Abstract
Since early 1990s, the United States has developed the "tech prep" (technical preparation) program, which aims to combine the occupationally oriented education of high school, and postsecondary vocational education. This paper aims to analyze and point out some characteristics of the tech prep curriculum, and discuss the "articulation" problems between the high school and the postsecondary institutions, such as community colleges. The contents of this paper are as follows; 1. In the early 1980s, the national reports on educational reform, e. g. A Nation at Risk (1983), by the National Commission on Excellence in Education, recommended to increase the number of units of academic subjects, such as English, mathematics, science, and social studies in the high school graduation requirements. But the trend of the arguments on educational reform changed in the early 1990s. There emerged the demands for workforce with higher skills as well as higher academic achievements, and the need of the "integration" of academic and vocational education was emphasized. Tech prep was one of the approaches to the implementation of such "integration". It aimed to provide the workforce with higher technical skills in the era of the high technology and the world competition in economy. The Carl Perkins Vocational and Applied Technology Education Act of 1990 was the first federal legislation to recognize and support the tech prep. 2. The Curriculum of tech prep programs, especially the high school level, usually includes (1) applied academics, e. g. applied math or applied science, and (2)vocational and technical education. They were expected to build the basis of the postsecondary vocational education at community colleges or technical institutes. Besides that, the School-to-Work Act (1994) made the work-based-learning an important part of the program. 3. The analysis on the example of "Central State Education-to-Careers Consortium" gives us some ideas on how much the original purposes of the tech prep program have been fulfilled. In that consortium, most of the vocational and technical subjects are provided at the "area vocational center" independent from high schools, as, the same as previous "vocational education" programs. Applied academics, such as "applied math" or "applied science", are not required for graduation of this program. Although some work-based-learning activities, e. g. "job shadowing" and "cooperative Education" are given, quite few students are enrolling the "youth apprenticeship", the most well organized this kind of activity. These facts make us have some doubts about the degree of the fulfillment of original purposes of tech prep.
