At Thomas A. Edison CTE High School in New York City – a large, comprehensive high school in Queens – students actively shape the future of their school. Together with faculty, they contribute to projects that organically combine career and technical education with college preparation, establishing a model for integrating academic content with career-related learning.
In a recent class at a robotics shop, the teacher was difficult to spot among a sea of students working in small teams to design, code and tinker with their mechanical creations. Each student had a role, from shop foreman to time manager and clean-up crew. Allyson Ordonez, an 11th grade student, served as class ambassador, welcoming guests and showing them around the classroom.
“In your normal classes – English, math, science – you learn the basics, but this class takes those topics and combines them,” Ordonez said. “Math and science make up robotics and we take everything we learn from these normal academic classes and apply them to what we learn here.”
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Ordonez sounded more like a seasoned engineer than a high school student as she showed off a small drone she was building and described the equipment.
Edison attracts teens from all over the city with its thirteen career options – the most of any public school in New York City. Students can earn college credits through a partnership with the City University of New York, participate in internships and work-based learning at companies like Apple and Google, and receive industry certifications. If students pass these industry-recognized exams, they can work in tech jobs right out of high school while also pursuing associate and bachelor’s degrees.
In some ways, Edison’s offering is similar to other innovative CTE models across the country, which apply the excitement and engagement of career classes to rigorous academics. But Edison goes one step further by giving students enormous power in redesigning it.
Transitioning to Career and College Readiness
Edison opened in the 1950s as an all-boys trade school. Today it serves a diverse population of nearly 2,335 students. Principal Moses Ojeda is about the closest thing to an Edison lifer: He graduated in 1993 and later returned as a teacher before becoming assistant principal and then principal in 2012. He transformed the school from the days of typewriter and copy machine repair programs to state-of-the-art offerings including robotics, automotive technology, graphic arts and cybersecurity.
All of this stemmed from Ojeda’s early days as principal, when a student asked him a question that would change the trajectory of Edison’s education.
“We know we’re here for CTE,” Ojeda recalled the student saying. “But why do we need the academics?”
Ojeda asked the student, who was in the automotive field, if he had heard about Pascal’s law in his physics class. “And the child said, ‘Yes, I remember that.’ I said, ‘Okay, that’s your braking system.’ And I went around the room and connected to each academic area.”
Ojeda then turned to social studies teachers Phil Baker and Danielle Ragavanis to help students see the relevance of academic lessons to their careers.
“For them, CTE felt useful, while academics too often wondered, ‘Why are we teaching this?’” Baker said.
Ojeda supported Baker and Ragavannis in establishing a research and development department to engage students in design thinking, including articulating what makes learning meaningful to them. The R&D department has grown to include faculty from each department working with students to figure out how to integrate essential skills into core academic lessons. In this way, they apply one of the XQ Institute’s critical design principles for innovative high schools: Youth Voice and Choice.
“To take on a project, teachers have to work with one of the children,” says Ragavanis. “Students have a full seat at the table and should be our equals, and in some cases our bosses.”
Edison was later selected for Imagine NYC – a dynamic partnership between New York City Public Schools and XQ to design innovative, high-quality schools with equity and excellence at their core. Faculty members said this collaboration brought additional support and resources to scale their ideas to make the academic courses feel as relevant to students as the CTE classes.
Mastering essential skills
Driven by employer demand for “soft skills,” Baker and Ragavanis worked with student designers and faculty in the R&D department to develop “five essential skills”: communication, collaboration, giving and receiving feedback, design thinking and professionalism. These skills reflect XQ’s learning outcomes and now guide the learning objectives in many of Edison’s academic classes. Research shows that these outcomes, or goals, can help students succeed in college, in their careers, and in life.
For example, English Language Arts teacher Jason Fischedick created a student-run community theater, which he called “the most ambitious thing I’ve ever tried to do in the classroom.” Aside from the selection of the four student directors, Fischedick relinquished almost complete control of the process. Students were responsible for hiring a crew, casting actors, and organizing and leading rehearsals.
“We are in a time crunch and we have to figure out how to manage that time effectively to ultimately get a good product to show off,” said Colin Zaug, one of the student directors, from Grade 12. “It’s all about teaching of independence and preparing students for the real world. I don’t know how many of these kids will end up being actors, but it teaches us time management and how to stay focused on the task at hand.”
Baker said this is how the R&D department is modernizing Edison.
“We’re trying to create a link between academic classes and CTE classes, and bridge the gap that existed between the two, and make sure that academic classes have a career-oriented application,” he said.
Baker said ninth graders in the R&D department designed the essential skills section for their grade level so that regardless of the content of the lessons, they all receive the same immersion in crucial career skills. Student voice is now so integrated into Edison’s core that teachers collaborate with student designers to plan their units. And he said teachers are comfortable with the language of career-oriented learning and essential skills, while students appreciate the engagement and develop new levels of self-confidence.
Yordani Rodriguez, a 12th grader, used the essential skills in a number of leadership positions, from his work at Model UN to serving as editor-in-chief of the school’s literary magazine. And those are abilities that will serve him long after he leaves Edison.
“When you’re leading someone and they’re looking at you, you have to be on your toes,” Rodriguez said, noting that these skills are now always in the back of his mind. “I need to communicate, I need to receive feedback and most importantly, I need to be professional.”
Rodriguez will be a first-generation college student when he attends Columbia University in the fall. However, Baker emphasized that the essential skills will serve students wherever they go.
“This is something that all of our students should be able to use, no matter what they do in college or in their careers,” he said.
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Make time for innovation
The work of the R&D department touches students in every class. Nearly 40% of 9th graders are involved in classes taught by R&D members, and there are plans to expand. In addition to the essential skills, students also participated in using a project-based learning approach. Thanks to word of mouth and student shows to showcase their work, Baker and Ragavanis have expanded their R&D department to include 18 faculty in ELA, math and science, including new recruit Fischedick.
“They make me innovate every year and that’s why I joined this team, because I’m someone who likes to try new things,” he said. If something doesn’t work, he added, “That’s OK.” I have become more open about my classroom and what I can do in the classroom because I feel supported.”
Edison’s lessons are now influencing broader changes in New York City high schools. It is an anchor school among more than 100 high schools in the city participating in FutureReadyNYC, a bold new vision for career-related learning.
Edison students also apply their essential skills off campus. Once a week a group visits PS 175 in Queens. They lead 10-week cycles for students from kindergarten through 5th grade in more than 25 different courses, from cooking to robotics and Model UN.
As with the other opportunities at Edison, Baker says students gain a much deeper understanding of learning and careers by applying essential skills outside the classroom.
“It was an incredible experience for our students,” Baker said of the teaching opportunity. “They gain so much in terms of professionalism, trust and the ability to explain complex processes to people, which is a very difficult skill.”
Revelation: The XQ Institute is a financial supporter of The 74.
