Despite significant interest in Career and Technical Education (CTE), little is known about CTE teachers. Using ten years of Maryland administrative data, we find that almost one-fifth of CTE teachers enter the profession with a high school diploma or associate’s degree, reflecting state policies allowing trade/industry professional experience to substitute for higher degrees. Relatedly, CTE teachers are roughly twice as likely as non-CTE teachers to enter through alternative licensure pathways that bypass traditional teacher education (68% vs. 36%). In Maryland, there is a larger share of Black teachers in versus out of CTE (37% vs. 22%), leading to greater race matching opportunities for Black students. This pattern extends across nine out of the eleven total CTE career clusters. We hypothesize that these patterns are related: decreased barriers to entry may support more Black individuals to become CTE teachers, with potential implications for their Black students’ career success.
Blazar, D., Song, D., Goings, R., Plasman, J., & Gottfried, M. (2025). Pathways into the CTE teaching profession: A descriptive analysis of degrees, licenses, and race in Maryland. AERA Open, 11. https://doi.org/10.1177/23328584251361382