising inequality between school districts. First, CTE programs have diverse foci. CTE programs aim to prepare students for future education and employment and span 16 federally recognized “clusters”that roughly map to industries ranging from culinary arts to information technology to healthcare. As the variety ofCTE programs grows, opportunities associated with CTE will vary. In fact, recent work finds substantial heterogeneity in participation in and r

FAQs

How does the study categorize CTE programs?

It uses a non-parametric clustering approach to group CTE into two types: career-focused and college-focused.

What is the relationship between district income and CTE access?

Regression analyses show a positive association between school district income level and access to college-focused CTE.

How does inequality in access affect student participation?

The study finds that inequality in access shapes inequality in participation, meaning students participate differently across districts based on access patterns.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Pentious