Indiana P-CAP

Expanding Pathways to Careers and Postsecondary for High School Students
Project Update

P-CAP Expansion

CELL has recently been awarded two grants - a grant from the Don Wood Foundation and a Rural Postsecondary & Economic Development (RPED) grant from the U.S. Department of Education - to expand the Indiana Pathways to Careers and Postsecondary (P-CAP) model to serve fifteen additional Indiana high schools.

Contact Our Team

Interested in learning more about P-CAP? Contact Brooke Marsh, Career Readiness Project Coordinator, at marshb@uindy.edu.

About P-CAP

The Center of Excellence in Leadership of Learning (CELL) is a longstanding leader in partnering with Indiana schools to incubate and expand innovative strategies for strengthening students’ college and career pathways. With initial support from the Indiana Department of Education, CELL is working with schools to develop and launch their own models of Pathways to Careers and Postsecondary (P-CAP). Within the evidence-based P-CAP model, each school designs their own local P-CAP program based on the assets and needs of their students, school, and community partners. The career pathways available to P-CAP students are determined by school leaders so that they align with students’ career aspirations, local high-wage and high-demand opportunities, and school resources. Many of the P-CAP programs offer multiple pathways to choose from including advanced manufacturing, construction, and healthcare.

Indiana’s P-CAP Model

The P-CAP model is defined by five strategies. P-CAP Strategies 1 through 4 are student-facing while Strategy 5 provides the foundation for the first four strategies by building a cross-sector infrastructure of local partners who come together to support P-CAP students and ensure they have early access to career and postsecondary attainment.
  • Strategy 1: Relationship-centered Learning
    The foundation for student support, community building, and family engagement is built upon relationship-centered learning, which leads to higher student engagement in the classroom.
  • Strategy 2: Integrated Hands-on Curriculum
    P-CAP facilitates learning by combining two or more core subjects and delivering them through project-based learning (including workplace learning challenges) offering students hands-on, integrated learning.
  • Strategy 3: Career Pathways
    P-CAP schools ensure equitable student enrollment in high school career pathways that are aligned with high-skill, high-wage, and in-demand industry sectors in the local economy. Every P-CAP student’s career pathway experience 1) is aligned with Next Level Programs of Study, 2) offers quality work-based learning, and 3) may result in them earning stackable workforce credentials.
  • Strategy 4: Postsecondary Pathways
    P-CAP also aims to increase the number of students with a postsecondary pathway by working to remove barriers between high school and postsecondary education that are often experienced by educationally disconnected students. Every P-CAP student’s postsecondary pathway experience offers 1) dual credit, 2) the ability to earn stackable credentials, and 3) advising support aimed at supporting the transition to postsecondary.
  • Strategy 5: High School, Industry, and Postsecondary Collaboration
    Local P-CAP programs are supported by a close working collaboration among high school, industry, and postsecondary partners. They work together to build the school’s blended career and postsecondary pathways and connect students to community partners who will help support their future goals and attainment with career-connected project-based learning and quality work-based learning experiences.

Indiana P-CAP mentor Schools

The following four schools were P-CAP pilot schools and will serve as mentor schools as part of the model's expansion: 

Indiana P-CAP partner Schools

The following schools are part of the 2024 cohort of new P-CAP programs:

History

Indiana Pathways to Careers and Postsecondary (P-CAP) was first funded in 2022 through an Explore, Engage, and Experience (3E) grant from the Indiana Department of Education (DOE). Four pilot high schools worked with CELL to implement the P-CAP model: Lincoln High School in Vincennes, Logansport High School, Perry Central Junior-Senior High School, and Winchester High School.

Roots in the P-TECH Model

The Indiana P-CAP model was informed and inspired by a model of Pathways in Technology Early College High School (P-TECH) that was developed by EducatorEdge, a division of Ulster BOCES in New York. EducatorEdge played a pivotal role in the early days of Indiana P-CAP by building the capacity of CELL and the four pilot school partners through training, consulting, and hosting study visits to their P-TECH partner schools including the Hudson Valley Pathways Academy, HFM BOCES, and Ellenville P-TECH High school. The Indiana P-CAP team at CELL is grateful for the mentorship and support provided by the EducatorEdge team that made Indiana P-CAP possible.

Students - with their needs and limitless potential - were the singular reason the four Indiana schools partnered with CELL on the dreaming, building, and refining of the Indiana P-CAP model in their communities. After leaders within the P-CAP pilot schools first saw the national P-TECH model in action, they walked away with one thought - “I can name which students in our buildings would thrive from an experience like P-TECH.”

The P-CAP model aligns with existing research on how to effectively bridge the gap between school and career pathways for students who have experienced prior educational disengagement. P-TECH is the foundational model that inspired and informed the adaptation and development of Indiana P-CAP to meet the unique context of Indiana. P-CAP is based on Indiana’s student needs and the education-to-workforce ecosystem. The two key differences in the P-CAP model are that 1) it is four years, not six, 2) it is not early college, and 3) it involves more career pathways than just technology.