Any selective criteria used to admit students to vocational technical schools must be actually essential to the success of the school, per new regulations the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) is drafting for their board’s review in February.

The board has been reexamining the admissions process for career technical education high schools for months, just three years after they overhauled their regulations to promote more “equitable access” to the career-oriented schools.

Demand at the state’s technical schools far outpaces the available space, and 25 of the 29 career technical education schools in Massachusetts use “selective criteria” like grades, attendance and discipline records from middle school to choose which applicants should come to their high school programs.

Some say these admissions practices disproportionately exclude students of color, those who are learning English, have disabilities or come from low-income families. They instead advocate for a lottery model of random chance for all interested middle school students.

After months of reexamining the admissions processes and talking to stakeholders, Board of Elementary and Secondary Education member Martin West, who led a task force to look at the regulations, said many of the state’s career technical education schools have a proportionate amount of students from protected classes.

“We learned that many of the schools, if you compare the composition of their student bodies to the composition of the sending districts, we see that they are quite representative in terms of their racial and ethnic composition and in terms of other protected classes, like students with disabilities, English learners and others,” West said. “That being said, there are exceptions to that.”

West said in some cases of comparing applicants to admitted students, students from protected classes are less likely to be admitted.

Previewing what the regulations presented to the board will likely contain, Martin said last week that “any selective criteria” used in admitting a student will “need to be essential to the success of the school.”

“The principles that really come down as a legal framework are that any selective criteria need to be essential to the success of the school [and consider] if they are having any disparate impact in the admissions process,” he said.

This could mean that if schools want to use disciplinary or attendance records to reject a student’s application, for example, the school would need to prove that those “selective criteria” are directly tied to the school’s success.

In the past, superintendents of vocational schools have said using these selective criteria is especially important in career technical education environments.

“Our schools only consider the most serious disciplinary offenses. In the absence of such criteria, our vocational community would have concerns. Attendance: we cannot send tutors home with large equipment. Students cannot succeed in co-op programs if they are not present and can’t earn credentials without the requisite number of hours,” Aaron Polansky, superintendent of Old Colony Regional Vocational Technical in Rochester, said during a Board of Elementary and Secondary Education meeting last October.

Additionally, West noted that for larger career technical education schools with long waiting lists, a lottery model may be appropriate, but not for smaller schools without long waiting lists.

Franklin County Technical School Superintendent Richard Martin mentioned how an effort to get a lottery admission model has been ongoing for a few years. He said his school and other western Massachusetts districts looked into the lottery model, and for Franklin Tech, “It didn’t fit who we were.”

Martin said the school uses a variety of admissions steps for applicants — including attendance records, grades, disciplinary records and interviews at the school. He explained that evaluating these records is important for Franklin Tech to get an idea of the whole student, both on and off paper. Disciplinary records are reviewed to see if there are serious infractions that could compromise classroom safety if a student can’t self-regulate, and if student attendance is consistent, given the school’s 18 missed-days policy. According to the student handbook, a student who is absent from school for 18 days or more will receive no credit, regardless of their grade in the course or shop.

“It’s really important that we continue our current practices,” Martin said.

Franklin Tech has between 225 and 250 middle school applicants each year. Each grade level from ninth grade to 12th grade accommodates roughly 180 students. DESE data indicates a total enrollment of 621 students across the four grades for the 2023-2024 school year.

Martin said if the lottery system is implemented statewide, Franklin Tech would follow it, but he would be concerned some student populations would not be represented as they are now under current admissions practices.

Martin said under current practices, Franklin Tech is successful in enrolling and supporting students in special education. Special education students make up around 30% of the student body, making the district one of the higher special education student-enrolled career technical education schools, per 2023-2024 DESE data.

Martin said his concern with a lottery model would be the possible loss of these students.

“We embrace that — that’s what we want,” Martin said about the school’s special education enrollment.

West gave an example of a reform schools could make to the admissions process to make it more accessible for some students, while maintaining a requirement that the student show interest in actually attending the high school.

Currently, he said, some schools require students to sit for an evaluative interview for a seat at the high school. An alternative, West proposed, would be requiring students to write a letter or tour the school. This way the student can still prove they are interested and dedicated to the school, but it makes the admissions process more fair for limited spots.

This recommendation from West is something already in place at Franklin Tech. The school has agreements with member towns through which information about the school is made available via information sessions and visits to Franklin Tech, and the tech school covers the transportation costs involved. Additionally, Martin said open houses are available, students can interview for placement and letters of recommendation are part of the process.

Reporter Erin-Leigh Hoffman contributed to this report. She can be reached at ehoffman@recorder.com or 413-930-4231.