Running a Business in High School: Selection into the Virtual Enterprises Program

To better prepare high school students for the workforce, many schools and districts are building career and technical education coursework that provides students with the opportunity to deeply engage in work-based learning. Virtual Enterprises (VE) is a program where students open school-based enterprises, hold positions in the company (e.g., Chief Executive Officer, Marketing Director), sell products on a virtual market with other participating schools, and engage in regional and national competitions. We first examine how schools enroll students in VE courses, drawing on a survey of VE teachers across the country and interviews with school staff in two districts. We find that some schools have selective processes to determine which students will participate, and VE programs in Kern High School District and New York City Public Schools are more likely to be selective than programs nationally. We leverage historical administrative data from Kern High School District and New York City Public Schools to examine the characteristics of students who participate in Virtual Enterprises. We find that VE-takers have significantly higher prior test scores, have lower prior absences and disciplinary incidents, and are significantly less likely to be identified as English learners and special education students. Prior course-taking patterns also differ for VE-takers. The differences in characteristics of VE-takers cannot be fully explained by sorting into schools or pathways. Survey data from six schools across the two districts indicate that VE-takers have different exposure to work and work-based learning prior to entering the course. VE-takers also demonstrate higher levels of career readiness at baseline according to measures of professionalism, leadership, and financial literacy. Schools should consider the tradeoffs of establishing selective processes for CTE programs. Enrolling high-performing students who can navigate more complex application processes may result in stronger engagement and improved performance in competitions, but selective processes may limit opportunities for students who could benefit from intensive work-based learning experiences.