Career Connected Learning
Chancellor Banks has outlined a bold vision for New York City: through a reimagined student experience that centers career-connected learning, all students will reach long-term economic security. This vision is one where academic excellence is integrated with real-world skills and experience—giving students a head-start on college and career and helping them build a strong plan toward a path to a rewarding career.
Career-connected learning is an essential part of this vision. Starting in school year 2022-23, building on lessons in Career & Technical Education School and early college high schools, NYC Public Schools launched two pilot programs, which are the first investments in this vision: FutureReadyNYC and Career Readiness and Modern Youth Apprenticeship.
FutureReadyNYC (FRNYC)
FRNYC is a multi-year initiative where participating schools choose to build one of four career pathways: business, education, healthcare, or technology. Through this career-connected pathway, participating students will:
Explore a range of careers and take classes aligned to a career that interest them,
Develop 21st Century skills including digital and financial literacy,
Get real world paid work experiences like internships
Earn early college credit and industry-validated credentials, and
Be supported with personalized college and career planning to ensure successful transition into college and/or careers that provide family-sustaining wages.
FRNYC already serves 100 schools, with plans to grow by at least 50 percent next year. These schools are reimagining high school entirely, partnering with companies like Northwell Health, Google, and Goldman Sachs to braid college and career readiness into the very design of the student experience. Students gain sustained career exposure over four years, giving them a competitive edge when they enter the workforce and a stronger grasp of how their learning connects to the real world.
Modern Youth Apprenticeship
The gold standard of career-connected learning, offers paid, multiyear placements in the private and public sectors. Ninth and tenth graders at these schools take courses in career readiness, and then upperclassmen can apply to spend half a day, four days per week at apprenticeships. We had nearly 60 schools join our apprenticeship program last year, and in combination with FutureReady, we enrolled nearly 8,000 students in career readiness coursework.
Climate Science
NYC Public Schools are the largest contributor to the city’s solar energy goals, with 81 solar installations across our schools to-date. We are growing both our climate education efforts and our focus on green career paths, and we are launching Climate Action Days across our schools.
Virtual Education
We already have two remote options for our high schoolers: a fully virtual school and a hybrid option. And through a separate program, over 2,500 of our middle and high school students are enrolled in specialized courses, offered virtually, that aren’t available on their own campuses, from AP classes to world languages to electives. We are working toward a world where every high schooler, and many middle schoolers, can opt into high-quality online coursework, coursework that is more flexible and provides more opportunities than a standard brick-and-mortar classroom. Any student who is prepared to put in the hard work should be able to enroll in class on Saturdays, or in the evenings, to accelerate their progress toward graduation.