The Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) is partnering with UCLA Extension to train its career technical education (CTE) teachers. The training is intended to assist a group of teachers – who are often new to the field – with best practices to engage K-12 students.

“Our accredited instructors have many years of experience and are leaders in the education field,” said Antwon Martin, director of the Education portfolio at UCLA Extension. “We will provide these CTE teachers with the training and know-how to make their content palatable and engaging to LAUSD students, while setting those students up for future success in any number of amazing professional fields.”

CTE integrates technical training and academics to help students develop the demonstrated knowledge and applicable skills needed for transitioning to career training, post-secondary education and the workforce. LAUSD offers classes in a wide variety of industry sectors including agriculture and natural resources; business and finance; engineering and architecture; fashion and interior design; hospitality tourism and recreation; information and communication technologies; and public services and transportation.

To facilitate these classes, schools hire real-world experts who have not necessarily been trained to teach with a traditional teacher preparation program. Based on the gap between the profession and the classroom, LAUSD has sought ways to effectively support CTE teachers. Since LAUSD does not have a formal CTE preliminary teacher induction program, the partnership with UCLA Extension will help strategically fill that gap.

“Our new CTE teachers come from a wide range of expertise, but oftentimes don’t have the pedagogical understanding that is necessary for success in the classroom,” said Donna Lewis, who works as a CTE-linked learning specialist/school support administrator for the LAUSD Division of Instruction. “Our goal is CTE teacher retention. We want consistency and coherence in the classroom to prepare our students for postsecondary success, and we know that if a teacher leaves the classroom because they are frustrated or overwhelmed, it substantially undermines that goal.”

CTE teachers often arrive at LAUSD completely comfortable lecturing in front of a large group of college students or training adult learners. However, K-12 classrooms require teachers to be nimble and flexible collaborators in their subject matter expertise and simultaneously navigate challenges and obstacles associated with authentic hands-on learning.

“We need to teach the content to the students in a way they might best receive it,” Lewis said. “We’re bringing the real-world career skills and competencies to life in the classroom. We’re taking the academic core and marrying it with skills through demonstration and application of knowledge. We hope that we can provide our teachers with professional development opportunities that can empower them in a way where they can deliver the content and not just be the sage on the stage but the guide on the side – that they can usher the students forward with critical thinking and problem solving using a project-based learning framework.”

CTE classes offer an opportunity to bring the academic core classes (English, math, science) to life by infusing relevancy and understanding in preparation for industry success. Ultimately, students in CTE classes are ushered through the development of capstone projects that demonstrate easily observable technical and career-ready soft skills. CTE teachers serve as the foundation for bridging the industry gaps between novices and experts to equip students with the confidence and agency necessary to meet their goals and aspirations.

“We want students to move away from that rote memorization of content and really be able to problem solve and think critically about what they learned by applying it in real-world situations,” Lewis said.

With the rebranding of vocational education to CTE over the past 20 years, students will be poised and capable of tackling the jobs of today and tomorrow. Therefore, CTE teacher development is critical.

“High school students are taught these specialized skills they can carry forward in life,” Martin said. “It can be a work-based learning opportunity where they can actually, in their high school, receive those hands-on opportunities to work in that space.”

The inaugural CTE cohort will include 40 teachers – each with 0 to 1.5 years of experience – and run through June 2026. Moving forward, organizers hope to expand support to all LAUSD preliminary CTE teachers, which tallies about 80 teachers. Cohorts will meet monthly to discuss topics including teaching styles, instructional strategies, small group strategies, classroom community cultivation, SDAIE strategies, student empathy, student assessments and student benchmarks.

“We want to change the mindset of the teacher from giving a download of information to where they are seeking feedback and making sure students understand the lesson content,” Martin said.

The partnership between UCLA Extension and LAUSD will be transformative and long-lasting.

“We are the second largest school district in the country and UCLA is a highly sought after research institution – you bring those resources together as thought partners and there is power in that,” Lewis said. “We have dedicated, committed individuals on both sides who are willing to come together and collaborate on something that will benefit society.”

“It’s a great collaboration and a great partnership,” Martin said. “I’m excited for what is to come.”