Does everyone need a college degree? Maybe not, says Harvard study.
In discussions about 鈥�college and career readiness鈥� 鈥� one of the education catchphrases these days 鈥� the focus is usually on college.
But increasingly, some educators are calling for more attention to the career part of the equation 鈥� and questioning whether a traditional four-year college degree is necessarily the best path for everyone.
A new report released by Harvard Wednesday states in some of the strongest terms yet that such a 鈥渃ollege for all鈥� emphasis may actually harm many American students 鈥� keeping them from having a smooth transition from adolescence to adulthood and a viable career.
鈥淭he American system for preparing young people to lead productive and prosperous lives as adults is clearly badly broken,鈥� concludes the report, .
Despite a clear message that college is important 鈥� and a pervasive desire among young students to attend college 鈥� only about 30 percent of Americans complete a bachelor鈥檚 degree by their mid-20s, with another 10 percent completing an associate鈥檚 degree by then. A massive effort in recent decades to increase those numbers has improved them only slightly.
鈥淚t would be fine if we had an alternative system [for students who don鈥檛 get college degrees], but we鈥檙e virtually unique among industrialized countries in terms of not having another system and relying so heavily on higher education,鈥� says Robert Schwartz, who heads the Pathways to Prosperity project at Harvard鈥檚 Graduate School of Education.
Emphasizing college as the only path may actually cause some students 鈥� who are bored in class but could enjoy learning that鈥檚 more entwined with the workplace 鈥� to drop out, he adds. 鈥淚f the image [of college] is more years of just sitting in classrooms, that鈥檚 not very persuasive.鈥�
Whether students opt for college or not, they need a range of skills to be employable in the long term, so 鈥渃ollege and career-ready skills are really no longer two separate tracks,鈥� Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said Wednesday in Washington at an event releasing the report, according to prepared remarks.
While not endorsing the particulars of the Harvard report, Secretary Duncan noted the importance of transforming career and technical programs, in which more than 15 million high school and postsecondary students are enrolled.
The United States can learn from other countries, particularly in northern Europe, Professor Schwartz says. In Austria, Denmark, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, and Switzerland, for instance, between 40 and 70 percent of high-schoolers opt for programs that combine classroom and workplace learning, many of them involving apprenticeships. These pathways result in a 鈥渜ualification鈥� that has real currency in the labor market.
In the US, vocational education has a bad rap, Schwartz acknowledges 鈥� and often for good reason, given the poor quality and its traditional role as a dumping ground for poorer students and students of color. And he鈥檚 not advocating the sort of tracked systems that Germany and Switzerland have, in which poorly performing students are often pushed into vocational tracks as early as middle school.
In Scandinavia, students follow a common curriculum until Grade 9 or 10 and then choose what sort of path they want to follow. In Finland, where income class is the least predictive of achievement among OECD countries, 43 percent of kids at age 16 opt for a three-year program that mixes work with learning and moves them to the labor market. But they still have the opportunity to go back to higher education later.
Much of the current education rhetoric emphasizes college over career training. President Obama has frequently stated his goal of having the US lead the world in college graduation rates by 2020. 鈥淭o compete, higher education must be within the reach of every American,鈥� he said in his recent State of the Union address.
But higher education doesn鈥檛 have to mean a traditional college degree, the report notes and the Obama administration acknowledges. Many of the growing career fields actually require credentials other than a bachelor鈥檚 or associate鈥檚 degree.
A Georgetown University study projected 14 million job openings between 2008 and 2018 in the 鈥渕iddle-skill occupations,鈥� such as electricians and paralegals, in which workers need an associate鈥檚 degree or occupational certificate.
The college-for-all rhetoric should be broadened, the Harvard report concludes, to become 鈥減ost-high-school credential for all.鈥�
But the report also says that will take a massive overhaul to a system that, right now, doesn鈥檛 do a good job showing kids what the link is between their learning and the jobs to which they aspire.
Employers should be more active in the learning process 鈥� whether through internships, visits with students, or brief 鈥渢ry out鈥� experiences 鈥� and students need more opportunities to master the kind of 鈥渟oft skills鈥� likely to help them in the workplace, perhaps through team projects, says Ronald Ferguson, another of the report鈥檚 authors and a co-chairman of Harvard鈥檚 Pathways to Prosperity Initiative.
The report points to several models in the US that could also be expanded to improve career and technical education. Career academies for high-school students are showing promise in places ranging from Pennsylvania to California. And Project Lead the Way, an engineering curriculum currently serving about 300,000 high-schoolers nationwide, culminates in team projects to solve an open-ended engineering problem.
鈥淚f we persist with the illusion that everyone is going to college, then we鈥檙e cheating those kids who aren鈥檛 going,鈥� Professor Ferguson says. 鈥淎 majority of the workforce does not have a college degree, and a majority of the things those people do are going to continue not requiring a college degree.鈥�
Staff writer Stacy Teicher Khadaroo contributed to this report.
