Four State Laws That Could Blur the Lines Between School and Work

Think back to your high school experience. Did it help you develop a strong sense of your educational and career passions? If it did, did you graduate with a clear path toward achieving those aspirations? Did you finish high school with any of the academic or professional skills you needed to advance in your career? 

Many of us didn’t, and at Jobs for the Future (JFF), we think high school presents an ideal opportunity that’s too often being lost. We have a vision, called the Big Blur, that aims to erase the traditionally rigid lines between high school, college, and the world of work. JFF advocates for a unified education and workforce system that empowers young learners to explore their career interests early on and then efficiently and cost-effectively guides them, from the age of 16 to about 20, along a pathway to earning a postsecondary credential with labor-market value and entering a career that offers opportunities for economic advancement.  

The Big Blur has not been realized in its entirety. But states can create policy environments for blurring to take hold and transform entrenched and siloed approaches to funding, governance, and staffing. JFF undertook a review of legislation enacted by states during 2024 to get a picture of how they are moving toward the Big Blur and what steps they still need to take.  

We discovered two key legislative trends: 

1. Improving systems alignment
   Several state legislative measures attempt to strengthen collaboration between secondary, postsecondary, and workforce systems so that learners experience greater continuity in their pathways as they interact with various providers.  
2. Evolving high school expectations
   States are codifying the inclusion of college and career skills development and/or career exploration during high school, and some are integrating the acquisition of college and career skills into graduation requirements. In those states, every student will have access to early college programs of some kind and will be provided with the same information as they go through their high school experience. As a result of this step toward the Big Blur, students will leave high school with a range of skills or, at a minimum, clear knowledge of the steps to take on their college and career pathways. 

It’s worthwhile to note that most of the bills we examined passed state legislatures with bipartisan support—evidence of a shared understanding that young adults need more than a high school diploma to succeed in today’s economy. What we don’t yet know is whether these bills will be implemented effectively and in strategic ways.  

Increasing Transparency of Student Experience Data: Colorado HB24-1364

Rigorous and transparent data reporting allows learners and workers to make decisions that best fit their needs. Quality data is necessary for enacting evidence-based programs that are effective and affordable.  

This bill responds to recommendations from the Colorado Department of Education’s Secondary, Postsecondary, and Work-Based Learning Integration Task Force to move the state toward the vision expressed in the Big Blur by bringing career-connected learning, college credit, and industry-recognized credentials to all high schoolers. The legislation calls for a new study on outcomes of the state’s various postsecondary and workforce-readiness programs and associated costs and savings. State officials will use the results to propose an economical way to expand effective programs and bring alignment to reporting requirements and funding approaches. The second part of the legislation creates a state longitudinal data system to make these data-driven decisions possible.  

Making Dual Enrollment Intentional: Indiana S.B. 0008

Dual enrollment and college in high school programs are gaining popularity as ways to increase students’ ability to access and complete college courses while still in high school. Such programs are called “intentional” if they’re connected to desired college majors and career fields of interest.  

With this bill, Indiana is taking a big step toward intentional dual enrollment. The legislation calls for all high schools in the state to begin offering Indiana College Core coursework by the 2025-26 school year, or to submit an implementation plan to the Commission for Higher Education. Through the College Core coursework, high school learners can earn meaningful postsecondary credits while still at the secondary level. The program is a 30-credit-hour block of general education college-level coursework, and the credits students earn through it can transfer among all Indiana public institutions and some private ones. By scaling that curriculum statewide, the bill brings Indiana closer to the Big Blur. In the 2023-24 school year, 16 colleges and 222 of Indiana’s 433 public high schools offered the Indiana College Core, an increase of 81 high schools from the year before. The goal of this program is to have the Indiana College Core in at least 500 high schools by 2025.  

Guiding Students’ Pathways: New Mexico H.B. 171

The Big Blur vision holds that secondary education must include time for college and career exploration and preparation. This allows learners to begin progressing toward their post-high-school goals before graduation. It enables them to begin engaging their passions early, and it opens up an affordable approach to postsecondary education.  

New Mexico’s newly enacted legislation calls for every high school student in the state to create a “next-step plan” based on factors such as college and career readiness. These plans, required of students entering grade 9 in the 2025-26 school year, will be used to devise a path toward high school graduation and the fulfillment of requirements for the New Mexico Diploma of Excellence. The state’s high school diploma can support the Big Blur vision in that its purpose is to “demonstrate that a student is ready for success in postsecondary education, gainful employment, and citizenship and is equipped with the skills to be a lifelong learner.” Through grades 8 to 11, students will complete an interim next-step plan that outlines the steps they need to take in the following year to continue moving toward graduation. Criteria include curricular and course options such as dual enrollment, career pathways, and pre-apprenticeships. We hope to see meaningful implementation of this bill; for example, the credits students earn should advance their progress along their college and career pathways.  

Expanding Access to Credentials of Value: Virginia H.B. 1345/S.B. 199:

There’s an increasing recognition that high school graduation requirements are meaningful for learners when they reflect skills needed after high school.  

This bill requires the Virginia Board of Education to partner with the Virginia Community College System, directors of career and technical education programs, and industry partners to develop and maintain a list of industry-recognized workforce credentials. Local school boards are required to accept any credential on this list as a substitute for a required credit. Additionally, all College and Career Access Pathways Partnerships between a district and a community college must detail which credentials on the list can be substitutes for course credit. To line up with the Big Blur vision, these credentials must fulfill core course requirements, not simply elective requirements. To take the cross-sector partnerships to the next level, further development of quality measures is needed, and these credentials should be embedded in programs of study.  

What’s Next? 

Passing legislation is an important step toward transforming education and workforce systems, but it’s still just a single step. State priorities and leadership must also advance the legislative goals if implementation of the legislation is to be impactful. It’s also paramount to have measures in place that give all potential stakeholders, including learners, opportunities provide input; ensure that programs of study and other learning experiences lead to high-quality credits and credentials; and require college- and career-readiness programs to operate in collaboration with all involved systems. Otherwise, policies won’t reach their full potential.