Local Teenager Wins Missouri's Breaking Tradition Award

Breaking Traditions News Release – March 2016

CTE Students are Breaking Traditions

Caroline Schott, an outstanding Project Lead the Way Student from Cape Girardeau Career and Technology Center (CTC) to receive the State Breaking Traditions Secondary Award!

The Missouri Breaking Traditions contest has announced this year’s outstanding students in nontraditional career and technical education programs. Nontraditional means occupations or fields of work in which individuals from one gender comprise less than 25 percent of the individuals employed in that occupation or field. For twenty-three years, Breaking Traditions has honored outstanding students who have chosen specific career and technical programs based on their interests and abilities, and who have not let their gender influence their career decisions.

Career Centers, public two year colleges and comprehensive high schools can nominate a single student from each nontraditional program. Winners from the nine regions in the state are chosen by a panel of judges, and these finalists then compete for male and female secondary and postsecondary/adult State awards.

Caroline Schott from Cape Girardeau’s Career and Technology Center has won the State Breaking Traditions Award. She will be honored April 27th during an awards ceremony at the James C Kirkpatrick State Information Interpretive Center in Jefferson City. Caroline is a Notre Dame student who attends CTC for Project Lead the Way Pre-Engineering program. She is the daughter to Michael and Kimberly Schott of Cape Girardeau. She will be attending the University of Missouri – Kansas City to pursue an engineering degree in Civil Engineering.

State winners will receive scholarship offers from all Missouri Community College and from the State Technical College of Missouri. Scholarship amounts and guidelines vary, and are set by each school. State and Spirit winners have been given a list of college people to contact for more information about these scholarships. Some colleges also offer scholarships to Regional winners.

In addition, each State, Spirit and Regional winner who continues his or her education next fall will receive a $100 scholarship from the Missouri STEM Foundation. College and Career Consultants have information on these scholarships.

Sponsored by the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (DESE) and the Regional College and Career Consultants, the Breaking Traditions awards are an excellent opportunity for students, career-technical programs, educators and schools to receive recognition and statewide publicity. Special thanks go to the instructors who took time to complete nomination forms for their outstanding students.

For more information, please check the Breaking Traditions website at

dese.mo.gov/college-career-readiness/school-counseling/breaking-traditions-awards-2016