The School District of Lee County continues to expand opportunities for students who want to prepare for the job market.
Ed Mathews, associate superintendent for Adult, Career, Technical, and Alternative Education, said at Tuesday’s school board meeting that the district has upscaled career education because there are so many jobs available.
“They depend on the district to continue to scale to the size of a growing population,” he said of technical, soft and power skills. “We can make our community the strongest we can possibly be. We match the community’s needs and need the community partners to allow that understanding to occur.”
Seven programs had growth for the 2024-2025 school year: Information technology with a 32% growth, manufacturing a 26% growth, business, management and administration with a 17% growth, hospitality and tourism with a 16% growth, agriculture, food and natural resources with a 16% growth, arts, A/V technology and communication with a 14% growth and law, public safety and security with a 7% growth.
The district’s business partners grew from 40 to 110, with the hope that number continues to climb.
Industry certifications for 2024-25 rose to 3,342 with an 82% pass rate. The digital tool certifications earned was 1,267 for a total pass rate of 87%.
The top five industry certifications were entrepreneurship and small business, certified food protection manager — ServeSafe, PMI project management ready, Autodesk certified user – inventor, and agriculture associate certification.
Adult, Career, and Applied Curriculum Education Director Matthew Bredenkamp said the Career and Professional Education Act is a very large source of funding at the school level, which provides them more control over this funding source.
“As they pass the certifications, 80% of funds earned through that go back to the school and 20% go to the CTE department for new programs. These career academies were always created to be self-sustainable. Passing certifications puts money back into the program, the students are supporting the efforts,” he said, adding that the money can go towards equipment they may need, and sustaining their testing procedures.
Clayton Simmons, the Office of School Choice administration executive director, said the district is undergoing an exciting endeavor, as Superintendent Dr. Denise Carlin wants to emphasize “grow your own.”
He said all of their remodels and new construction will have early childhood programs for families.
“We are working with HR to have a pathway in every one of our high schools to be a teacher,” Simmons said, adding that they are exploring a memorandum of understanding with Florida Gulf Cost University to do a dual enrollment program to work towards becoming a teacher. “Students can go out in the workforce and work in early childhood programs in the district.”
Xello, a program that creates successful futures, has also had a positive impact in the district, as there were more than 53,000 unique student logins. The program helps with digital portfolios, as well as having course planning aligned to industry needs.
Simmons said there were nearly 60,000 completed lessons with strong participation across K-8, more than 20,000 students saved careers and 9,300 saved colleges.
“Our goal is for every single high school student to have a structured way to log in to Xello and start college and career exploration,” he said.
According to statewide data, students who are using Xello reported that they have 14% higher college preparedness, 21% higher career readiness and recent graduates reported that they were 29% better with career readiness verse nonusers.
“All of our students will leave us with a Plan A and Plan B,” Simmons said of their direction after high school – enroll, enlist, employee, or entrepreneurship.
Matthews said there will be dual enrollment opportunities at the high schools, instead of students traveling to other campuses.
Another career ready event is Pathways to Success, an event that started last spring. Bredenkamp said it provides a little extra push to decide what to do after graduation. Attendees have the chance to talk to business leaders, meet administrators and students.
“We are planning to be at Estero High School later this month,” Bredenkamp said.
The presentation also highlighted adult general education, Dunbar Community School and Technical Colleges.
The fall 2025 adult education enrollment totaled 1,567 students – 84% English for Speakers of Other Languages students and 16% GED. The demand includes citizenship, basic computer skills, conversational Spanish and English.
Simmons said they have a CDL program starting next semester at Cape Technical College to address the district and workforce needs, as well as ServeSafe and CRP and AED.
The Dunbar Community School had 663 ESOL students with a student diversity ranging 24 countries – 53% from Haiti, and 33% from Cuba, Guatemala, Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia and Mexico.
“Currently we have a tremendous demand at Dunbar Community School,” Simmons said of many students on a waitlist. “We are tackling this on another front. We are adding programs to existing facilities, adding to Lehigh Middle School and expanding at South Fort Myers High School.”
Many of the high school students are utilizing both Cape Coral Technical College and Fort Myers Technical College. There are 57 students from the East Zone, 81 from the South Zone, and 72 from the West Zone.
Cape Coral Technical College currently offers 15 programs with areas of focus in nursing/healthcare, technology, culinary arts and hospitality, barbering and cosmetology, business and digital design and veterinary assisting. With the expansion of this campus, there will be blue collar skilled trades programs with areas of focus to include building trades and construction design technology, HVAC, welding, automotive service and marine service technology.
The Southwest Florida Public Service Academy also offers many opportunities for career development through the Criminal Justice Academy and Fire, Paramedic and EMT Academy.