Bill DeBaun, Senior Director of Data and Strategic Initiatives
Reading time: Four minutes
States are working harder than ever to ease and improve their students’ postsecondary transitions to college and career. Illinois’ Postsecondary and Career Expectations (PaCE) Framework is one such
effort that “was developed…to provide guidance…on what types of experiences and information a student should have in order to make the most informed decisions about college and career planning, beginning in 8th grade and continuing through high school.”
The PaCE Framework is a model other states might consider for themselves.
Legislation passed in June 2022 requires Illinois’ public school districts to adopt and implement
the framework for grades 6-12 over the next three academic years (including 2022-23). More information on the Postsecondary & Workforce Readiness Act is also available on a mini-site with decidedly
more digestible language than the legislation.
Postsecondary Education Exploration, Preparation, and Selection.
Financial Aid and Literacy.
The framework then notes, by grade, what students should be supported to do and know by the end of that academic year. Sure, there’s a lot of bullet points in the chart above, but NCAN members and most college and career readiness professionals won’t
see a whole lot of surprises there in terms of what’s included. What’s most valuable is having all of these named and collected in one place for those districts and schools who are interested in leveling up their college and career readiness programming.
It's true that you can’t throw a stone 10 feet in the education field without hitting a framework, model, or checklist of some kind, but this isn’t something the state of Illinois dropped on districts and schools and then walked away from. First, PaCE
has been adopted by the Illinois State Board of Education, Illinois Board of Higher Education, Illinois Community College Board, and the Illinois Student Assistance Commission “for benchmarking key points in the college and career planning process
for students.”
Beyond that, however, there’s a whole bunch of resources on how to implement the PaCE framework. Some districts and schools had already been doing so voluntarily, but many more will have to do so in order to be in compliance with the 2022 legislation.
To support that implementation, ISAC is providing these training opportunities and resources:
On-demand webinars that offer an overview of PaCE and updates as they happen
In-district training opportunities that include:
A “PaCE Framework Development Workshop” that “takes a school/district team through the creation of their own PaCE aligned framework. During the workshop, an ISAC facilitator will lead a discussion with the team in order to build consensus
and develop their own framework. Upon completion of the workshop, the school/district team will receive a formatted version of their framework from ISAC as a follow up.”
“Implementation support sessions,” which are a series of three one-hour meetings to guide a district or school’s PaCE team through the three steps of the implementation process.
A robust implementation guide, written in real life words you’ve seen before somewhere outside of a consultancy(!), that walks through key parts of PaCE implementation
like identifying a team to do this work, building stakeholder buy-in and understanding, and developing and following a game plan.
The PaCE framework also overlaps with the Illinois State Board of Education’s College and Career Readiness Indicator (CCRI), part of the state’s accountability system, and College and Career Pathway Endorsements, which find students completing “an individualized
learning plan, a career-focused instructional sequence, and professional learning opportunities.” To keep all of this straight, there’s a crosswalk that shows which elements of PaCE
contribute to these policy and pathways elements.
NCAN is increasingly focused on how states can drive college and career readiness for their students. For example, we recently announced a set of state policy levers by which we’re measuring states’ progress, and we are hosting a set of state policy working groups to focus on
universal FAFSA, state grant aid systems, and college completion strategies.
Illinois brings us a very good example of a state with a coherent vision of what it wants its students to know and experience before graduating high school. NCAN will keep an eye on implementation and report back as updates warrant. Have questions or
concerns? Email me at debaunb@ncan.org, I’d love to hear from you!
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