Facilities and Equipment for a CTE Pathway: Toolkit

About this toolkit and what drives facility cost

This toolkit helps you plan the room and the equipment for a new CTE pathway: what the state requires, what is only recommended, how the space will be inspected, and which funds can pay for it. It is written once for every pathway. Nurse aide and electrical are the worked examples because they sit at opposite ends: one is governed by a health regulator with detailed lists in some states, the other by almost no state standard at all.

Three things drive what a lab costs, and they are worth sorting out before you price anything.

1. Who sets the standard. Some pathways answer to an outside regulator whose approval depends on the room (nurse aide). Others answer only to the state CTE office and a credential provider (electrical). A regulator’s list is a floor you must meet. A CTE office list is usually advice.
2. Infrastructure versus equipment. Equipment money is relatively easy to find. Money for a sink, new power drops, ventilation or a wall is not. Most state equipment grants and Perkins either bar construction and renovation or require prior approval. Find out early whether your room needs infrastructure work, because that part usually comes from local capital funds.
3. Cohort size. Where a state sets ratios (beds per student, students per instructor in the lab), the cohort size sets the equipment count. Decide your cohort size before you build the equipment list.

No published, priced nurse aide lab or construction electrician lab from the seven states turned up in this research. This toolkit gives you what is required and what is typical, and a worksheet to price it locally. It does not invent a dollar figure.

Items are labeled Confirmed, Confirm with the agency, or Changing. Last checked October 2, 2026.

Worked example: the nurse aide skills lab

The federal nurse aide rule (42 CFR 483.152) requires at least 16 hours of supervised practical training “in a laboratory or other setting,” but it sets no standard for the room or the equipment. State rules and approval forms fill that gap, and they differ a great deal. Two states set numeric ratios, two name equipment categories, and three set only a general standard.

What the ratios mean for a cohort of 20

The two states with numeric ratios produce very different labs. Under North Carolina’s list, 20 students need 2 beds and 2 full-body manikins. Under Pennsylvania’s checklist, 20 students need 4 complete mock resident units (20 divided by 6, rounded up), each with its own bed and furniture. Check your state’s rule before you size the room.

Typical equipment

These items appear across the Arizona rule, the North Carolina list, the Pennsylvania checklist and Arizona’s CTE equipment list. Use them as a starting list, then adjust to your state’s requirements and your cohort size.

• Resident unit: adjustable hospital bed with side rails, cleanable mattress, overbed table, bedside cabinet or nightstand, chair, call light, privacy curtain
• Manikins: full-body adult manikin; Arizona names a manikin for perineal care
• Mobility and transfer: wheelchair with footrests, walker, gait or transfer belts, mechanical lift (optional in North Carolina, listed in Pennsylvania)
• Vital signs: manual BP cuffs (adult and large adult), stethoscopes, electronic thermometers, calibrated standing scale with height bar, wall clock with a second hand
• Hygiene and elimination: wash and emesis basins, bedpans, urinals, bedside commode, briefs
• Infection control: sink with running water, soap, paper towels, hand sanitizer, gloves in several sizes, gowns, masks
• Linens and clothing: sheets, pillows, bath blankets, towels, washcloths, resident clothing for dressing practice
• Feeding: meal tray, adaptive utensils, intake and output measuring containers

Arizona’s CTE office publishes a Nursing Services equipment list (October 2025), labeled as recommended guidance. Idaho’s CTE CNA list, an out-of-state example, marks the items needed for testable skills and suggests three ways to lower cost: donations from local health agencies, rotating students through stations, and sharing a lab with another program.

Space

None of the seven states’ nurse aide rules sets a square footage. North Carolina’s school facilities guidelines suggest 2,000 to 2,500 sq ft for a health occupations room, and describe that figure as a recommended minimum, not a standard. North Carolina’s nurse aide application asks for a lab of at least 100 sq ft for one bed.

The sink

North Carolina and Pennsylvania both require a sink with running water, and Arizona’s CTE list names one. A sink is the item most likely to need plumbing work, and plumbing work is the part grants rarely pay for. If your room has no sink, price it first.

Worked example: the electrical lab

No state among the seven sets a binding equipment list or facility standard for a high school electrical lab. What shapes the lab instead is the credential you teach to (usually NCCER Electrical), the state’s advisory facility guidelines where they exist, and safety practice.

What the states publish

What NCCER asks for

NCCER’s accreditation guidelines ask sponsors to submit photos of the finished space and equipment where tests and hands-on performance profiles will be given. They set no square footage or fixed lab specification. NCCER posts equipment and material lists under Program Resources on its website. The Electrical Level 1 performance profiles show what the lab must support: safety for electricians, mounting device boxes, hand bending, and wireways, raceways and fittings.

Typical items

This list follows the tasks in the NCCER Level 1 performance profiles. Confirm with the agency: check it against NCCER’s own equipment list before you buy.

• Wiring booths or bays (stud-wall stations for rough-in and trim-out)
• Hand conduit benders and a conduit cutting and reaming station
• Practice panelboards and load centers, device boxes, raceway and fittings stock
• Wire, devices (receptacles, switches, GFCI and AFCI devices), strippers and hand-tool sets
• Multimeters and voltage testers
• Motor-control or low-voltage trainers
• PPE: safety glasses, gloves, hard hats where overhead work is simulated
• Lockout/tagout kits

Space and power

Lay out the room around the wiring bays and a storage area for conduit and wire stock, and size it to your cohort. If students will work on energized trainers or panels, plan the power distribution for the lab with your facilities staff. That work is infrastructure, and most equipment funds will not pay for it.

Safety and inspections

Who OSHA covers in a school lab

Federal OSHA does not cover state and local government employees. Public school staff are covered only where the state runs an OSHA-approved State Plan that includes public employees.

OSHA standards protect employees, not students. OSHA said so directly in a 2007 letter about a Pennsylvania public school: students have no employment relationship with the school. That does not make OSHA practice optional in your lab. Host employers apply their own controls, your students will be employees soon, and programs such as Virginia’s Electricity I have students earn OSHA-10. Teach and run the lab as if the standards applied.

Practices to build into the room

• Lockout/tagout (electrical). 29 CFR 1910.147 requires written energy-control procedures, training, and standardized lockout devices that identify who applied them. Model this in any lab with energized trainers or panels.
• Eyewash. Where eyes or body may be exposed to corrosive materials, 29 CFR 1910.151(c) requires quick-drench or flushing facilities in the work area. In a nurse aide lab, this applies if you use corrosive disinfectants. In an electrical lab, it matters where battery or chemical work happens.
• Eye protection. North Carolina law (G.S. 115C-166 to -169, as cited in DPI’s CTE guide) requires eye protection devices in certain courses. Confirm with the agency whether your state has a parallel statute.
• GFCI protection and emergency shutoffs (electrical). Common in practice. The only published source found for emergency shutoffs is North Carolina’s facility guidelines, in the science lab section. Confirm with the agency what your state CTE office expects.
• Infection control (nurse aide). A sink with running water, soap and paper towels, and PPE in several sizes. See the nurse aide section above.

Inspections tied to program approval

• Arizona is the only state found that requires a fire inspection report for each nurse aide classroom and lab, at first use and after remodeling.
• Virginia, Missouri and Hawaii inspect or visit the nurse aide site as part of approval. Michigan surveys before issuing the permit.
• Pennsylvania requires PDE approval before a nurse aide lab moves.
• Otherwise, labs fall under the building’s ordinary fire and building code inspections by local or state fire officials.

No standalone state CTE lab safety manual for health science or electrical was found for the seven states.

Paying for the lab

Equipment and facilities are funded differently, so treat them as two budget lines from the start.

Federal Perkins V

• Equipment is allowed. Local Perkins funds may buy equipment, technology and instructional materials aligned with industry needs, including machinery, testing equipment, tools, hardware and software (Perkins V section 135). Construction and renovation are not listed as uses.
• Supplement, not supplant. Perkins must add to, not replace, state and local CTE spending.
• Prior approval for big items. Under the federal Uniform Guidance, equipment means items with a useful life over a year and a unit cost at or above the lower of your capitalization level or $10,000. Special-purpose equipment of $10,000 or more, and any capital improvement, needs prior written approval from your state.
• Administration is shifting. The U.S. Department of Labor has handled day-to-day Perkins administration since a May 2025 interagency agreement; the U.S. Department of Education keeps statutory authority. The statute and Perkins V rules are unchanged. Changing: watch for new guidance.

State funds

All amounts and windows change every year. Treat these as a map of where to look, and confirm the current cycle.

Three things to know before you apply

1. Renovation money is scarce. Of the funds above, only Missouri’s Enhancement Grant clearly pays for facility renovation. Michigan’s 61v bars it, and Arizona puts infrastructure on the recipient. Plan to pay for a sink, power drops or ventilation from local capital funds or bonds.
2. Thresholds differ. The line between equipment and supplies is $10,000 under federal rules (or your lower capitalization level), $5,000 in Missouri and in Arizona’s 2019 guidelines, and $3,000 in Pennsylvania. Check the threshold of the specific fund.
3. Approval comes first. Missouri’s grant funds only approved programs, and Pennsylvania pays no vocational education funds before approval. File the CTE approval (Approvals toolkit) before you count on state equipment money.

Template: lab planning and cost worksheet

Work through this in order. The first part sets the size of the lab; the second prices it; the third matches each cost to a fund.

Part 1. Set the requirements

Part 2. Price it

Get at least two local quotes for anything above your capitalization threshold. Ask local hospitals, long-term care facilities, contractors and the electrical union whether they donate or lend equipment; Idaho’s CNA list names donations, station rotation and sharing a lab as cost reducers.

Part 3. Match each cost to a fund

Before you sign a purchase order

• The CTE program approval is filed or granted.
• The regulator (if any) has confirmed the lab meets its rule, or you have scheduled its site visit.
• Your facilities staff has signed off on power, plumbing and ventilation.
• Any item at or above $10,000, or your lower capitalization level, has state approval if Perkins pays for it.

Quick reference by pathway

One row per pathway. Each pathway guide has the full state-by-state detail; rows are added as new guides are completed.

Review status and sources

Last checked October 2, 2026. The Pennsylvania Competitive Equipment Grant row was checked against PDE’s 2025-26 guidelines on October 3, 2026. These items are open for reviewers:

1. Priced lab costs. No published, priced nurse aide or construction electrician lab from the seven states was found. Possible sources: Michigan 61v award applications, Pennsylvania equipment grant applications, Arizona CTED budgets, Missouri Enhancement Grant awards.
2. NCCER equipment lists. Use them to check the electrical item list above.
3. Pennsylvania. Confirm the Report of Change checklist (1 unit per 6 students, restroom within 25 feet) applies to new programs, and whether a fire inspection is required. Confirm the status of HB 308.
4. North Carolina. Confirm whether 10A NCAC 13O .0301 or 21 NCAC 36 .0405 add lab standards beyond the DHSR list. Find the current DPI CTE Equipment Guide. Confirm the eye protection statute text.
5. Michigan. Open LEO’s sample nurse aide equipment list. Confirm whether 61v has any funding after round 2; the FY2026-27 budget shows $0.
6. Virginia. Check the Electricity I curriculum for an equipment list.
7. Arizona. Confirm the State Priority Grant amount and allowable uses, and current CTED levy figures.
8. Missouri. Confirm FY27 Enhancement Grant dates and amounts.
9. Hawaii. Confirm whether HIDOE has a state CTE equipment line and whether DHS uses an equipment checklist during site reviews.
10. Electrical safety features. Find a state CTE source for GFCI, emergency shutoff and trainer expectations.

Sources

Nurse aide lab

• 42 CFR 483.152
• Mich. Admin. Code R 400.301 to 400.357
• 18VAC90-26 and Virginia Board of Nursing on-site review form
• NC DHSR Basic Equipment and Supply List (rev. 4/20)
• Ariz. Admin. Code R4-19-802 and ADE Nursing Services Equipment List
• PDE NATCEP Report of Change Form (rev. May 2025)
• 19 CSR 30-84.010
• HAR 17-1444
• Idaho CTE CNA Equipment List (out-of-state example)
• Public Schools of NC Facilities Guidelines

Electrical lab

• ADE Electrical and Power Transmission Installation and ADE CTE Equipment Guidelines
• CTE Resource Center, Electricity I
• NCCER Accredited Training Sponsor Guidelines (2022) and Electrical Level 1 test specifications

Safety

• OSHA State Plans and OSHA interpretation letter, June 14, 2007
• 29 CFR 1910.147 and 29 CFR 1910.151

Funding

• 20 U.S.C. 2355, 2 CFR 200.1, 2 CFR 200.439

• MCL 388.1661v, MDE 61v Q&A, MDE 61v awards (April 8, 2026)

• VDOE release, May 12, 2026

• NC DPI CTE Fiscal and Policy Guide (January 2025)

• A.R.S. 15-393

• PDE Supplemental Equipment Grant Guidelines

  PDE Competitive Equipment Grant guidelines, 2025-26 (checked Oct. 3, 2026)

• DESE FY26 Enhancement Grant Planning Guide

• UH State CTE Office, About Perkins