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productive future workforce. The goal is to make
education relevant so students stay engaged in
school and understand why they need to know
what they are being taught in the classroom.
Linked Learning helps prepare students for both
college and careers, but schools can’t do it alone.
Employer partners are key to ensuring students
are learning industry relevance and getting that
practical experience that is hard to find in a
traditional high school setting.
Employers engage by offering a wide range
of work-based learning experiences, from
classroom speakers to job shadowing days to
paid internships and many activities in between.
At SMUD, for example, “career ambassadors”
are trained to go into local classrooms and teach
students about careers in energy. Employees
talk about their own career paths and the skill
sets needed to thrive in the workforce, and they
engage the students in mock interviews and
competitions like science and engineering fairs.
But SMUD’s commitment doesn’t stop there;
they also host six-week paid internships for 25
high school students every year. Students are
placed in various departments and they work
closely with SMUD employees who teach them
about the various facets of their department
and how they interface with other departments
and customers.
And what’s the ROI on this investment in
prospective future employees? SMUD reports
that it has hired 52 of its interns over the 14
years that they have been engaged in this work.
“We believe that a robust educational system that
is successful in educating students and having
students that are prepared for the world of work
is one way that you see a community thrive,”
said King.
UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital Oakland also
offers internships. Community Health & Adolescent
Mentoring Program for Success, or CHAMPS, is
the hospital’s three-year internship program that
introduces about 100 underrepresented minority
high school students to the realities of health
professions. Each student participates in six- to
eight-week clinical rotations in different hospital
departments, and seniors present capstone
projects incorporating their internship experience
at the hospital, community clinics, and private
medical offices.
Their goal is to equip otherwise at-risk students with
the skills to succeed in the demanding and critical
health field. A significant percentage of students
who participate in the program go on to four-
year universities and graduate health profession
programs, like medicine, nursing, physician
assistant, pharmacy, public health, and social work.
“This is our opportunity to take what they learn in
the classroom and apply it in a real-world setting,”
said Michelle Ednacot, Academic Coordinator for
CHAMPS. “I believe the ROI is really providing a
more diverse workforce in health careers, and
letting (students) know there are jobs out there
for them.”
SunPower Corporation is another leader in work-
based learning. The Linked Learning students
they engage learn how to design and install
residential solar panel systems, and SunPower’s
efforts to provide a six week-long comprehensive
solar science summer experience this year to over
240 high school students is showing returns.
The project design and implementation strategy
is a direct response to the Linked Learning
O
akland school officials believe high
school students are more serious about
classwork and study harder when they
can connect their high school curriculum with
real-world work.
Armed with data showing that students involved
in internships tend to do better academically,
Oakland Unified is embarking on a plan to bring
a career pathways curriculum, which combines
work experience and academics, to all of its 9,200
high school students.
It’s part of a “Linked Learning” high school
improvement strategy that also includes providing
each student with an advisor and creating small
learning communities in which students interested
in the same career paths take classes together for
several years.
OUSD already offers Linked Learning internships
and advising to about a third of its students in such
fields as health care, digital media, engineering
and art. Most of its high schools offer some career
programs, while at two high schools, MetWest High
School and Life Academy, the entire curriculum is
designed around internships and career pathways.
Studying data about its own students from
2011-2012, OUSD found that graduation rates,
college preparatory course completion rates
and standardized test scores were all better, on
average, among high school students in career
Oakland Unified
Implements
Linked Learning
