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Career technical schools in Massachusetts will use a lottery system to admit students when there are more applicants than available seats, an approach that supporters say will ensure fairness and critics warn will water down education standards.
The Board of Elementary and Secondary Education voted 8-2 Tuesday to advance new regulations from Gov. Maura Healey’s administration that will require the state’s 29 career technical education districts to use the lottery system starting in the 2026-2027 school year.
Vocational programs have become increasingly popular in Massachusetts. According to a Lawyers for Civil Rights federal civil rights complaint that kicked off the state’s pursuit of the reform, during the 2020-2021 school year 18,500 rising 9th graders applied for 10,616 available seats in the state’s career technical schools.
In Greater New Bedford, up to 1,000 students from Fairhaven, Dartmouth, and New Bedford apply for 500 seats in Greater New Bedford Voc-Tech High School’s ninth grade class each year, according to reporting from the New Bedford Light.
Career technical education proponents say the programs open opportunities for high-wage, in-demand jobs. Some of the programs offered at career technical schools are automotive repair, HVAC, cosmetology, nursing, plumbing, IT support, medical assisting, dental assisting, and hospitality management.
Reform supporters have argued the current admissions process disproportionately leaves limited slots for students of color, English language learners, students with disabilities or those from low-income families, and that a random lottery would be more equal.
However, career technical school officials argue that criteria such as disciplinary records, absences and candidate interviews help them determine if a student is ready to be in a different environment than typical classrooms.
The regulations approved Tuesday do not mandate an automatic blind lottery for every school. Schools will be allowed to opt into using certain “weights” in their admissions lottery, if they choose.
Schools may use “student awareness” in weighting a student application in the lottery, which includes whether they’ve attended events such as open houses, tours or online video information sessions. They can also use “student interest,” which weighs whether students have submitted essays or done interviews at the school.
The career technical schools may also opt in to considering middle school attendance and discipline records in how they weigh students. After a public comment period attracted over 2,000 responses to the draft regulations released in March, the version voted on Tuesday made some small changes to this section.
Reform advocates argued that attendance and disciplinary records have disproportionately excluded low-income students, students of color, disabled students and English learners. The state education department changed the regulations to make clear that attendance and discipline weight may not include data from before a student’s 7th grade year.
“Schools maintain local control in determining which combination of criteria to use, including opting to use none of the criteria and running a non-weighted lottery,” Education Secretary Patrick Tutwiler explained.
In Greater New Bedford, the voc-tech school has admitted fewer low-income students, students of color, and English language learners than its sending districts. Over the last few years, Greater New Bedford has begun to implement a partial lottery to begin testing reforms to its admissions process.
Board members heard over an hour of public comment at their meeting, mostly related to the career technical school regulations, and debated for about an hour amongst themselves. Board members Michael Moriarty and Farzana Mohamed voted against the measure, and Tutwiler abstained, though he recommended members vote in favor of it.
Board Chair Katherine Craven also reminded members that though they voted on the regulations Tuesday, their fate could be tied up in the outcome of state budget talks, as the House pursues a legislative intervention to stop the admissions overhaul.
Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce President Tim Murray, a former lieutenant governor, called the vote for a lottery-based admissions system “a disappointing outcome that will unnecessarily water down admissions standards, limit voc-tech access for students and undermine the pipeline of skilled workers across the state.”
Murray urged lawmakers to pause implementation of the policy and establish a task force to study admissions practices and develop “effective solutions.”
“Our students’ future should not be determined by bouncing bingo balls in an unproven lottery system,” he said. “Unfortunately, Massachusetts continues to retreat from having high expectations and standards for our students.”
Tracy Griffith, racial justice program director for the ACLU of Massachusetts, said vocational schools in 2021 admitted 73.2% of white applicants, compared to 60.4% of applicants of color. She called the regulations a “crucial step toward ensuring equity and dismantling long standing exclusionary practices.”
“This shift is essential to fulfilling the democratic promise of our public education system, not just in name, but in practice,” Griffith said.
New Bedford Light reporter Colin Hogan contributed information to this State House News Service story.
And there goes the last decent public school above the elementary level in New Bedford. Just one more sacrifice to the pyre of political ideology.
Let’s be honest: The primary reason why Voc is the “good high school” is due to its being able to weed out kids who are violent, delinquent, gang members, or otherwise predisposed to antisocial behavior. That’s why it has higher academic scores despite having only half the academic hours of NBHS, and graduates students that are more likely to go to college.
Loosening entry standards at Voc isn’t going to magically make the violent and delinquent children better students. It’s only going to result in Voc’s fall to the same level as NBHS, and increase the flight of middle class families from the city once their first child graduates 5th grade.
Alas, our children are nothing but unfortunate guinea pigs to test the latest ideological fad of the state’s political class, nearly all of whom would rather jump off a skyscraper than willingly send their children to a gateway city public school.
“And there goes the last decent public school above the elementary level in New Bedford. Just one more sacrifice to the pyre of political ideology.”
100% agree.
So a child with discipline issues, attendance issues and horrible grades will be selected to the vocational school instead of an Honor Student? Someone explain to me how this is good educational policy? U can’t..anytime the government intervenes, its bad for the people.
NBHS complained that VOC was doing so well with their outcomes, so the woke politicians jumped in to solve a non problem. Typical Massachusetts, lets have everyone fail.
This is such an incredibly injustice to any student who has wanted to attend a vocational school. Shame on Governor Healy for allowing this to happen. Massachusetts has been going downhill for years when it comes to offering students an opportunity for a trade school education. A lottery is extremely unfair to those students who deserve a chance to learn !
Only 1 in 28 high school vocational students go onto their chosen vocation. That’s bad business. This dangling of a shiny carrot to a child and wasting tax payers money has gone on far too long. These schools are much more successful at a college level like that of NE Tech or in the labor unions. Some of these regional vocational school superintendents earn far more salary with far less students than district superintendents in the very same town, so much so that it would seam almost criminal. Some districts with their own vocational programs are merely padding a general district budget with monies earmarked for vocational education where those monies never get to the shops. Vocational shop budgets for tools, equipment and consumables are being stolen by districts to pad the general budget. Starting a new shop programs to receive additional money only too dumb down and underfund the shop to failure and close is a tactic used by some districts to pad the general budget. Where teachers nationwide in elementary, middle and special education are being laid off as a write this and students are simply being moved on to the next grade level without proficiency, it’s time for change. Oh, let us not forget about the millions of illegal immigrant children that are here that need a free education too.
The destruction of vocational education. Kids will get into Bristol Aggie with no interest in agriculture, and to the the exclusion of kids who would love to be there, because they want to avoid NBHS. Nice job.
I wonder when the Governor will begin tell MA State colleges that they must take apart every team from every sport, and select players that represent the racial make-up of the MA population regardless of talent, and ability to win, if any tax payer funds are used, then discrimination lawsuits should be filed if every team doesn’t have a diverse make-up, and don’t forget the LGBTQ+ and TS players, if it’s in society, it must be seen, heard across all schools.