The Career and Technical Education or CTE covers variety of subject areas that are designed for the students to prepare them for lifetime careers; the courses are formerly referred to as occupational education. The current documents and regulations of the State Education Department legislative language use all the CTE terminologies. However, the federal legislation and documents continue to position this curriculum as a vocational education. The Commissioner Regulations defined CTE as a kindergarten throughout adult area of study including precise academic contents that closely aligned in career and technical subjects. In grades nine to twelve, Career and Technical Education consists of disciplines of agriculture education, family and consumer sciences education, business and marketing education, technology education, trade or industrial education, and technical education. The principle of CTE is to offer learning experiences for the students to experience the awareness of broad range of different careers and develop their skills applicable to career and personal roles necessary for the employment in career areas or postsecondary study in particular.
The successful programs of CTE prepare the life of all the students as productive members of the society. There are good characteristics of CTE programs, the elements of the success of its programs are the following: First, the teachers are certified professionals who remain current in their area of expertise. Second, sequences of courses are prepared for the students for future employment or postsecondary studies. Third, it is a work-based learning opportunity. Fourth, business and industry consultant committees are always ready to provide productive inputs in the program. Fifth, it offers the opportunities to apply academic concepts to the real-world situations. Sixth, the programs allow the students the opportunity to earn credits for college-level high school programs. Seventh, CTE has preparations for the student in the industry-based assessments. Last, provides opportunities to use the latest business or industry-based technologies and to achieve the career cluster standards.
The content and structure of the Career and Technical Education or CTE is focus on what teachers should know and can do for the students and the school. It is not debatable that the CTE teachers are necessary in teaching academic concepts . Good academic skills provide positive influences to the students to master their technical skills and their success depends on the command of academic skills. The vision of CTE is articulated by well-round teachers joining in technical expertise with academic knowledge and skills. In the historical view, the technical knowledge and skills of the teachers in vocational education are more important than teachers with academic knowledge are. However, with the exposure on several symposiums on CTE, teachers embraced and agreed with the concept on academic content in education. The command of the core academic disciplines presented four statements that expressed the different qualities for CTE teachers. The statements are the solid grasp of industry skills, the equivalent of a master’s degree in the academic area associated with their field, mix of basic industry skills, and a strong grounding in the general workplace skills, and some industry experience and a minor in the academic area associated with their field.
In teacher liability, there is a great deal of interest presented with some basic reasons. Places that are prone to different accidents are schools or institutions and off-campus activities. School liability has increased over the years, especially in the tort liability area. The staple of education law is the tort liability. With these issues of accidents, possible legal actions or litigations are necessary. An increased of off-campus activities are evident to the public and the potentiality of danger of the accidents lead to legal actions or litigations, negligence in the part of the teachers. Recently, decisions in negligence cases are brought against school or institutions that indicate the frequency of unchanged legal proceedings. There are also an increased in seeking remedies of the issues and the concept of rights. More legal actions are presented that involves the teachers. In general, government immunity protects the schools from the issues of liability. There are exceptions that vary from different state in the country leaving the schools vulnerable to liability. Teachers should be reminded of the preventions that will avoid complaints or legal proceedings through informing them of their liability. In the end, legal representatives should prove the elements of negligence cases applied to schools and teachers, and for them to understand the elements to view the potential liability and prevent from happening.
The most important tort in the modern law is negligence; it is concerned in breach of legal duties to ensure the consequence that damage, caused to the claimant. Negligence is under the broader heading of the tort law; tort is a wrong committed by a person against the other. Negligence consists of not acting in prudent and reasonable manners by a person and that prudent and reasonable person would not do. The wrongdoing is subject to legal proceedings between persons when there is a duty on one person not acting negligence and the breach of duty occurs that caused damage to another person. Negligence exists in the activity or conduct on the part of the teachers that create unreasonable chance of dangers. When the teachers would ignore the danger or do not see the dangers even it is needed, they should be held negligent if the students are injured. Examples of negligence, people who are injured in car accidents and sued the driver, companies that lose large amount because the accountant failed to advise beforehand properly, or patients who sued the doctors for wrong medical treatment. Torts are identified by the interest of the claimant that they protect in particular. Nuisance protects against interfering with the use and enjoyment of land of the claimant while defamation protects against the damage to reputations. Negligence protects against personal injury, damage to property, and economic loss.
As defined in legal concept, there are four elements of negligence. First, is duty of care; someone must take reasonable move to ensure that no one will be hurt from his actions. Second, breach of duty; if a person does something that would hurt someone, then that person breached the duty of care. Third, factual causation; it is a proof that negligence has happened. The last element of negligence is the damages; the jury or the court needs to prove the weight of the damage caused the claimant. In the contrary, if a student contributed to the injury the teacher can use the defense of contributory negligence. If the jury or court discovers that contributory negligence is present, then the teacher is not being held liable. As an exception, in the case of younger students, to prove the contributory negligence is difficult because in many states, the tort laws hold that young children are incapable of the contributory negligence. Thus, the students can collect damages even if they did some contribution to the injury.
The concept for teachers acting in the principle of loco parentis is involved through legal standard. It implies that the teacher in relation to the student position as a caring parent or unofficial guardian. It allows the teachers the privileges of parents with their added responsibilities for the protection of the students. The teachers could be liable for damage caused to students if the conduct of the teachers falls below its standard of care. Teachers need to meet the higher standards of care with their special knowledge that makes the teachers aware of the dangers that normal parents would not appreciate. The principle of loco parentis influenced several aspects of the conduct and risk of the teachers. The criminal code states that every teacher, a parent, or a teacher standing in place of parents is justified in utilizing actions through ways of correcting a student or child, who is under his care and the force or action does not exceed the reason under the circumstances. The teachers are protected against the conviction of assaults because of its reasonable punishment of the students under their care and this is the application of the principle of the loco parentis concept. The School Act deals with the school boards’ power, and among the matters, it requires every board to carry liability insurance equivalent arrangements to cover the exposures.
Normally, the teachers are required to make sure that the system of supervision is established inside the classroom or in all activities to ensure the instructions and warnings provided to the students. In addition, the own experiences of the teachers provide good ideas of the levels of supervision as required to ensure the degree of safety adequately. Both the teachers and the administrators should decide the quality and quantity of supervisions for the school. It is the responsibility of the teachers to carry out the assigned duties of supervisory. It is argued that adequate supervisions do not apply a constant supervision of all the students all the time . The duty of the teachers is to guard the students against dangers that are seen and not to keep the students under their direct observation at all times. The extent supervisions depend on the mental ability, emotional stability, and age of the students being supervised accordingly. The lack of supervisions will cause or contribute to the injuries. If the teachers are performing on the assigned duties, the liability insurance of the school boards provides the needed protections in the legal proceedings to the extent of the limitations in the policies.
The teachers should take all the necessary steps to secure the medical attention to students who are ill or suffered injuries seriously. All the decisions are made with the consultations with the school head or principals. The opinions of the teachers and principal are required for the medical treatment of the injured or ill students. The immediate steps are necessary to secure the safety of the student, and notify the parents and advise them regarding the event and proposed steps taken. In case the parents are out of reach during the emergency, the teachers should bring the student to the nearest hospital immediately. After the child enters in the hospital with the care of the qualified doctors that is the time, the responsibilities of the teachers end and the remaining duty of the teachers is to continue their efforts to contact the parents.
In the modern economy, the foundation on academic knowledge and the technical skills are both essential to qualify for any job and to become successful. When the employers seek job readiness with the excellent skills, Career and Technical Education programs offer many ways to acquire the required knowledge and skills that strongly promotes the application of learning. The Career and Technical Education engages all the students and assists them to prepare for the employment and postsecondary education. In addition, the CTE stakeholders; the students, teachers, administrators, parents, school board and state school board members together develop a shared understanding and common goal about how the CTE programs fit in the overall education of the students. In the part of the administrators and especially the teachers liabilities and the challenges they are facing along the course in educating the students require coordination and perseverance. These obstacles can be conquered only if parents, school officials, the business community, and policymakers work as one.
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