As schools attempt to foster smoother transitions for youth into the workplace, differing realities must be considered. A school-to-work opportunities system cannot be restricted to those occupations meeting an elusive definition of "high wage." Three possible workplace learning opportunities are as follows: the high-skill, high-wage workplace; the community-building workplace; and the capacity-building workplace. Each offers the potential for work-based learning where young people would be able to develop skills that are needed to work in high performance workplaces and that meet the requirements of broad clusters of related occupations. At present, there are at least eight strategies for connecting school-based learning (SBL) to work-based learning (WBL), including job shadowing, internship, youth apprenticeship, school-based enterprise, and cooperative education. Explicit in the current federal legislation is the integration of academic and vocational curriculum and the integration of SBL and WBL--a double integration model that integrates academic and vocational SBL with WBL. Barriers to double integration include the following: lack of continued, meaningful, and expanded business involvement; resistance to new methods of education by school-based educators; uneasy relationships between secondary and postsecondary institutions; and a lack of an identifiable credential. (A list of recommendations or best practice in combining SBL and WBL is included. Contains 29 references. (YLB)