Technological changes in the workplace have placed considerable pressure on the U.S. educational system to prepare students for increasingly skillbased occupations. Employers reward new hires for having the skills or credentials needed for their job, underscoring the importance of having either the requisite "tools in your toolbox," or some basic…

Compared foreign-born and native minority community college entrants in terms of credits earned, the likelihood of transfer to a 4-year program and the probability of degree completion. Results for 26,575 students in the 1990 cohort and descriptive statistics for 25,173 students from 1997 show that nativity, race, and ethnicity were all related to…

This report summarizes statistics on access and attainment in higher education, focusing particularly on community college students, using data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988 (NELS:88), which follows a nationally representative sample of individuals who were eighth graders in the spring of 1988. A sample of these…

Over the last decade, policymakers, educators, and researchers have increasingly sought to understand community college policies and practices that promote students' success. This effort has been partly driven by an increased emphasis on outcome accountability, but it has also promoted a productive discussion about improving institutional…

This paper seeks to answer some of the many questions that exist about credit-based transition programs. The paper reviews 45 published and unpublished reports, articles, and books on the most common credit-based transition programs: dual enrollment, Advanced Placement (AP), International Baccalaureate (IB), Tech Prep, and middle college high…

Dual-enrollment programs, which allow high school students to enroll in college courses and earn college and high school credit simultaneously, are one method to introduce students to the idea of college and to its academic and social demands. The college credits that high school students potentially can earn also tend to be free or low-cost--a…

This document is a report on the performance, graduation, and transfer of immigrant and native minority students at City University of New York (CUNY) community colleges. The study also compares the experiences of immigrants at CUNY community colleges to those of native United States minorities. A total of 8,332 students responded to the survey,…

This paper outlines an agenda for research on postsecondary vocational education that can be carried out with existing data. A particular interest is encouraging research that can provide insight into the effects of the Carl D. Perkins Vocational and Technical Education Act 1998 (the Act). The paper begins with a brief review of relevant sections…

Employers' motivations for getting involved in school-to-work internships and their perceptions of the quality of work-based learning placements were examined through a telephone survey of 334 employers participating in 5 school-to-work programs (2 in New York, 2 in Pennsylvania, and 1 in Michigan) and a matching sample of 323 establishments not…

This report addresses contemporary concerns about the competitive threat from for-profit educational institutions, contrasts national data on for-profits with national data on private non-profit and public post-secondary institutions, and examines case study data comparing a for-profit chain with three public community colleges located near…

Community colleges are a crucial source of educational opportunity for millions of Americans, making fundamental contributions to state and national economies. While community colleges should be proud of their role in providing access to higher education and the opportunity to obtain better quality jobs for their students, there is much more to…

This report analyzes the current educational reform movement by drawing heavily on the parallels between it and contemporary efforts to reform work. It argues that current initiatives which are often solely associated with vocational education can form the basis of an education reform strategy that applies to all students. Based on information…

This report, which is directed toward policymakers, educators, employers, researchers, and others interested in the school-to-work (STW) movement, synthesizes literature on the development and effectiveness of STW programs since 1993. Part I provides an overview of the STW movement and examines the effectiveness of STW efforts in terms of…