College shopping is among the biggest challenges that a family can face in education and yet can be the most rewarding. All of those decisions that began with the first child care provider (if one could do that) through the sequence of later schooling is topped off by a decision about college. It may be the last educational decision in which parents participate. That inevitability is another reason to pull in as much information into the college search as possible.
This month, I’m sharing some resources for you to consider in a new series I’m calling “5 Key Takeaways”. This first version of the series will focus on college shopping. The takeaways I’m offering are the following:
Typical national college ranking leaves out other valuable perspectives
When looking at other forms of college ranking, one should look at inputs and outputs
One primary output to look at is one’s return on investment
A second primary output is the concept of social mobility
We should not let quantitative rankings overrun or overshadow individual experience
In the Youtube video I run through those takeaways and share the following resources:
The primary goal for providing these resources is to de-emphasize the prestige-based rankings that tend to dominate our searches. I hope these perspectives add to your to family conversations.
When I worked in the education policy space, there were several researchers who stood out because of their work on access and equity. Among them was Anthony Carnevale, now Professor of Policy at Georgetown and the Director of their Center on Education and the Workforce.Back then, his research focused on standardized testing and how it should recognize the context within which students learn.
At Georgetown, he continues to be a powerful force on the side of equity.Not many have the breadth of perspectives on how students get to college and the prospects for success afterwards. Thus, for the parents who are approaching educational planning strategically, the recent interview I had with Dr. Carnevale had a lot to offer.We talked about strategic “opportunities and threats.”
Our conversation began with Tony (as he prefers to be called) talking about how The Center on Education and the Workforce came into being.“Foundations asked me what they should do with the money they were holding on to—I told them to give to me”.His pitch worked because back then, in the early eighties, he recognized pivotal changes in the labor market.“Jobs that used to only require a high school degree had vanished.Now 70 percent of the good jobs required a bachelor’s degree or more.” Tony explained.He also tied his observations to a report that was as important to the education policy community that the Kerner Commission report was to the civil rights community.A Nation at Risk, released to the world in 1983, documented in stark detail the failures of the nation’s education system from kindergarten through college.
In more modern times, Tony has been behind more than 80 reports that look at various aspects of educational opportunity and career pathways that A Nation at Risk found to be in peril.
Summarizing just the first report, “Three Pathways”, looks at the likelihood of students getting good jobs based on the path one takes leaving high school.Defining “good jobs” as those earning roughly 45,000 per year, they found that 20% of the good jobs that exist were obtained students following a high school path.Jobs fitting this category include truck drivers, construction equipment operators, and office support.
The second path is called, “middle skills”.Such skills are those which are obtained with community college level technical training and end with a certificate or credential.They were found to earn 24 percent of all good jobs.These kind of jobs are composed of law enforcement officers, electricians, computer control programmers, and highway maintenance workers.
The third path, the bachelor’s degree, accounts for 56 of all good jobs.This category includes managers, journalists, computer programmers and architects.However, the other to look at the same data is to consider the fact that almost 75% of all jobs obtained by those with a BA meet their definition of good jobs.
Moreover, when comparing job growth across blue-collar to skilled industries, the differences could not be more stark.If you have possessed middle skills, and looked for jobs in the skilled services industries, you saw a 77 percent increase in your general area with 20 million new good jobs.Blue collar industries only saw and 800,000 job increase and for those with bachelor’s degrees, 500,000
The main takeaway for parents planning strategically is that students while the more a student earns, their income potential increases, options to get a good job are still plentiful for those who do not attend or graduate from a four-year college.
Thinking more about the path to college, I asked Tony about how families should decide among these forks in the road.He lamented then about the school’s role in the process.“We need much better career counseling.Not enough resources are being spent to help students make choices.” He also doesn’t think that just using a “career predicting” diagnostic test is enough.He favors more interpersonal connections with professionals.If you are a parent with a child who is still trying to figure out in which direction you are headed, please comment below to say whether and from where you are getting career information.
“Already”, Tony said, “the SAT is not being applied correctly.First, if you get a 1,000 (meaning not the highest percentile) you could still be the kind of student who could graduate from Harvard, even if you couldn’t get in.”Here he is suggesting that the test is not a full measurement of student potential.
Now, Tony argues, college outcomes are more of a reflection of a family’s income than a student’s potential.“If you are in the top tier of test takers, but your family’s income is in the lowest 25%, only 30% of your peers complete college.But if your family’s income is in the highest 25%—even if you were in the lowest tiers of test takers, 70% of you and your peers are likely to graduate.”
As we got to the end of a policy-heavy discussion (which I asked for), I was incredibly moved when asking him about how his family history impacted his own career path.As the third generation from immigrants hailing from Italy, he was given a charge.The patriarchs two generations back planted in the minds of Tony and his two brothers (all PhDs) that because of the patriarchs’ desire to honor their new American citizenship, Tony and his brothers must “make the Carnevale name great”.
Last year I wrote a blog post about how earlier generations can manifest inter-generational momentum by sharing their own aspirations.But the charge issued by Tony’s grandparents and uncles activate that concept in a profound way.I can say that in my eyes, who as a younger researcher in education policy who kept seeing Tony champion causes of diversity, he has definitely lived up to that charge.
This month I’m stepping out from beyond the perimeter of these webpages to expand my circle of inclusion.
As of this writing, I’m simultaneously launching a YouTube channel!On it, I will hold on-camera interviews with friends, colleagues, and others whose expertise in education matters make a difference in the lives of our students.
While I will continue to post topics each month here, my goal is to spark actual conversation with each guest and with each of you should you decide to listen in.I will be deliberate about drawing out tips for parents to implement, but I’m also interested in the broader picture that impacts educational opportunity and outlook.With a mixture of guests and topics, I hope the mosaic we build brings form and definition to the world that we as families have to navigate–to in turn prepare our students to be high achievers regardless of what is next after high school.
In this first discussion, I’m talking with a good friend James Rose, who is the director of an organization in DC called, “Reach4Success”. While over the past three years, roughly six trillion dollars has been awarded to 172 million recipients according to the National Student Loan Data System.However, families must pass through the necessary crucible of financial aid applications to receive those awards.Mr. Rose’s program helps families navigate the application process and trains others who can pass along the knowledge more broadly.
I’m looking forward to having these discussions or “virtual coffeehouses” to share the kind of knowledge that can help you make room for the dream you and your family share.In the case of financial aid, knowing that college is possible can certainly help students hold on to the optimism that may be driving their effort.
I hope you will join me online and subscribe.Thanks in advance for your continued support.
Missing from the MLK quotes that ricocheted across the internet on 18th of this month….
…was the shifting context in which Dr. King uttered them. The Deep South back then thought him “uppity” and “militant” because of his eloquent insistence for equal justice. He stood up to their constant saber rattling, gainsaying, and eventual fire-bombing with a piercing intellect. Grudgingly, the South along with the rest of America eventually accepted that his thoughts on race and class should be heard. But once he tied Vietnam to his principled stance on non-violence and the status of Blacks in America, again, pundits promptly pounced.
Recently I was at a Home Depot when a young African American man was helping me with a propane gas purchase. To get to where I was waiting for him, he sprinted like a running back I would have blocked for if we were on the same team (so long ago). Releasing the mental image into the air I said, “someone give that brother a football!” We both laughed. Then, in response he said, “Can I ask you a question?”
An idea left unchecked can grow into a conviction.
A belief in one’s purpose can grow into professional ambition. Conversely, disbelief in one’s abilities, expressed by others, can be internalized and grow into self-doubt. In the movie “Inception“, the protagonists attempt to plant a negative thought in their target, which they hoped would lead the target to renounce his inheritance. Which ideas are being planted in the minds of our children during this time of racial crosswinds?
Do you have a vision of the person you’d like for your child to become?
If so, how will they get there? Will their journey be driven by your motivation, or will their motivation come from within? Perhaps they already have their own vision?
When we allow our children to experience boredom, you may get the opportunity to see how these questions might be answered today.
At least three phrases now hold a special place within the American lexicon: “social distancing”, “self-quarantine” and “going remote”.
These responses to COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, have (temporarily?) changed society. Among the most disruptive changes is the move to remote or online learning. What will it take for our students to succeed in what will be a new education frontier for many? Continue reading Going Remote: Learning to Learn Online
Thomas Seuss Geisel, better known as “Dr. Seuss”, was born. Over his prolific lifetime he authored over 60 books. You probably have a favorite. Mine is “Fox and Socks”, but not because of my childhood experiences. Its because of what happened to me in my adulthood.
