Career Clusters
The National Career Clusters® Framework
The Career Clusters Framework serves as the foundation for designing consistent, high-quality Career Technical Education (CTE) and career pathway programs.
All learners deserve to participate in meaningful career exploration and preparation experiences through Career Technical Education (CTE) that prepare them for the changing and interconnected world of work. This requires systems and structures that are accessible, responsive to evolving industry needs, and flexible for the needs of each state and community. Since 2002, The National Career Clusters® Framework has provided a shared structure and language for CTE program design across the United States. Advance CTE serves as the steward of the Framework.
In fall 2024 following 2 years of input and validation, Advance CTE released a modernized Framework designed to serve as a bridge between education and work and a central building block for consistently designed and high-quality CTE programs.
The Framework
The modern Framework consists of 14 Clusters and 72 Sub-Clusters that serve as the primary organizing structures for CTE programs. These structures are supported by five Cluster Groupings aligned to purpose and impact of included careers, and three Cross-Cutting Clusters that provide both skills and careers that can stand alone and intersect with all other Clusters. Twelve Career-Ready Practices to ensure that every program includes the skills that are essential to every career and life.
The Framework guidebook compiles the key elements of the modernized National Career Clusters Framework, including; descriptions of Framework layers; Framework graphics; Career and Cluster and Sub-Cluster definitions, and sample programs of study.
The Framework is for and benefits everyone in the CTE community:
Click the image below to explore how each partner can use and contribute to a successful Framework and access role-specific resources.
Explore the Framework
Click each ring to explore the definitions and content of each layer of the Framework. Keep scrolling to click and explore each Career Cluster.
Structure Definitions
Large purpose-driven meta-sectors that help guide young people toward Clusters that are aligned with their interests, their sense of purpose, and the impact they want to make on their communities.
Industry sectors as defined by groupings from Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) and North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes.
Major groupings of career areas within a given field that have similar skills as defined by industry area.
Clusters that are based on both sector-specific and contextualized functions instead of purely discrete industry sectors. These Clusters have both Sub-Clusters and implications for courses taken in all other Career Clusters.
The Career Ready Practices, built on a meta-analysis of over 30 different listings of general professional skills developed by industry and educational institutions, represent the skills needed to succeed in the modern workplace. These practices should be embedded across the pre-kindergarten to workforce continuum. Read the full list of Career Ready Practices.
Career Clusters
Click each Cluster for Cluster definitions and implementation resources.
