Comparing Academic Readiness Requirements for Different Postsecondary Pathways: What Admissions Tests Tell Us

Ensuring postsecondary readiness is a goal of K‐12 education, but it is unclear whether high school students should get different messages about the required levels of academic preparation depending on their postsecondary trajectories. This study estimated readiness benchmark scores on a college admissions test predictive of earning good grades in majors associated with middle‐skills occupations at 2‐year postsecondary institutions. Results generally indicated similarity between those scores, the corresponding scores for students preparing for high‐skills jobs requiring a bachelor's degree, and established readiness benchmarks for the general college‐going population. Subsequent analyses revealed small variation between readiness benchmarks for different college majors. Overall, results suggest that high school graduates need a strong academic foundation regardless of the postsecondary path they choose.     

The effect of community college enrollment on bachelor's degree completion

Rouse [Rouse, C. E. (1995). Democratization or diversion—the effect of community-colleges on educational-attainment. Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, 13(2), 217–224] finds that enrollment in a community college may divert students from attaining a bachelor's degree. However, this result may be due to selection bias, as the population of community college students should be quite different from those who attend 4-year institutions in terms of both observable and unobservable characteristics. This study uses propensity score matching to non-parametrically balance a data set from the 1996 Beginning Postsecondary Students survey in order to overcome issues associated with selection bias. Results from a Cox proportional hazards model indicate that attendance at a community college lowers the hazard rate for completing a bachelor's degree. The results are consistent with previous studies.     

Course-Taking Effect on Postsecondary Enrollment of Deaf and Hard of Hearing Students

Data from the National Longitudinal Transition Study-2 were used to examine the effect of academic and career or technical education course-taking in high school on deaf or hard of hearing (DHH) youth’s postsecondary enrollment in 2-year, 4-year, and career or technical education institutions. We examined the proportion of academic and career or technical education courses taken, completion of algebra, and completion of an occupationally specific course of study. Propensity model analyses indicated that academic course taking significantly increased the odds that DHH students would enroll in postsecondary school. Completion of a higher proportion of career or technical education courses was not related to enrollment in postsecondary education, including career and technical education schools. Implications for practice and future research are discussed, including the importance of secondary transition planning staff both encouraging DHH students who have a goal of future postsecondary attendance to take a rigorous, academically focused high school curriculum, and providing students with the support to complete these courses.     

The value of using early-career earnings data in the College Scorecard to guide college choices

Policymakers are increasingly including early-career earnings data in consumer-facing college search tools to help students and families make more informed postsecondary education decisions. We offer new evidence on the degree to which existing college-specific earnings data equip consumers with useful information by documenting the level of selection bias in the earnings metrics reported in the U.S. Department of Education's College Scorecard. Given growing interest in reporting earnings by college and major, we focus on the degree to which earnings differences across four-year colleges and universities can be explained by differences in major composition across institutions. We estimate that more than 70% of the variation in median earnings across institutions is explained by observable factors, and accounting for differences in major composition explains 20–30% of the variation in earnings over and above institutional selectivity and student composition. We also identify large variations in the distribution of earnings within colleges; as a result, comparisons of early-career earnings can be extremely sensitive to whether the median, 25th, or 75th percentiles are presented. Taken together, our findings indicate that consumers can easily draw misleading conclusions about institutional quality when using publicly available earnings data to compare institutions.     

Student Flow Between Community Colleges: Investigating Lateral Transfer

The traditional unidirectional (“linear”) postsecondary path from high school to a community college to a 4-year institution into the workforce represents accurately a decreasing proportion of the pathways actually taken by students through higher education. Instead, students increasingly exhibit patterns of enrollment that take them through multiple postsecondary institutions, both within levels of the higher education system (e.g., multiple community colleges, multiple 4-year institutions) and across levels (e.g., movement back and forth between community colleges and 4-year institutions). These “swirling” patterns of enrollment are widely recognized by scholars of higher education, but they remain poorly understood. In this study, I employ data that address 89,057 first-time students in the California community college system to answer a number of key questions concerning lateral transfer between community colleges, which, according to prior research, constitutes one sizeable component of student “swirl”. Building on the very limited work on this topic, I examine whether the reported high prevalence of lateral transfer holds true under a more stringent operational framework than that employed in prior work. I explore whether lateral transfer is primarily an artifact of students enrolling simultaneously in multiple community colleges, sometimes called “double-dipping”. I investigate the timing of lateral transfer from several different perspectives to determine how lateral transfer fits in students’ progress and development. Finally, I probe the relationship between students’ level of academic investment in their current community college and the risk of lateral transfer.     

Can “Some College” Help Reduce Future Earnings Inequality?

This article addresses the policy debate over “college for all” versus “college for some” in the United States and analyzes the relationship between “some college” (as a formal education attainment category) and earnings. Our evidence confirms—using data from the American Community Survey (ACS), the Panel Study on Income Dynamics (PSID), and the Survey on Income and Program Participation (SIPP)—that more (postsecondary) education, on average, is associated with higher median earnings. However, there is emerging evidence that a proportion of workers who have attained lower levels of education (i.e., “some college”) earn more than those who have attained higher levels of education (bachelor's degree).

We focus particular attention on the subset of Americans who fall into the U.S. Census official category entitled “some college.” This is a heterogeneous group who have alternate educational credentials but who have not acquired a formal associate or bachelor's degree. Instead of an unequivocal focus on “college for all” or even “community college for all,” we argue that educators and policymakers should consider “some college” as a viable pathway to future labor market success. In sum, we conclude that some types of “some college” could lead to a reduction in earnings inequality.     

High Educational Expectations and Low Achievement: Stability of Educational Goals Across Adolescence

Abstract

Data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 were used to investigate variables that predicted stability of adolescents' postsecondary educational expectations from Grade 8 to 2 years after high school. The study included students who had early expectations for at least a bachelor's degree as well as 8th-grade reading or mathematics test scores that were below the median. All participants had high early expectations and comparatively low early achievement. Six years later, approximately 76% of the participants still had high expectations, whereas 24% of them no longer expected to earn a bachelor's degree. Results provide support for the addition of variables to the social cognitive model of educational achievement when predicting long-term educational expectations and attainment.     

ALLEVIATING TRANSFER SHOCK: CREATING AN ENVIRONMENT FOR MORE SUCCESSFUL TRANSFER STUDENTS

Community college students transferring to a 4-year college or university face a variety of challenges. Social and academic issues can pose potential hurdles to graduating with a bachelor's degree for these students. Community colleges and 4-year institutions must work closely together to create more efficient and effective partnerships for students transitioning through the higher education system. This article makes suggestions for community college staff and faculty members to help transfer students successfully transition into university life and complete a bachelor's degree.     

Recruiting and supporting low-income,high-achieving students at flagship universities

We study an intervention designed to overcome multiple hurdles faced by low-income, high-ability college students to determine if and how it affects students’ long-term outcomes. UT-Austin’s Longhorn Opportunity Scholars (LOS) program recruited at impoverished high schools and provided scholarships and enhanced support services to students who enrolled. We use administrative records for Texas public college students and find that LOS had large, positive effects on enrollment in and graduation from UT-Austin, masters’ degree enrollment, and earnings. In particular, our results suggest that high achieving college attendees who went to a targeted high school saw UT-Austin enrollment increase by 71% and earnings 12 years after high school increase by 4.6% (an 82% increase among attendees). A somewhat similar program at Texas A&M called the Century Scholars Program had no effect on enrollment, but other contemporaneous enrollment shifts limit our analysis of other outcomes. The LOS results suggest that well designed, targeted recruitment programs with adequate supports can improve long-run outcomes for low-income students.     

HOPE for community college students: The impact of merit aid on persistence,graduation, and earnings

Community colleges play a major role in postsecondary education, yet previous research has emphasized the impact of merit aid on four-year students rather than two-year students. Furthermore, researchers have focused on the impact of merit aid on enrollment and outcomes during college, but to my knowledge, none have yet considered the impact of aid on earnings after college. This paper utilizes discontinuities in eligibility criteria for a large merit scholarship to examine the local impact of aid on student outcomes both during college and after college. The findings suggest that reducing the cost of community college does not impact persistence, academic performance, degree completion, expected earnings, or short-term earnings after college for marginally eligible students.     

Higher Education Policy and Legitimacy Building: the Making of a New Academic Credential in Ontario

Canada's province of Ontario introduced a new policy in 2000 allowing community colleges to offer a new type of undergraduate degree. This decision was a significant policy change for the government considering the nature of Ontario's binary system, where a rigid separation has historically prevailed between the university and college sectors. Drawing on multiple sources of data, this study indicates that the decision to create a new type of applied bachelor's degree generated a series of uncertainties and challenges for higher education institutions, students and government agencies. The paper highlights the need for policy makers to consider the socio‐cultural aspects of higher education systems in policy design, particularly the role of legitimacy.     

Exploring the Relationship between State Financial Aid Policy and Postsecondary Enrollment Choices: A Focus on Income and Race Differences

This study explores the relationship between state financial aid policies and postsecondary enrollment for high school graduates (or equivalent diploma holders). Utilizing an event history modeling for a nationally representative sample from the National Education Longitudinal Study (NELS:88/2000) in addition to state-level policy variables, this study examined how state aid policies differentially affect students’ postsecondary enrollment choices depending on their family income and race/ethnicity between the years 1992 through 2000. The findings demonstrate that there is a clear and consistent gap in college enrollment for students who are from different income and race/ethnic groups, and that changes in state financial aid policy are significantly related with the type of institutions a student attends across income and racial groups. The study findings have important implications for state aid policy as well as future research on the role of public financial aid policy in college choice of students from different income and racial/ethnic backgrounds.     

Virtual advising for high-achieving high school students

We examine whether virtual advising – college counseling using technology to communicate remotely – increases postsecondary enrollment in selective colleges. We test this approach using a sample of approximately 16,000 high-achieving, low- and middle-income students identified by the College Board and randomly assigned to receive virtual advising from the College Advising Corps. The offer of virtual advising had no impact on overall college enrollment, but increased enrollment in high graduation rate colleges by 2.7 percentage points (5%), with instrumental variable impacts on treated students of 6.1 percentage points.     

The effect of articulation agreements on community college transfers and bachelor’s degree attainment

For more than a century, community colleges have provided a postsecondary education alternative to the traditional, 4-year university. Enrolling disproportionate numbers of both disadvantaged and nontraditional students, the community college sector has seen unparalleled gains in enrollment over the past few decades. Along with these increases in enrollment, there has been a shift in focus toward transfer to 4-year institutions, as well as the development of articulation agreements. Established in order to ease the transfer process from community colleges to 4-year colleges/universities—for those students interested in obtaining a bachelor’s degree—these agreements currently exist in more than 30 states. Via two-level, hierarchical linear modeling, this article examines the student and school level characteristics of community colleges that affect transfer and bachelor’s degree attainment rates. Also examined is the impact of articulation agreements. Ultimately, while articulation agreements are not found to yield a significant effect on transfer rates, they are found to have significant, positive effects on bachelor’s degree attainment rates.     

Why has for-profit colleges’ share of higher education expanded so rapidly? Estimating the responsiveness to labor market changes

Over the last two decades, for-profit colleges (FPCs) have substantially increased their share of the higher education market. One potential explanation is that FPC sector may be more responsive to labor market changes than public competitors. Using panel datasets of Associate's degree students, we examine the effects of changes in labor market conditions across various employment fields on enrollment and degree completion in related majors. The results indicate that enrollment and degree completion in the FPC sector is positively related to employment growth and wages in related occupations, while public institutions remain largely unresponsive. Heterogeneity analysis reveals that these relationships are similar across groups of students by gender and ethnicity. Furthermore, the results also indicate that students in public institutions are non-responsive to changes in labor markets associated with requiring an Associate's or Bachelor's degree.     

THE EFFECT OF ACADEMIC FACTORS ON TRANSFER STUDENT PERSISTENCE AND GRADUATION: A COMMUNITY COLLEGE TO LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE CASE STUDY

Critics contend that enrollment in a community college lessens the likelihood that a student will complete a bachelor's degree (S. Brint & J. Karabel, 1989). A number of studies have examined personal, demographic, and environmental characteristics that influence the academic performance of community college transfer students. This research has included characteristics that are not readily available to admissions representatives at four‐year institutions, and studies have not considered the private, liberal arts college as the senior institution.

The purpose of this study was to identify easily ascertainable characteristics that occur prior to transfer and to assess the relationship of these characteristics to persistence and baccalaureate attainment at a private, liberal arts college. Two academic factors related to persistence and graduation were included in the methodology: completion of the associate (AA) degree and community college grade point average (GPA) The subjects for the study were 200 students who completed the AA degree and transferred from one of three community colleges to a private, liberal arts college over a 5‐year period.

Results indicated that whereas completion of the AA degree resulted in a higher persistence/graduation rate, completion of the AA degree with a community college GPA of 3.0 or higher increased the persistence/graduation rate to a level equal to that of native students.     

Where to attend? Estimating the effects of beginning college at a two-year institution

Two-year colleges are an important part of the higher education system in the United States but there are concerns as to how attendance at these institutions affects educational attainment and labor market outcomes. This paper uses data from a nationally representative survey to examine the impact of students beginning their college career at a two-year college instead of a four-year college. Treatment effects are estimated using both standard regression techniques as well as propensity score matching. As these estimates may be contaminated because of selection on unobservable characteristics this paper will also employ a number of sensitivity analyses to consider the potential bias. The results show large negative impacts on both educational attainment and labor market outcomes for men and women who begin at a two-year college, even for those students who expect to complete a bachelor's degree. The evidence from the sensitivity analyses suggest that to eliminate these large effects there would need to be substantial, and arguably implausible, selection on unobservable characteristics.     

COMMUNITY COLLEGE REVERSE TRANSFER STUDENTS: A MULTIVARIATE ANALYSIS

Reverse transfer students (i.e., students transferring from a baccalaureate institution to a community college) are either completers (i.e., earned a bachelor's degree) or noncompleters (i.e., did not earn a bachelor's degree). The investigation reported in this article included a procedure to construct-validate an instrument that captures data about why reverse transfer occurs and a discriminant-analysis profile that highlights differences among completers and noncompleters. The findings have implications for student recruitment, student services, and future research.