Dr Francis Tuttle - CareerTech's Second State Director

Dr. Francis Tuttle - State Director from 1967-1985

The late Francis Tuttle was director of Oklahoma's State Department of Career and Technology Education for almost two decades. He pioneered the way for career and technical education nationwide.

Prior to coming to CareerTech, Tuttle taught vocational agriculture and served as superintendent of schools at Gotebo, Muskogee and Holdenville.

Following his retirement from ODCTE, the governor appointed him director of the Oklahoma Department of Economic Development. He subsequently was appointed secretary of commerce when his agency merged into the Department of Commerce.
Tuttle’s service to education includes consultations for Sweden, Thailand, the Soviet Union and China. He also served as president of the American Vocational Association.

He was one of the first three inductees into the Oklahoma Educators Hall of Fame and received the Henry G. Bennett Distinguished Service Award in 1992.

Tuttle was inducted into the CareerTech Hall of Fame in 1990.

Tuttle's time as state director included several firsts:

• In his first act as state director (and five years before any federal law required it), he ordered that salaries be equalized at all levels without regard to gender.
• By a legislative act made effective on July 1, 1968, governance of vocational education transferred from the State Board of Education to the newly established State Board for Vocational and Technical Education. The same statute also established the State Department of Vocational-Technical Education as an independent executive agency.
• The first Skills Centers offered vocational training classes to inmates under the jurisdiction of the State Department of Corrections.