Vocational Schools Whether you are new to the job market or looking to enhance marketable skills, our private vocational or trade schools are an excellent starting point. These schools train students a variety of skilled jobs and lead to an associate's degree or professional certificate. Career areas include cosmetologists,for barbers, emergency medical techs, nurse's assistants, computer specialists, legal secretaries, travel agents, aviation mechanics, pilots, truckers, auto-racing support personnel and other technical, apprenticeship and specialty areas.
Trade & Vocational Schools A vocational school, also known as a trade school or career college, is a higher education institution in which students are taught the skills needed to perform a particular job. Traditionally, vocational schools were not liberal arts schools. Instead, they taught job-specific skills and concentrated primarily on training students to work in specific industries. In the 1990’s, this narrow vocational focus changed; and vocational schools moved toward a broader preparation of students that enhanced both academic and technical skills.
In the United States, vocational schools may take the place of the latter high school years; but they are generally considered to be post-secondary schools. Public trade and vocational schools are operated by the government, a school district or another officially-sanctioned group; and they may or may not charge tuition. However, most purely vocational schools are private schools; and within this group are non-profit and proprietary schools. Since proprietary schools are operated for the economic benefit of their owners, they have often suffered from a poor reputation due to a lack of quality and for exaggerating the job prospects of their graduates. But these shortcomings have been largely corrected by more stringent regulations. The term “career college” is reserved for post-secondary for-profit institutions. The prevalence of vocational schools has decreased sharply in the United States due to the offering of trade school classes at junior colleges and other higher learning institutions.
Many vocational schools now offer college degrees (associate, bachelor, master and doctorate); and the requirements for a particular program may include a liberal arts education. While some career schools may earn accreditation from national or specialized accrediting bodies recognized by the US Department of Education, a growing number of career colleges hold the same regional accreditation as traditional postsecondary institutions.
However, there is an issue with vocational or career schools that have national accreditation instead of regional accreditation. Regionally accredited schools are predominantly academically oriented, non-profit institutions. Nationally accredited schools are predominantly for-profit and offer vocational, career or technical programs. Each college has the right to set standards and refuse to accept transfer credits. However, if a student is enrolled in a nationally accredited school, it may be especially difficult to transfer credits (or receive credit for a degree earned) if he or she then applies to a regionally accredited college. Some regionally accredited colleges maintain general policies against accepting any credits from nationally accredited schools. Others are reluctant to accept the credits because they feel that academic standards are lower than their own, or they are unfamiliar with the particular school.
Students who plan to transfer to a regionally accredited school after studying at a nationally accredited one should research the transfer policies well ahead of time to ensure that they do not lose their earned college credits. There have been lawsuits against nationally accredited schools that led prospective students to believe that they would have no problem transferring their credits to regionally accredited schools. Notable among these lawsuits is Florida Metropolitan University and Crown College, Tacoma, Washington. The U.S. Department of Education has stated, however, that its criteria for recognition of accrediting bodies does not " . . . differentiate between types of accrediting agencies, so the recognition granted to all types of accrediting agencies - regional, institutional, specialized, and programmatic - is identical." However, the same letter states that "the specific scope of recognition varies according to the type of agency recognized."
The Association for Career and Technical Education (ACTE) is the largest American national education association dedicated to the advancement of career, technical or vocational education.
