Career-Connected High Schools Grant Program
In January 2024, the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction was awarded a multiyear grant from the U.S. Department of Education as part of its Career Pathways initiative, Unlocking Career Success. Wisconsin’s grant project, titled Unlocking Pathways Wisconsin, is intended to build capacity among secondary education, postsecondary education, and workforce development systems. The project will expand access to career-connected high school programs with the goal of increasing the proportion of students who graduate with these four keys that will unlock their career success:
- Key 1: Career Advising Navigation
- Key 2: Dual Enrollment
- Key 3: Work-Based Learning
- Key 4: Workforce Credentials
Part of the grant will involve creating a capacity-building model for 18 pilot high schools that enables them to “unlock” the state’s existing programs, resources, and partnerships connected to the Academic and Career Planning (ACP) program and the Regional Career Pathways (RCP) approach. Pilot high schools will each be matched with a mentor high school that has demonstrated success in most or all of the four keys.
Unlocking Pathways Wisconsin is about making sure that students in schools that are rural or have a high percentage of socioeconomically disadvantaged students (or both) can still receive an education that prepares them to move into a career of their choice—whether that career takes them through college, the military, or directly into the workforce.
For more information about the federal grant program, see “Raising the Bar: Unlocking Career Success.”