Episode 78 – CTE with Shannon Quan

février 21st, 2025 /
Spencer Tuinei /

Sup avec le Sup

Episode 78 - CTE with Shannon Quan

00:00 / 21:05

Wendy Dau: Welcome everyone to the next episode of Provo City School District’s What’s Up With The Sup Podcast. I am Superintendent Wendy Dau. Career and Technical Education, otherwise known as CTE, is recognized during the month of February. Today, I am visiting with Shannon Quan, a CTE teacher at Provo High School.

She specifically teaches robotics and computer science. We will talk about her path to becoming a CTE teacher and all that it entails. But first, let me give you our updates.

There are three new policies available for review on our district website. Go to provo.edu, click on Policies, Forms, and Documents. You can click on Review Draft Policies here.
- You will see a draft of Policy 5160, Personnel, Employee Religious Beliefs, or Conscience, Policy 5250, Personnel Conflict of Interest Update, Policy 5090, Personnel Code of Conduct.

The next School Board Meeting will be on Tuesday, February 25th.
- The Study Session will take place in board room one and business meeting will be in the Professional Development Center at 6:00 P.M. Public comment is welcome during the business meeting and this will be the meeting where the board votes on the lease revenue bonds.
If you would like to provide public comment during this meeting before their vote, please plan to attend at 6:00 P.M. In the Professional Development Center, the Utah legislative session is still going strong.
We have links on our website to bills and our district’s positions on specific legislation, and we appreciate the great relationship that we have built with all of our legislators as they have been working with us on different bills related to education.
Continuez à regarder mes vidéocasts hebdomadaires dans votre courrier électronique tous les lundis. Ces vidéocasts vous permettent d'être informé, en un seul endroit, des événements importants qui se déroulent dans le district.

And now for our guest, Shannon Quan.

So it’s Career Technical Education Month. February is CTE month. So tell us a little bit about how long have you been at Provo High? What made you want to be a CTE teacher? Just, how did you land here? Like, tell us all about that.

Shannon Quan: So, this is the end of my fourth year at Provo High. I was recruited by one of the former assistant principals.

She used to be my next door neighbor. And I was working in Alpine District and she says, please come and save my robotics program, and I said no. I’m not doing that. I’m just not going to do that. I was happy where I was. It was fine. And she’s like, no, please come. And she sucked me in. She’s like, well, just come and see this space.

And so I came and I saw this space and I went, ah, and then that’s how I ended up. I know. It’s pretty nice. And you haven’t even seen all of it.

Wendy Dau: Well, you’ll take me on a little tour.

Shannon Quan: Absolutely. Yeah.

That’s– that’s how I ended up here, teaching robotics, and then added drones and added CAPS and added all the things. So that’s how we ended up here. But it’s been a really good experience.

Wendy Dau: That’s awesome. What did you study in school to end up in this direction?

Shannon Quan: Elementary Ed. Oh, see, that is awesome. That is okay. So then what made you want to switch into this? When I was elementary Ed, I was teaching computers, and in computers I was also teaching robotics and robotics is really, like, I love robotics and so that’s really how it transitioned from there is that I had the –I had the, background already and I’ve had websites and blogs and, you know, like all of those kinds of things.

So, marrying computers and robots was not a big leap. I’d been doing it for a while anyway. So coming and doing it here with bigger and better robots and a little bit more of a budget? It was, it was a good thing.

Wendy Dau: Slightly bigger kids, but they still act like kids.

Shannon Quan: High schoolers are my jam. I love high school students.

And I really like to specialize. So, you know, like teaching robotics or teaching drones or teaching at CAPS. I don’t have to teach everybody all the things, which is not my favorite thing to do. I get to teach them more. more depth, I think, you know, like deeper into robotics or deeper into a little bit of the coding or deeper into flying drones or whatever it is.

Wendy Dau: Okay. So what kinds of things are kids leaving your classes with? They do skills testing and certifications. I’m sure all of those pieces are part of CTE. So talk with us a little bit about those pieces that kids leave with.

Shannon Quan: So students leave here. Hopefully knowing that they can fail and it’s okay.

And so I’m hoping my goal is to teach them grit and from talking to industry experts and higher education, connecting with people in that way, the things that they tell me that they need are not the practical skills as much as they need collaboration. They need to be able to work as a team. They need to be able to express their opinion.

They need to be able to take direction. They need to be able to — they need to not give up. And then of course, part of CTE that we teach, that’s part of our strands and standards are– we have to teach professional skills, and that I take that seriously. You know, like you need to be on time.

You need to be in class. You need to be working when you’re in class. You need to be using your tools effectively. My class isn’t as scary as say, Woodshop, where you can cut off a finger or something, but you know, like you still need to know how to use the tools that we use appropriately. You still need to know what they mean and what the terms are and how to identify them and all those kinds of things and– and then I take the scare factor out. Because sometimes students are afraid to mess up, or they’re afraid that we’ve been doing an electrical unit, they’re afraid that they’ll get shocked by the electricity, they’re afraid that they’ll blow the light bulb, you know, like they’re afraid of all of those kinds of things. And so I try to take the fear factor out to just teach them that no, you just put your head down and you just plug away and you just get it done.

But in the process, you get your hands dirty, build something. You made that happen, you know, like through your perseverance. Yeah. You figured it out.

Wendy Dau: So CTE is also really well known for CTSOs and all of the competitive strands of that. Are you an advisor for one of those?

Shannon Quan: I am not an advisor for one of those.

And, that sort of, yes– that sort of boggles my mind just a little bit. Like, I don’t know how I’d fit that in. We dabbled a little bit in– 1st Robotics is a big competition, and we did that one year. They came in and they took over part of my space. It just… we tried really hard to make it work and it was a great experience but it was such a time suck that it took way too much time for my family, and I couldn’t wrangle how to keep work at work and family at family, and it just bled over too much and it was just so hard that I was like, first of all you’re taking up all my space and I need it, and secondly you’re taking up all my time and I need that too. And so I couldn’t wrangle that.

Wendy Dau: So there’s really not a benefit that’s coming out of this.

Shannon Quan: There wasn’t a benefit for me, no. No, there wasn’t a benefit for me.

Wendy Dau: Well, sometimes it’s good to say no. Sometimes it’s alright, so that’s good. One of the things that I think people don’t realize about CTE teachers is how many different preps you have.

Like, you’re teaching lots of different things every single period, and sometimes you’re double stacked and you’re teaching different things, maybe even in this– same class period sometimes.

Shannon Quan: I don’t actually teach the same–

Wendy Dau: That’s good. That’s good.

Shannon Quan: I would be a crazy person. I’m already crazy enough. I don’t need to be even more crazy.

Wendy Dau: But tell us a little bit about all of the different classes that you teach.

Shannon Quan: So I teach Robotics 1 and Robotics 2, and the great thing about Robotics 1 and Robotics 2 is that they’re an elective science credit. So students can choose either CTE, Or they can choose elective science, which is kind of great for students that maybe don’t want to put in like an anatomy and physiology or a chemistry or, you know, like some of those core where they really want like more hands on or something that feels a little bit less crazy. Because I really don’t give a lot of homework. It’s like, you need to be in class Because you’re not taking a 1500 dollar robot home with you, right? It’s not gonna happen. I know we’re not allowing that. Yeah, I teach a drone class that is kind of like driver’s training only for pilots? So you basically learn the regulations and all of the twiddly little things that you have to know how to do in order to Be a pilot.

You fly a drone instead of flying a plane, but they’re really similar things things that you need to know how to do. I teach that. And then we’re adding a Design, Build, and Maintain class. For drones, so we’re trying to complete that drone way. Yeah, we have the Technology and Engineering pathway completed. You can complete that, since we’re so close to the airport, and we’re so close to and we have so many good programs. We’re trying to add that pathway.

So, Design, Build, and Maintain, and then I teach at CAPS. I do Business Marketing and Entrepreneurship over there. So that takes a lot of my time as well. And then I do the Testing.

Wendy Dau: And then you’re the testing coordinator. What do you wish that parents knew about CTE that you feel like they’re, I sometimes feel like parents are missing. Some information about CTE sometimes or, or their perception of what it can do for their child, and why it’s so important. What are some of the things that you would like them to know?

Shannon Quan: I love, and I would love parents to know, that CTE gives you such great connections between, like, Woods for instance. You can take what you learn in Woods and you can apply it immediately once you graduate.

And sometimes even when you, before you graduate– drones, for instance, once you get that pilot’s license– your license to fly drones, you can immediately start a side hustle because you’re– you’re licensed. You’re legal. You can make money doing this. Same thing with Auto. I was talking to the Auto Teacher and he has companies that contact him on a regular basis that say, I need your students that have passed this certification or they have this much experience or, you know, like whatever the thing is that they need and they can immediately.

They can graduate from high school and get a job. They can continue on, and many do, but in that interim, they have a way to translate what they know and they make money. Same with, like, Videography and Photography. We have Screen Printing. We have so many great options here that if you take those classes and you learn.

Like a semester, a year, not even a long time worth of stuff, you get a really great opportunity to translate that into something that you can make money with right away. Something that is marketable, is valuable and can take you far. And then, you know, like you use that to support yourself while you go to trade school, or you use that to support yourself while you go to college, or you just maybe have a gap for a little bit and you just work for a while, which is okay as well.

I know our welding students, our welding teacher encourages them to start side hustling as they’re in welding. And so that’s the thing that I love about CTE is that it’s practical, hands on useful, usable for students. Like it gives them such a leg up. Like immediately.

Wendy Dau: Yes, it can be very immediate.

Yeah, I think sometimes people forget about that. They still think that there’s just so much to do and it’s like, no, they’re like actually leaving with all of this skill set.

Shannon Quan: They are leaving with really great skills and not all of them translated into making money or a job or that kind of a thing, but they have the skills.

And a lot of times they transfer over to a job that they wouldn’t even think, Oh, I can use that skill here that I already have. It’s great.

Wendy Dau: Give us an example of a student that maybe didn’t seem as sold on one of your classes or a CTE experience and then it just clicked for them, and they were just like, This is what I want to do, this is amazing.

Or they had a little bit of an interest and then it just developed or blossomed into something else.

Shannon Quan: I have a student who is in my drone class and he already likes flying drones and he flies the FPV ones, which are the ones where you wear the face mask, and they fly really fast, and they’re a different breed, like they’re a racing drone, totally different breed from what I actually teach students how to do. And he still has to get the licensing and stuff, and I mentioned that I was working on getting the Design, Build, and Maintain class, and he was on me every day.

Do you have approval for that? How is that coming? I really want to take that class. I really want to know. And, I still, like– he still comes in and will talk to me and say, How’s that going? Are we going to have it next year? You know, so there’s those kinds, and then I have other students. And one of the things that I like about me being in CTE is that I get girls in my class, and they’re like, I’ve never built anything before.

They haven’t messed with Legos, or they haven’t messed with Kinects, or they haven’t messed with any of those kinds of things. And they come into my class, and they’re like nervous, like, I’m not gonna know, I’m not gonna do it right. And a lot of my girls tend to be perfectionist. I teach them that it’s okay, like, you’re okay.

You’re not gonna get it right the first time, and that’s totally okay. And then, and then they’re like, okay, can I take another one? And it’s like, yes, please take robotics. So you can get that science credit and you can try a different kind of robot and you can expand that. I have several that are going to SheTech this year.

Wendy Dau: Oh, good. Which is really exciting. That’s really fantastic.

Shannon Quan: So, I do, I have students that come in and they’re like, this was nothing like I thought it would be. And some of them– or like, this is nothing like I thought it would be in a bad way, and they transfer out right away, and I’m always sad to see them go.

And then there are others that are in, and they’re like, I had no idea this would be so cool, or so fun, that I would like it as much as I do, and then they stay for robotics too, which is really great.

Wendy Dau: That’s really great. Yeah. Tell us about SheTech, because I think that’s something that maybe people don’t know about.

When I first heard about it, I was like, this is amazing!

Shannon Quan: SheTech is cool. I actually can’t go because I’m taking students on a different field trip that day.

Wendy Dau: Of course you are! Dang it!

Shannon Quan: Right? And it’s like, unfortunate they ended up being on the same day. But SheTech is this really great program where we introduce young girls to technological fields because they typically are– I don’t know if they’re afraid they’re not smart enough, or if they just have never worked in those kinds of things before, or what it is, but I’ve had more students sign up this year for it than I have ever and as I’ve been here, the first year that I was here. I think I had one or two girls in my classes maybe and now I’m up to, you know, like in a class of 28, I might have 10 girls, which makes me feel so much better.

Like maybe that’s, maybe it’s good that there’s– that there’s a woman teaching the class and it breaks those barriers.

Wendy Dau : Pas de question.

Shannon Quan: Anyway, and so, yeah, I’m excited for SheTech and a little disappointed that I can’t go, but they introduce girls to a whole lot of things. It’s not just coding, it’s all kinds of technical fields and things that they can do and things that they might not know that they’re interested in or it might spark a really cool, like, oh, I could do that.

Wendy Dau: That’d be so cool. What is one thing that you wish Provo City School District would do better in terms of promoting CTE for students? Are there additional programs we need to consider? Is there, like, what would that look like? Like, I want you to think pie in the sky. Are we missing things for kids? And what are those things?

And are we missing things for our teachers? What are those things? If you had the school boards right in front of you, what would you, what would you want to tell them?

Shannon Quan: I think that one of the things that we miss with CTE is how great the pathways are. And a lot of times we think, Oh, that class would be great, or oh, that class would be great, or oh, that class would be great, and they are.

But we don’t give students a clear pathway, and I think that a lot of times we miss the boat on the pathway. Unfortunately, you know, like when you’re trying to create a new pathway, like the Aviation pathway, for instance, you’ll burn out a teacher if that one teacher is trying to add all the pathway.

Wendy Dau : C'est vrai.

Shannon Quan: Yeah, all of the pathway components, and so– or all at once, because that’s just a lot to learn all at one time. So. But having a clear plan, like, yes, at Provo High, let’s add an Aviation pathway for drones so that students can get their drone license, they have experience with audio and visual component, which is one of the classes, the Design, Build, and Maintain class, and then let’s put them at CAPS so that they actually work with a real company to actually do whatever it is the company needs with drone. Maybe it’s a construction company where they need pictures of their construction site. Maybe it’s a farm where they need something mapped out or they need a way to know like how their crops are doing. Or maybe it’s–

Wendy Dau: I didn’t even think about that, but that’s incredible.

Shannon Quan: Right? Maybe it’s a real estate agent that needs some video of a property. There are a lot of ways that– and then they take that, and so then they’ve had four classes, which means that they’ve had two years already, experience with drones, and they have flight time. They have a flight log. They can show an employer.

I have all of these flight hours. These are the projects that I’ve done. I can maintain the drone. I can fix it. If something happens to it, I’m a valuable asset. And so I think that we miss the whole point a lot with pathways that we forget that we need a pathway. And a lot of times we forget how to end, you know. Like we get, well, we have the– we have the Explorer courses, we have our Concentrator courses.

And then we’re like, yeah, but we don’t have any of the Completer courses. Well, we do, but we forget that we have the completer courses. It’s just at CAPS because that’s where we do a lot of our CTE completer courses. And we miss that component of it. We’re not getting the kids there to finish and they get really cool.

Like they get chords at graduation. They have, you know, like, that’s a good thing to put on a college application. It’s a great thing to put on a scholarship application. It’s a great thing for them to take with them where they go, because they’ve shown, first of all, that they complete things, which is fantastic.

For themselves, they show that they’ve done that. But secondly, it just translates to all kinds of really good things that they can show in their lives that they can put on.

Wendy Dau: We were, when we were looking at just school and district accountability data, like one of the things that they look at is obviously post secondary readiness.

And we couldn’t figure out, we’re like, we have really high CTE enrollments in our district. What’s happening here. And it’s the Completer piece.

Shannon Quan: It is.

Wendy Dau: They’ll take one or two classes and we’re not encouraging them to finish that out because we’re just– sometimes to be honest, we’re just trying to fill the schedule of the kid, right?

Shannon Quan: It is so true. Yeah, right.

Wendy Dau: Yeah, and we totally get that it but it’s being deliberate and intentional and making sure we’re giving those opportunities to students with disabilities or a Multilingual student. Like what supports are we gonna give to that student so that they have those opportunities? And and just being really proactive about that.

I think that’s something that we need to, like, get on board and do better with as an entire district.

Shannon Quan: And I think that too often, we just don’t know. Like, I didn’t understand the way the pathway worked when I first started in CTE. And there’s a bit of a learning curve to it. And so the more, you know, like, of course, the more that I’ve worked with it, the more I understand it.

And I thought, Oh, well, these students can’t complete their CTE pathway if they haven’t passed all of those CTE tests. Well, those tests give us really good information about are we teaching the things that the state thinks that we need to teach them, which is fine, but the misunderstanding is, well, they didn’t pass the test, so they can’t complete it, and that’s not the case at all.

They just have to take the classes to be a pathway completer. They don’t have to pass every single one of those tests, so if they take four CTE classes, they don’t have to pass all four CTE tests. They just have to take the classes to be the completer. And that was one of those things that I did not understand in the beginning.

Wendy Dau: I don’t know that all of our counselors necessarily understand all of those pieces too, right? And like how to make sure that we’re laying that out. As I was talking with Clay Bingham, our CTE director. He was even saying, like, just laying that out for a counselor so that they’re understanding that as they’re advising the student, that makes a huge difference.

Shannon Quan: Yeah, it makes a big difference. And the more, you know, like the more we have counselors on board, and admin on board, and teachers on board– because I think that a lot of times our core teachers don’t see the value in that, because they have no experience with it, not because it’s not a great idea or they wouldn’t be on board with it, but they really just don’t have any experience with it.

And so making sure that teachers and counselors and admin understand would probably go a long way.

Wendy Dau: I think it would.

Shannon Quan: I think it would, too. So.

Wendy Dau: Thank you so much for talking with– you’ve made me so passionate about learning about all of these things.

Shannon Quan: CTE is my jam.

Wendy Dau: I can tell. I love it. Your kids love you. They must. That’s–

Shannon Quan: It’s amazing. They’re so fun.

Wendy Dau : C'est génial.

Shannon Quan: They’re so fun.

Wendy Dau: We’re lucky to have you in Provo City School District.

Shannon Quan: Well, I appreciate that.

Wendy Dau: Thank you everyone for joining me for this week’s episode of What’s Up with the Sup. As always, all episodes will be posted on the district website, YouTube, and anywhere you get your podcasts.

If you have any topics or questions you would like us to discuss on the podcast, please email us at podcast@provo.Edu. Don’t forget to join us again next week for another new episode of What’s Up with the Sup. Have a great day, everyone.