The bachelor’s degree is America’s most commonly granted postsecondary degree—and most people equate it with a college education. Yet the associate’s degree is often a far more efficient route into good jobs than the longer, more expensive bachelor’s degree path. In this blog post, Mark Schneider shares recent data that ...
A decade ago, the U.S. Department of Education began reporting “Student Right To Know” graduation rates for America’s colleges and universities. While this federally mandated measure is flawed, it still captures the completion statistics of one of the nation’s largest groups of students. As this blog post shows, the news ...
Recent data shows that while students from low-income families began 9th grade with high aspirations of going to college, by junior year their expectations decline considerably. In this blog post, Sakiko Ikoma and Markus Broer argue that closing the enrollment gap between low-income students and their more affluent counterparts means ...
Parents, teachers, schools, districts, states, and especially students all want schools that prepare graduates to thrive in the 21st century. In this blog post, Anne Mishkind asks what it means to be "college and career ready."
Last Friday, President Obama announced a plan to make community college free for millions of students. Andrew Gillen and Thomas Weko argue the pros and cons of the plan.
Do median wages paid to bachelor’s graduates demonstrate gender differences after “controlling” for choice across high and low paying programs of study? Data from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board that merges student level data with Unemployment Insurance wage data can provide an initial answer to this question. In this ...
New U.S. Department of Education draft rules aim to hold teacher-training programs accountable for the quality of their graduates. In this blog post, Marianne Lemke discusses what's at stake.
Every year, the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics releases an annual report, America’s Children: Key National Indicators of Well-Being. AIR subject matter experts have identified some interesting findings from several indicators in the 2019 report’s education domain and explain why they matter. ...
While a new report concludes that “most teachers do not appear to improve substantially from year to year," Jane Coggshall argues we should not conclude that we should throw out all teacher professional development because it’s a waste of money. What’s needed instead, she says, is a broad set of ...
At 21, many foster youth “age out” of financial benefits and supports from the child welfare system—before they even finish college. Given the challenges they face, it’s not surprising that only 3 to 10 percent of them earn undergraduate degrees compared with 34 percent of young adults who weren’t in ...