The College and Career Readines and Success Center closed on September 30,2019 because the grant cycle for the U.S. Department of Education Comprehensive Centers ended. The information on this website will no longer be updated. Visit www.air.org for updates on college and career readiness.
This study assesses how the High Schools that Work initiative prepares students for college and careers. The report also presents strategies that district and school leaders can use to help students become more prepared for transitioning from high school to college and careers.
This 4-year longitudinal study evaluates the experiences of high school graduates enrolled in tech prep programs in eight regions across the nation. The study reports on their demographics, college readiness risk indicators, vocational interests, and performance as a function of graduation requirements at their high schools. The researchers reported no differences between participants and non-participants of tech prep programs with regard to college enrollment rates and percentage of students completing a degree or certificate.
This paper reports preliminary findings from the evaluation of the New York State Education Department’s Model Transition Program grants to sixty local education agencies aimed to improve post-secondary outcomes for youth with disabilities. Data were collected for more than 16,000 participants. This part of the evaluation aimed to describe the types of services provided and characteristics of the program participants. Results indicated that most of the students targeted by the program were male and enrolled in 11th and 12th grades.
This report analyzes the effect of vocational education on high school students’ academic effort and graduation rates. International cross-section data showed that nations (e.g. graduation rates from upper secondary school in Europe, Australia and North America and the correlation with enrollment in career-tech programs) that enroll a large portion of high school students in vocational programs have higher attendance rates and high school completion rates.
This study assessed the relationship between high school students home environment and post-secondary aspirations. Data was obtained from the School Success Profile survey administered to middle and high school students. Analyses were limited to a sub-sample of more than 11,000 students from two states. All students in the sample were included based on their eligibility for free or reduced price lunch program. Parental support and parents' high behavioral and academic expectations were associated with greater aspirations.
This study evaluates the EXCEL program, a college access program, which promotes underrepresented youth attending a higher education institution by guaranteeing a scholarship to a sponsoring university and providing various enrichment activities. Eighty-three eighth grade students with a GPA of B and above and standardized test scores at grade level or above were randomly assigned to attend EXCEL or to a control group. Results revealed that students involved in the program were not significantly more likely to attend college than students in the control group.
This third annual report on the national evaluation of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's Early College High School Initiative focuses on the 2005-06 implementation year. ECHS appears to have some preliminary positive impacts on student outcomes and the overall implementation and development of ECHS is progressing.
Submitted by Karen Pittman on
The Forum for Youth Investment is a lead partner on the College and Career Readiness and Success Center. The Forum is a nonprofit, nonpartisan action tank dedicated to helping communities and the nation make sure all young people are ready for college, work and life by age 21. As an action tank, we combine the ideas of a think tank – disseminating the best research about youth development practices – with the services of a consultant – helping community leadership groups implement those ideas on the ground. Thus our tag line: “Moving Ideas to Impact.”
This paper focuses on strategies for creating postsecondary pathways for high school dropouts in order to close the skills gap as well as connect the talents of these youth to postsecondary skills and credentials. The paper argues that in order to improve educational and economical outcomes for high school dropouts, there must be alignment of secondary, postsecondary, workforce, and adult education systems and several actions must be taken.
This fact sheet discusses the importance of aligning workforce data and how that data can inform educational and economic development policy. Aligning education, employment, and workforce data also allows stakeholders to answer a variety of questions such as: What educational experience do children need to successfully pursue their desired careers and do the courses a student takes correlate to his or her later employment and earnings?
