Career Pathways and Integrated Instruction: A National Program Review of I-BEST Implementations

Kenneth Couch, Matthew Ross and Jessica Vavrek ()
Additional contact information
Jessica Vavrek: Research Analyst

Journal of Labor Research, 2018, vol. 39, issue 1, No 5, 99-125

Abstract: Abstract Contextualized educational programs nested within career pathways provide instruction aimed at improving academic and vocational skills in the context of learning about a specific career or occupation. When the emphasis is on vocational training, contextualized education is commonly referred to as integrated instruction. This review provides an overview of the conceptual motivation and major elements of the career pathways and contextualized education approaches, with an emphasis on integrated instruction. This conceptual framework is used as the basis for conducting a detailed review of the important elements, operation, and empirical evidence of various local implementations of the Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training (I-BEST) model. We focus on variants of the I-BEST model, initially conceived and implemented in Washington, because it is the most widely known application of these approaches. Although several evaluations of Washington’s program found it to be more effective than traditional alternatives, we find little empirical evidence in support of the short-term local variants implemented elsewhere. This review provides important considerations for program administrators and policymakers as well as observations regarding gaps in knowledge regarding program operation and outcomes that deserve additional research.

Keywords: Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training; I-BEST; Contextualized education; Integrated education; Career pathways (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s12122-017-9251-x Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:jlabre:v:39:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1007_s12122-017-9251-x

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/economics/journal/12122

DOI: 10.1007/s12122-017-9251-x

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Labor Research is currently edited by Ozkan Eren

More articles in Journal of Labor Research from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().