projects, $200,000 of the $6,000,000 request will be used for funding the Awareness House Training Center for 1972. Environmental Education The Office of Education perceives the Environmental Education Act (PL 91-516) as a broad mandate to stimulate educational improvements in this area and coordinate these efforts with other public services. A unit has been established in the new Office of Priority Management to administer the Act, and positive action has been taken to assure appropriate attention by other OE units who engage in activities related to environmental education. Active liaison is also being provided with related agencies outside of QE, such as the Council for Economic Quality and the Environmental Protection Agency. In this way, we plan to achieve a coordinated approach in designing a national educational effort to preserve and enhance the natural environment. To accomplish the main purpose of the Act, improving the quality of living depends upon processes which foster local self-improvement and community development. Urban centers are being encouraged to develop plans which call for the imaginative use of both educational and noneducational agencies to design environmental improvement projects, train local citizens in occupations needed for environmental improvement, generate better use of local resources, and make use of idle talents in an integrated program that uses education as a process for community-wide involvement. With this approach, the $2,000,000 requested for 1972 will be used to build models of community improvement which will involve all age levels and all public services. These models, once developed, will be used to encourage widespread community improvement inspired by changes in individual and group values, attitudes, and behavior toward enhancing the natural environment and thereby the quality of life. Vocational Education Research and Development The 1972 budget request of $36,000,000 under the Vocational and Adult Education Appropriation, is based on the primary goal that all individuals in American society desiring or needing employment should be able to secure and pursue it in a manner satisfying to them and to society. Development of dramatically new and markedly improved approaches to vocational education is therefore among the highest Office of Education priorities. This request represents support for innovations and curriculum development as well as research and development. This program would be administered by the National Center for Educational Research and Development, using the authority of the Cooperative Research Act, in order to provide closer coordination between preparation for careers and preparation for civic and social responsibilities. Much of our recent investment has been related to the human service. fields, to prepare students for entrance into and upward mobility within occupations where there are growing manpower shortages. For example, the Institute for Local Self-Government in Berkeley, working with junior colleges and municipal agencies, designed programs for civil engineers, inspection services, and other public service fields; these are now being used by more than 5,000 students in 50 junior colleges. Recreation services for the ill, the disabled, and the aged are being vastly improved as a result of work by the New York University, School of Education, in cooperation with 22 employing agencies. The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), is working with representatives of health professions to improve career ladders for sub-professionals in allied fields. In still another field, the aviation mechanics technician program that UCLA developed and field tested has resulted in the Federal Aviation Administration's revision of standards for accrediting aviation maintenance technicians' schools. To help children learn about jobs at the junior high school level, where career attitudes are formed, the Vocational Education Research and Development center at Ohio State University has worked out programs in two broad areas, construction and manufacturing. Materials on "The World of Construction" are already being used by over 14,000 students in junior high schools across the country, and parallel materials are being prepared to broaden student outlook toward industrial occupations. Beginning in 1971, we are moving toward major development activities to solve educational problems related to conditions of widespread unemployment which exist concurrently with specialized manpower shortages. We hope to begin designing educational alternatives which will prevent this kind of situation in the future. The amount requested for 1972 represents $14,600,000 to continue ongoing activities and $21,400,000 for significant new research and development. The continuation support is needed for (1) major ongoing research and development programs, (2) exemplary programs initiated under Part D of the Vocational Education Amendments of 1968, (3) curriculum research and development programs already under way, and (4) funding of the two vocational education research and development centers--one at Columbus and one at Raleigh. In 1972, new development activities will build on the occupational education programs initiated during 1971. Part of this effort will consist of finding ways to help young people in inner cities become The program will work with school agencies but economically productive. will also furnish other important alternatives to present vocational education practice and will include experimenting with procedures at the elementary school level where attitudes about work are formed. The major thrust of this work will be to integrate general education and vocational education objectives into a common program. Supplementing the development activities will be an unsolicited basic and applied vocational education research program that will capitalize on the best thinking from the university community and the private sector. This will augment a similar Cooperative Research investment in unsolicited basic and applied research in more general areas. Experimental Schools The Experimental Schools program serves as a bridge from research, experimentation, and demonstration to actual school practice. It provides support for a limited number of large-scale experiments in comprehensive educational reform, with a major focus on documentation and evaluation. Over the next five years, the program will generate a series of such experiments representing a full range of alternatives to current practice for urban, suburban, and rural schools. We are requesting $15,000,000 for this activity in 1972, an increase of $3,000,000 over the 1971 level. Since 1945, many changes have been initiated in our schools. Among the better known innovations are laboratory schools, new grade organization patterns, new curricula, increased specialization in staff, compensatory programs, special summer programs, flexible and modular scheduling, extended school years, computer-assisted instruction, educational television and performance contracting. Most of these "promising practices" offer improvement in only a small segment or component of the school program. Furthermore, each reform represents a relatively isolated change in a particular educational system. Dissatisfied with the results of piece meal or individual component changes, educational reformers have sought the opportunity to address the need for total change by placing a number of these promising practices together in a comprehensive program. Specifically, the Experimental Schools Program will complement other research and development activities supported by the Office of Education. It will move forward validated products and practices developed by the National Center for Educational Research and Development, the developmental and experimental activities of the Bureau of Educational Personnel Development in the teacher training area, and dissemination activities by the National Center for Educational Communication. It is important to emphasize from the outset that experimental schools are testing a hypothesis, not implementing a validated change strategy. The program makes the assumption initially that it is possible |