Ryan Stoyer: Welcome to the PBL Simplified podcast for administrators brought to you by Magnify Learning, your customized PBL partner. From over a decade of experience with you in the trenches, we are bringing you this top rated educational podcast designed for visionary school administrators seeking to transform their schools with project-based learning. Launch your vision, live your why, and lead inspired. Here's your host, Ryan Stoyer. Welcome to the PBL Simplified podcast. I'm your host, Ryan Stoyer, CEO of Magnify Learning, and we've got a leadership guest episode today. So, if you've been following the podcast for a while, you know, we've got these solo episodes that we do where maybe I go and tackle some portion of project-based learning specifically for leaders on this podcast. And then every now and then, we bring in leaders because we want you to hear what's happening around the country. And we're in the middle of really a series and focus on CTE. So, we wanted to bring somebody in who's doing some innovative work in the CTE space and let you hear kind of what he's doing. So, we've got Jason. Jason, thanks for being on the podcast.
Jason Lucia: Yeah, Ryan, thanks. It's great meeting you and I really appreciate you having me on.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah, Jason. So, uh your bio says you're an innovative at—Well, I threw in the innovative actually. You didn't have that in there, but with the work that you're doing, the articles that I read, like you guys are doing things differently, so I'm really excited to have you on the podcast, but you're administrative director at Central Westmoreland Career and Technical Center in Southwestern Pennsylvania. So, we're Pennsylvania doing some some good work. So, when did you know that you were going to be an educator?
Jason Lucia: Yeah. So, um I was I was in my fourth year of of my bachelor's degree at the University of Pittsburgh and uh uh it was the early 2000s. I I was uh majoring in computer science and uh it was—that's whenever the tech boom was happening and the market was flooded. Salaries were low, jobs were plentiful um but full—a lot of a lot of IT guys out there and I couldn't find a job. So, I I was walking through campus one day and uh my my uh my friend at the time—uh I eventually married her—um was working at the school for blind children which was on the pit campus and uh she had said, "Hey, you may want to swing by. They're looking for people to work the evening shift um to work with, you know, a little bit older students uh that had not just visual impairments but other uh other disabilities." And I'm like, I I could really use a job. And uh so I I I stopped in and uh really cool experience even just stopping in. Uh the—the receptionist, the gentleman, um he was visually impaired. He was blind. And when I walked through the doors, um I noticed he was blind. Of course, awkwardly. I don't—at the time I didn't know how to even engage. And uh and he's like, "Uh I know you're standing there, so you can—you can come over. I—I'm not deaf. I'm blind." And and it was funny. That was enough to—to—to—to be the ice breaker for us. So, I start having a conversation and uh he—call—I said, "I just would like to—to get some info and apply, you know, cuz I'd like to—to have a job." And he calls upstairs and next thing you know, I'm walking around the the school basically on an interview and the supervisor is like, "Um, so can you start at like three o'clock today?" And I'm like, "Oh, okay. We're doing this."
Ryan Stoyer: So, you know that. Yeah. And I mean, it's like—it's those moments of impact in life, you know, it's—it's—I was—I was in the right place at the right time and I—I—you know I truly believe I was supposed to be there and I met a group of students in my—in my first year that changed the way I thought and it made me really appreciate life uh because they—and this is no pun intended—they saw things differently.
Jason Lucia: Yeah, that's good. And—and—and the best part about it is is they really um they really showed me a way um uh of—of how I wanted to—to be an impact uh in society and and on—on other people's lives. And that's when I—I was like, I want to—I want to shift gears. I want to be in education. And so from there, you know, I—I—I spent a few years there and then next thing you know, I'm—I'm teaching tech classes at a high school, you know, at—at a Catholic school in Pittsburgh. And then I move on because um that school I helped um I helped move that school moved to a new location uh north of Pittsburgh and I didn't want to move north. I kind of wanted to move south actually uh to—to the southern region of—of southwest PA and a CTC job was open over in Lake Trobe, Pennsylvania. So I applied for it. I got it. I became a computer engineering teacher and that's where my CTC journey started. And I really—that—I—I—I really—I can't say I would never but it'd be really hard to get me out of CTE right now because I—it definitely is my cup of tea when it comes to education.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah, I love it. I love hearing your story. Thanks for sharing that—there's calling in that, right? You maybe started looking for a job, but—yeah, but your wife, I love it. Uh girl is a great way to get you moving in the right direction. How about that? Right? Right. So, yeah, I'll follow. And uh but then found a passion, right? And completely change the direction of your life. And so now you're in CTC. What—you—you say like that's your place? Like why is that? Why is CTC kind of your thought?
Jason Lucia: Because because you can reimagine yourself. So, you know, one of the first times in my administrative side of career and tech ed um you know, we do—we do annual tours for ninth, you know, eighth and ninth graders, and that's—that's a standard, you know, to—to explore different program options. And the one thing that I realized, I was talking to a group of of ninth graders at one of the CTC's I was at, and the ninth graders kept asking all these really, really inquisitive questions about like what can you do and and what can I be and who can I be? And then it hit me. I'm like, man, we have magic doors on the front of our CTC. Kids can leave their baggage, all their problems, you know, even who they don't want to be at that given time. They can leave that all at the curb and and then walk in and reinvent themselves and be somebody different and really strive to be to—to be what they want and who they want to be. So, that's—I mean, that's really my tagline is every CTC that I'm a part of, we—we install magic doors. And—and they can—and students can come in and they can reinvent themselves. You may not be a great academic student and that's okay because there's a path for you and there's a really great chance that if we can help you explore what career and tech ed can offer, we can get you into a place where you're happy and you can succeed.
Ryan Stoyer: That's so good. We install magic doors. I—That's—That's good, Jason. I like that a lot. So, you mentioned, you know, kind of these eighth-ninth grade interviews. Those—those are standard, but you're also doing some things that are not standard. So, what—what I came across that really intrigued me to have you on the—on the show is uh at the the Consortium for Public Education published an article that you guys were in and it said, "We want every student regardless of their home district to have access to meaningful hands-on career preparation that connects directly to workforce needs."
Jason Lucia: Absolutely.
Ryan Stoyer: Let's talk about some of the things you're doing differently.
Jason Lucia: Yeah. So, you know, the one thing that—that frustrated me because Pennsylvania, it tends to be a siloed state. You know, there's the—there's the district, LEAs, the high schools, they stand by themselves, and then there's the CTC's where—the other school. And, you know, I—I—I've—I've lived too long in education to—to—to just put up with, you know, well, it's just always been this way. And that's probably the one thing that really irritates me. And, you know, another—another tagline that I always use is challenge accepted. And—and—and—and that's one of the things that—That really kind of gets me—gets the fire going with me because I've had families call my CTC, Central Westmoreland, and we have the only secondary level uh lineman's program in the state.
Ryan Stoyer: Okay.
Jason Lucia: So, students can come to my school that are part of my consortium of schools, the 10 of them, and they can—they can be in the lineman program. And I mean, we're putting out—I would say 80% of our students on graduation already have job offers in the lineman industry and they're making more money than I could have ever imagined at the age of 18.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah, that's right. That's what always blows me away with CTE, CTC is—Yeah—Sometimes it's seen as the other pathway. It's like, okay, with the other pathway, what is—what are the salaries of some of these kids are doing this lineman work we're talking about?
Jason Lucia: So, so entry level um in—in our area for either First Energy or for Duquesne Light is in and around 65 to $70,000.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah, that's not bad when you're 18. That's pretty good for an 18-year-old, you know.
Jason Lucia: And then—so—so—and—and—and one of my favorite stories is um it was my third year here at Central Westmoreland and you know I hear—I hear this diesel truck pull into the parking lot. I'm outside. I hear this diesel truck pull into the parking lot. This young man gets out and he got on fancy cowboy boots and you know fancy belt buckle and it's—it's a young man that graduated three years—you know my first year there—and I'm like, "Oh man, it's great to see you really appreciate you coming back to visit." And I go, "That's your truck?" He goes, "Yeah I just bought it." And I'm like, "Oh, that's really cool." And uh and I—I said, "So, what are you doing these days?" He goes, "Well, I also just bought a house." And I'm like, "Oh, okay. So, like you're—you're 20-21 years old. You bought a house. You got a truck." And I go, "Um, you know, how—how you managing your money? I know we do a lot at the CTC to help our kids understand, you know, the financial literacy part of life." And, uh, and he goes, "I don't have any loans. I—I pay cash for these."
Ryan Stoyer: What?
Jason Lucia: And I said, "Well, how'd you make all that money?" And he goes, "Somebody told me that I can make a lot of money if I was willing to—to—when I was asked go out on the the Dakota's pipeline and weld." And—and then um he goes um—I—he goes, "I—I told him I'm a lineman. I don't want to go out there and weld." And they go, "Oh, our partner company out there that are running—they're running the pipelines, they're also running them in conjunction with—with all the power lines and the power grid out there." So they hook this young man up with a job out there and He's making six figures right out of the gate, you know, as a 19-year-old.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah.
Jason Lucia: And he's like—the overtime. He's like, "Overtime, I bought a house."
Ryan Stoyer: I'm like, "Oh, I love that's—that's amazing."
Jason Lucia: You know, and that's one of hundreds if not thousands of kids that walk out of here that—that—have—have a really great story to tell because when he came here, he was unsure. When he was going through the process, he was figuring out a plan and then opportunity presented itself for him and he took a risk and I think that's one thing that you know we try to—we also try to encourage is don't fear all risks you know and—and—that's really something that if you fear every risk you're never going to see true success and you know we—we—we tell kids that you know we want you to be—we want you to be fearless and not reckless and we want you to be able to really showcase your skill set and not be afraid to and you know that—that—that's one of them. I will tell you another—Another great story. We had a welder that um you know and he's—he's getting ready to graduate. Uh he was deathly afraid of school when he first got here. You know, had attendance issues and—and the whole deal and found a passion in welding and found a real connection with my—I have three welding teachers and—and one assistant there. We have a big welding program. Um and—and—the teacher's like, "Hey, listen. I'm going to connect you with a company that I think would be a good fit for you." And whenever my teacher told me, you know, who the company was, and I'm like, "You really sure you want to put this kid out with it? Like they—they work their people—like they make a lot of money, but they—they have high expectations and they hold them accountable." He goes, "I promise the people there will be good with this kid." So, you know, I just—I just had my uh cooperative education uh coordinator give me the report on where our co-op kids are at right now. And this young man is making $24.50 an hour on a paid internship experience with this company. And they just offered him full-time employment upon graduation with full benefits.
Ryan Stoyer: Wow. Uh Wow.
Jason Lucia: And this—this kid was afraid to come to school.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah. Right. Our goal isn't to just have kids be happy at school, right? Like we're preparing for the next step, right?
Jason Lucia: 100%. And again, we always look at learning and—and I didn't mean to interrupt, but you look at learning and I think I was in a conversation um last week at a conference up in Hershey and—and it's—we talked about school and the first thing that I said, "Close your eyes and when I see the word school, what do you—what do you think of?" And they—they said, "I picture a building." I go, "That's where we go wrong." I said, "We don't have to learn in buildings that look like the traditional schoolhouse anymore." I said, "My—I said, my learning platform for my kids at the CTC is wherever they can take in knowledge and then apply it—apply that knowledge into—into a task and actually show their skill set." And whether it's up on a utility pole, you know, running lines over to our 150 ft tower that we have on our campus that the kids really learn how to run lines or we also have a—a pipe welding area. Um we're in our intro year. We—I ran a pilot for six kids out of our welding program where they got their diver one and soon to be diver 2 to learn to be underwater welders.
Ryan Stoyer: Wow. Yeah.
Jason Lucia: I mean—so—so—outside—like I love outside the box thinking. I love innovation. I love innovative thinking. And you know I'm going to get to the next—the next stage of of what the article was really about—about um that they wrote was, you know, I—I talked about the family that called and—and they were asking me um they—they're not one of my—they're not from one of my 10 schools and they said, "We know you have a lineman program and we'd love to send our—our child there. How do we do that?" So I said—I said, "You can, but the problem is I don't have any space. Like I don't have room. There's no seats available." And you know, I started having that—that conversation of why—why don't other students have access to programming like this that they want? So I then started really expanding my conversations to my superintendent group. Um then I expanded it to my board and then I brought my industry partners and my business partners in and I started talking about this story. I'm like listen—that—this is one of many. You know this is one family that was willing to pick up the phone but there's probably nine others that are—they're not willing to pick up the phone but they would love an option like this for their child. And so we started having this discussion of collaborative education and what does—what does countywide education look like in—in Pennsylvania and more specifically Westmoreland County. And I said, "Okay." I said, "So I don't have space. How do I get space? I can build buildings. That's expensive. And right now, you know, some districts, they don't have the funds. And you know, that's maybe not an option at the moment." I said, "But I know that some of my districts have space. You know, there's rooms and and and wings and buildings in high schools. Maybe I can move a program or start a program in one of my districts. So, one of the easier ones to start up, which we did, was a teacher preparation program. It's called Aspiring Educators. And we—we started it in one of our—in one of our districts. And it grew to a point where we had to open a second location. And so, the first location was at Mount Pleasant Junior Senior High School. And it—it was great. They—you know, we—they—it was just the perfect opportunity. They had a room that was in—in a part of their building that had a separate access. Bathrooms were available and they really didn't have to—to interfere with the daily running of the—of the high school and middle school at Mount Pleasant because I had—I could possibly have 10 different sending schools dropping students off at that location because it wasn't—I'm just going to run it for Mount Pleasant. It was—we're going to run Central's program at the Mount Pleasant High School campus. So, um it worked out really well. Grew to the point where we had to open a second location in the Hempfield School District um at Stanwood Elementary. And over time, we found that the elementary um level of of placement of this program was—was the best success we could have had.
Ryan Stoyer: Really that's interesting.
Jason Lucia: Yeah. And—and—and I'll talk about that in a second. Um but what I started to see is there were students that wanted to transfer from—from the Mount Pleasant location to the—to the Hempfield location because of the success that they were having. And so it got to the point where I said, "All right, we're just going to merge into the elementary level buildings and—and put the aspiring ed program there." Well, the Mount Pleasant School Board, who's been unbelievably supportive, said, "Hey, that—that we completely understand. You know, that's—that's a—a decision that has to be made, but what else can we do?" And I said, "Well, now you have my attention because I like that. What else can we do? We don't want to give up on how we can help kids. So, I started really thinking—like we—we struggle at times finding teachers. There is a teacher shortage. And I thought to myself, you know what? If I build buildings or if I open up spaces on my campus and figure that out, I'm—I'm going to be literally dehydrating my—my high schools of students because they—they want to come here. There's a big surge in career tech ed right now. And instead of dehydrating my buildings, why don't we figure out what they do really well? Like what classes do they offer that are just really um you know student-enriched and—but also are—are kind of a replica of the values and the culture of the community and in Mount Pleasant they—they thrive off of small and family-owned business and entrepreneurship and when I—I audited their program of study course book they have 14 business and finance and entrepreneurship classes and—I—there it is—like that shows what the values of their community are because the kids want to take those courses and they take them. So um I asked the superintendent uh if he would meet with me and we would figure out okay can I get a team of your teachers together and we could—we could evaluate current courses that you offer and literally crosswalk them to the standards that are on a program of study task grid for the state of Pennsylvania. If we could—com—if we could actually accomplish those standards based on all the elective classes that those kids could take. Could they be a CTC concentrator and could they be a CTC completer? Your teachers don't have to change anything. All we have to do is infuse career and tech ed into the daily running of elective courses. And so we mapped it out, did the crosswalk, worked with the state, and now we have a business entrepreneurship CTE pathway at the Mount Pleasant School District in year one where every student as a ninth grader at Mount Pleasant has to take business concepts. So, what better way to get it started? Now, all of those kids are now identified as CTC students. The stigma of VOTE really is fading in our community because it really doesn't look and feel like the old VOTE anymore. We're infusing all of this back into, you know, real actual coursework done at districts, not just by ourselves. And we're not depleting teacher jobs, you know, we're partnering. We're actually—we're actually adding value or adding purpose to the courses because—I mean I remember when I was in high school I—I sat with my counselor and they said okay what elective classes do you want to take and it was like going to the—to the Eat'n Park salad bar you know I want a little bit of this or a little bit of that but ultimately you know there was no actual continuity there was no—there was no real or alignment and this is what adding and infusing CTE has done with this initiative is we're adding purpose and value and now those teachers are collaborating with my teachers on what does standards-based learning look like? What does project based learning look like to infuse into regular academics?"
Ryan Stoyer: And I love it.
Jason Lucia: Just this unfold, it's like, hey, if we can do it there, we're now auditing every one of my district's program study guides and comparing it to the value uh and—and—and—their culture of their communities to really figure out where we can put all these pathways. And now that the superintendents are having discussions of—Can we align bell schedules so that hey, if you have a handful, you know, 8, 10, 12 students at Southmoreland school district that want to be on a business entrepreneurship pathway, how do we get them lined up act schedule-wise? And same with Mount Pleasant students. If they want to be on a pre-engineering pathway that's going to happen at Southmoreland, how can we share students? How can we give them the opportunity? Even though on Friday nights we're cross town rivals, they're putting football uniforms and they're going to compete, but on a daily basis they can learn together. They can share—they can share the ability to grow students for—for the betterment of—of—of our society and our communities and hopefully stay, you know, locally to grow our workforce. So, you know, I mean, listen, if our workforce leaves, so do our taxpayers.
Ryan Stoyer: Sure. Yeah. Keeping kids local is a big deal. And just—I want to pull a couple threads on some things that you said, too, because I mean, obviously, you're you're—I'm glad you're in this seat sharing with our audience because your values align and which—which was my suspicion when we had you on. Uh but you're doing a couple things and I wonder if they're even kind of unconscious. So I want you to kind of think through some tactics that you use that can be helpful for the audience. So I heard you say that you went to district leadership and you—when you described your program to them and the results—and you've got some student stories in your back pocket obviously. Thanks for sharing those. But you've got a district to say what else do you need? I know we've got some TCE programs that are listening and that we support—that that's not where they're at. They're—they're down the other hallway or the—they're the other building. Like how did you kind of bridge that gap? What are some things that you do?
Jason Lucia: So—So I can tell you—and—and—and I'm going to tell a story so that we can—so we can get to an answer to your question is when we first introduced the aspiring educators program. I had two superintendents at the time and they are no longer within my consortium, but I had two superintendents and one of them literally said that if VOTE teachers are going to teach kids how to be teachers, this is going to be the downfall of public education.
Ryan Stoyer: Okay.
Jason Lucia: And—and I looked at that as—that's pretty—Yeah. I mean, I see where you stand on this, but I looked at it as, you know what, I disagree with you. Um, and I—I now have to figure out a way to—to shift the mindset. And—and—that's really what it comes down to is, you know, I looked at it as I bring in industry professionals and most CTC's do, and then we have to teach them how to be teachers. So, not necessarily in the fact of—of the aspiring ed program, But I think we do a really nice job at teaching industry professionals that never really had to teach before how to be professionals, how to be how to actually deliver, you know, educational content to students on a daily basis to—to grow kids and to—to grow them in a way that they are going to be able to be the next um generation of the workforce. So I disagreed and—and we respectfully agreed to disagree at that point. Um but to get to my point—
Ryan Stoyer: but—but challenge accepted, right, in your challenge accepted.
Jason Lucia: And—and I will tell you, it really does come down to, you know, in the world of education, there are—there are people that want to teach and then there—there are people that just want to be teachers. And—and I say that in a way that, you know, the people that want to be teachers love June, July, and August. And nothing against that. I mean, there are some people that do an okay job and, you know, that—that—that's just how it goes. However, the—the people that—that really want to teach. They're invested and—and they're investing on a regular basis. And th—this—so these are the stories that I build and I put in my portfolios that when I go to these district leaders and these school boards, I tell the story. Nothing—nothing better gets somebody to believe than a success story and more specifically than a child's success story. And it's—and it's—it's funny. It's almost like the Jerry Maguire line of help me help you. Help me help you. And—and it's one of those things where Mount Pleasant has been, like I said, unbelievable. And they said, "What else can we do? What—what—what can we do to help you bring another opportunity? Not program, not class, just another opportunity to the students of Mount Pleasant school district and our community and their willingness to share their space with adjoining districts because it's about kids." Number one, every meeting I go into with my team and my superintendent, our discussion is what's best for kids. It's not about, you know, what am I doing great at Central Westmoreland CTC and only I can do it great or what is Mount Pleasant doing great and only they can do it great and so forth. It is all right. All right, guys and gals, what are we going to do for kids together? You know, I want to be able to say, "Hey, here's the opportunity. It's available for, you know, 5,000 high school kids. Now, there's a space concern and we work through those barriers, but it's an open opportunity. It's not just singular and—and it's definitely not tunnel vision, you know, when it comes to our initiative here in Westmoreland County."
Ryan Stoyer: So, I heard that—I'm going to pick—I'm going to pull a thread on that. I heard you tell stories. Hyper-kid focused. Right. That sounds like a whole mindset that you're bringing, right? So, if I'm a CTE director that's listening, um, help me get there. I'm—I'm listening to these stories. I'm like, "Yep, I want my program overflowing. I want space to be the problem, right? I want to have this positive outlook from the community. What's—it—is it—is it connection to community partners? Is that another one around mindset?"
Jason Lucia: Yeah, it definitely is. I mean, yeah, I definitely would say connection and community partners. I mean, you know, leaders leaders are about people. Good great leaders are about people, you know. It's not about management and—and—you know, people that—people that manage and want—and want to see—want to see greater success, they have to get out of their comfort zone. You know, success—success lives in uncomfortable, you know, levels. You have to be uncomfortable to be successful. And great leaders, you know, they're about people and they're about connecting with people and they're about bringing people together. And I think that's one thing that—that we've gotten fairly good at, you know, within Westmoreland County and southwestern Pennsylvania is, you know, I try—I try to relate to the situation that the person that I'm talking to is in. So I—I have a very um vast difference between some of my school districts. I have a—I have an inner-city school district um and I have some very rural school districts and—and—and again their communities, their student populations, even their teaching staffs very different. So I have to be able to bring people to the table relate to them and get them to understand it's not about just catering to a certain population. It's about creating ideas and—and partnering with industry to make it real. And that's—and—and I haven't even touched on the community college and post-secondary partnership that—that we've brought to the table with all of this because everybody is important in the next step in a child's success K-to-12. Everybody. And the earlier a child can be exposed to experiences and opportunities, we see greater success when they're ready to transition from high school to either post-secondary or the workforce or the military. And—and I say that because again, Pennsylvania lives in that siloed world. I've learned that people are just comfortable like—not working together at times.
Ryan Stoyer: Sure. We're just going to do our thing and we're going to try to present opportunities and we can't, we're just going to say we can't afford them. Takes extra time, extra relationships to collaborate, right?
Jason Lucia: Absolutely. I'm not okay with that. The—the crazy part about it is is I have sat with so many people that want to be part of the solution, they just didn't know how to start the conversation. So if you're a leader that is willing to start the conversation, and not all conversations are going to end successfully. That's just—that you have to be okay with that. But if you can end three out of four conversations successfully, to connect a dot. You're building a network of people that want to see kids succeed to build the next generation of great people. And I think that's really what it comes down to. Yeah, we want to build the workforce because eventually somebody's going to be in the workforce, but if we can build generations of good people, it's like—it's like if you—if you want to be in a good mood, you got to be around people that are in good moods.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah. So, that's right. If you don't, you just go hang out with people that are in bad moods all—all the time. And—take me back for a second. I—because we're getting farther away from the student story and—and—that's okay. I like where we're going. But what I also want to come back to your first couple student stories where—yes, I went from, you know, a—an internship or co-op opportunity like while I'm in high school and then I get this offer for full-time work, full-time benefits. That is, as you're talking to community partners, it feels like a big risk for an industry partner who is built around profit and has to pay people right for—for them to live their lives and has to fulfill customer orders to then say yeah I'll take a teenager right again like given the general idea of teenagers right now how do you bridge that gap to where it's like our teenagers are different I assume your wording's in there somewhere right?
Jason Lucia: yeah—so—so bridging that gap is—is literally engaging them to—to be—and—and I call it my VIP partnership track. So—good. So—so—that's one of the things where I—I work pretty integral with our chamber of commerce and our workforce investment board and our economic growth connection and every one of those entities say to me all the time, we got all these businesses and industry partners at—at—that level saying we can't find workers. We can't find employees. And I—and I say to them, okay, well, they've never stopped by. They've never stopped at my school. And then I say, "Okay, I'm going to—I'm going to give you an open invite to—to send and share with them. And on these dates, I welcome them and we will be prepared for one of them or 20 of them to show up."
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah.
Jason Lucia: and we're going to walk them around and they're going to get to see what the students are doing. They're going to get to talk to my instructors and they're going to get to talk to the kids. So, they got—they got to first they have to experience us before they can judge us. And then once they experience us, I tell We have different levels of partnership. If you want to be a VIP partner and have first in line access to—to what I would say we have a ton of Rockstar kids. If you want access to them, here's what you have to do in this partnership because if all you do is stand at the curb and say, "I need workers. I'm not going to send them out because I don't trust you yet." So, we build a network of trust with our partners and we show the kids.
Ryan Stoyer: You got—Jason, I like that you've got requirements on your end. Yes. Like if you want to partner with us, this is what you have to do. Not like we're going to bend and—and fit here and that kind of thing. I like that.
Jason Lucia: And I learned that—I learned that five and a half years ago. And I remember the specific meeting I was in. I'm not going to say which one it was just to not implicate anyone. But I will tell you it was the moment where I thought my goodness—like a partnership is two ways. Like you have expectations and needs and—and—we need to have some expectations and needs. But right now this conversation that we were having there—like I don't even get a say in what—what—we—what we expect. It's you're telling me what you need and then let—let you know whenever I can meet that expectation. I'm like that—that's not a partnership. So we—I took my team back and we started discussing okay if we have a student and I look at every student like they're my own and ironically my first—my oldest—is one of my students here.
Ryan Stoyer: Okay.
Jason Lucia: And—and—and—that was part of my interview here. They—they said when I took over, when I was hired, they—they asked me, "What—what—do I want to see Central Westmoreland look like in five or 10 or—or 15 years?" And I told them, "I want to build a system and a—and a place where my own child will walk in and say, I want to learn here and I want to be here every day." And I think we have done that because again, it's an—it's evidence in my storytelling of We built something that even my own children want to be a part of. And I look at every other child here as that. So, I'm going to make decisions and I'm going to build relationships with people and I'm going to—quote-unquote—I'm going to let my—my kids of my—of my school go and—and—work and—and experience something with them. I have to trust them and I have to know that they are going to have at least a very similar mindset and vision and mission within their companies that we have. And values that we have because then they're going to treat our kids very well and—and—it's going to be a great experience and again it's a culture builder and the best recruiters are the youth. So if you want to build your company you—you give a great experience to—to the youth uh of your—of your company. They're going to tell your story.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah.
Jason Lucia: And that—that was our best marketing tool is whenever it was my—it was it happened here uh in my third year whenever I saw just an explosion of applications come—come in and I asked my teachers I go on these tours—like are you giving out—like what are you giving away during these student tours to get them to apply? And they said we're not giving anything away and we're not even talking very much our students are telling their story. So that's one thing with our VIP partner tracks is we let the students tell their stories and then we kind of evaluate are the values of these partners kind of similar to ours and then we give them direct access to our students. We have—we have career days, we have signing days, we have, you know, interview days—that—that's really what it—what it comes down to is, you know, understanding the kids and their mindset and—and building trust. I mean, that's really and—and—like I said—it's all about trust.
Ryan Stoyer: All business moves at the speed of trust, right? And same thing in education. You're bridging the gap into—to industry. Uh, it moves at the speed of trust. So, let's—um, well, we're going to got a couple more questions for you and we'll wrap, but I'd like to hear kind of when you look at the broader CTE world and you're a visionary, so—but Pennsylvania might be your state, but if you just look at CTE in the next five years, like where would you like to see it go at a larger level?
Jason Lucia: Yeah. Um, so I can—I—I—I've—I've traveled a little bit and I've—I've experienced some other states and other schools. Um, and you know, I would like to see CT—CTE, you know, in our—just in our country, um, truly understand what infusing career and tech opportunities looks like on a daily basis for every child. And—and that's what I would like to see. And again, it—it's not literally taking CTC programs and running them in every academic class. That's—that's not the point. It's infusing discussion, topics, experiences um, within everyday learning that—that gets us—that gets a child to—to start thinking bigger, to start really wanting to challenge themselves to be better, and then creating milestone opportunities where students know, hey, listen, if I work towards this, I'm going to have a great chance. And—and again, I don't want to hang any end results on those chances, but you're going to get a chance, and we're going to help you, you know, walk through the—walk through the magic door of opportunity. And then it's up to you after that.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah, that's super good. Right. So, you've laid out honestly a great road map. Uh Jason, people are taking notes. If they didn't take notes, they should listen again and take notes. There's a lot of things you can pull out. If—if we got somebody—if a CTE director's listening, they're like, "Oh, I didn't know we could—I didn't know it could be this." Like, what's one small shift that you think they could start with?
Jason Lucia: I—I think the—the one—the one small shift is most people—we hope all—but most people that are educational leaders do have the mindset and—and the value of do what's best for kids. So you—you start the one first step is start to build your portfolio of success stories and get ready to tell it and really tell it to the point of you know this can be—it can be replicated, it can be duplicated and it can be multiplied and we can provide unbelievable experiences just by telling the first story because there are many people just waiting for the person to start the conversation.
Ryan Stoyer: That's good. Be—be the person that starts that conversation. I like that.
Jason Lucia: That's right.
Ryan Stoyer: All right, Jason, this has been fantastic. Uh love where we went. A lot of great student stories. Uh we'll put—uh like your LinkedIn bio in the notes so people can follow connect with you there. Any other place where people should connect to follow you?
Jason Lucia: Uh they can check out our website um here at the school. Um and I think that's one direct—direct way to get in touch with me. Um I—you know I—I live on LinkedIn a good bit. So if they want to reach out there that's—that's great or call the school. Listen, I'm willing to share the story. I'm really willing to share the framework. And you know I've—I—I have a really great superintendent group and superintendent team that we look at each other as colleagues and not just they're the superintendents and I'm the CTC director and we—we are—we've actually—uh traveled a little bit and presented our framework um and—and are willing to share it because it's really good for kids.
Ryan Stoyer: Yeah, I would—I would plus one that you should definitely be continuing to share that and we'll do the same. Jason, thanks for being on today.
Jason Lucia: Yeah, thanks Ryan. I appreciate it.
Ryan Stoyer: All right, PBL Simplified audience, you—you heard a—a great story and I don't care where you're leading at, there are nuggets in there for you. Like we're going to make sure we're doing what's best for kids and of course that's why we got into it, but are we still asking that question on a daily basis. We're making decisions based on that. And if you're CTE specific, you—you've definitely got a playbook here of—of leveling up. So these—this is why we do the podcast. Uh we've got some other opportunities as well to join PBL networks around CTE. So if you're interested in continuing this conversation, go to pblnetworks.com. That's pblnetworks.com. We'll get you plugged in. You—continue—continue this conversation uh via Zoom with other leaders around the states. All right. Thanks for tuning in. Go out and lead inspired.
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