TULSA Okla.
Student demand for enrollment in programs offered by Oklahoma’s
career and technology agency is more than the agency can afford to meet.
When school starts this year, about 12,000 Oklahoma
students will be on a waiting list for a slot in a CareerTech-funded class,
including 7,400 high school students wanting to take a class offered at school,
4,500 students wanting to enroll in a CareerTech
Center and 400 former students
wanting to enroll in CareerTech’s dropout recovery program.
“It’s very disheartening when you have to tell a
superintendent that says ‘I have 150 students that want to take this program,’
that ‘I can’t fund you,'” said Phil Berkenbile, director of the Oklahoma
Department of Career and Technology Education.
The agency’s state funding was increased about 4 percent to
$157 million for the fiscal year that began July 1.
CareerTech officials plan to ask the agency’s board of
directors to approve a request that lawmakers provide $15.2 million in the next
budget year to fund new programs, equipment and other costs to meet the demand
for programs.
“It’s not just about providing new programs,”
Berkenbile said. “It’s about expanding old programs, also.”
