The Oregon Association for Career Technical Education held its annual conference at the Seaside Convention Center on the coast this past April 13th to 15th. It was great seeing so many leaders making an impact with students across the state and being with people in person as over 100 people came by our Grouptrail booth. Having lived in Oregon for over 22 years and seeing the impact of Oregon public school educators on my kids and their growth, it was a moment to reflect on how thankful I am to have the opportunities I’ve had to be involved with this community for so long. The energy and stories shared with me from everyone across the state at the conference was inspiring and I appreciated the conversations I had - I’m grateful for all the interest in Grouptrail.
During our presentation at the conference, I shared that already, 50% of Oregon high school students are covered by Grouptrail through our current contracts with schools, districts, education service districts, and regional consortia. 45,038 student data records are currently being synced from Oregon student information systems in Grouptrail with an additional 51,214 being synced next. And thanks to our long list of integrations, we’re ready to flip the switch on adding another 18 districts after that.
With Work Based Learning becoming a vital part of CTE data, we heard over and over again that teachers, counselors and school administrators are looking for a user friendly and streamlined way to collect student participation, community partner engagement, and WBL activities related data. As a result, Grouptrail has partnered with Portland Public Schools in addition to 5 ESDs and regional CTE organizations, across 7 states, 60 districts, and 1,000 schools while sharing WBL program tracking insights, IT/legal agreement/procurement best practices, and a statewide level framework for continuity success at the Oregon ACTE Conference and beyond.
In our WBL related conversations, here are the top ten WBL tracking needs that have come up, all of which are built into Grouptrail:
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The solution serves small schools to large schools.
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Integrate with multiple student information systems.
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Incorporate existing industry partnerships and categories.
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Training and ongoing customer and technical support for sustainability.
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Customizable front facing and back end interface.
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Teachers can enter in a WBL experience for one or more students —easy, simple, and no duplicates.
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Ability to track all Career Connected Learning opportunities.
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Outreach related to options, special populations,hours, grade levels, and more.
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Track innovative interventions to engage students and configure custom categories to reflect internal needs.
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Admin, counselors, teachers, and students all can enter in data directly.
Thank you all for coming by to say hello and I’m looking forward to working with everyone to help realize our shared career success vision for students all across the Oregon!
—Justin