Many Americans, including the last wave of Gen Z-ers now entering high schools, want schools to offer more education and training options for young people like career and technical education, or CTE. They broadly agree that the K–12 goal of “college for all” over the last several decades has not served all students well. It should be replaced with “opportunity pluralism,” or the recognition that a college degree is one of many pathways to post-secondary success.

School-based CTE programs (there are also programs for adults) typically prepare middle and high school students for a range of high-wage, high-skill, and high-demand careers. These include fields like advanced manufacturing, health sciences, and information technology which often do not require a two- or four-year college degree. CTE programs award students recognized credentials like industry certifications and licenses. Some programs also provide continuing opportunities for individuals to sequence credentials so that they can pursue associate and bachelor’s degrees if they choose.

CTE Today

The federal role in today’s CTE began in 1917 with the Smith-Hughes National Vocational Education Act. In 2006, what had been called vocational education in the Smith-Hughes Act was rebranded career and technical education in the Carl. D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act. Federal funding for CTE in 2023 exceeded $1.462 billion.

Current-day CTE is unlike the vocational education of old that placed students into different tracks based mostly on family background. That sorting process often carried racial, ethnic, and class biases. While middle- and upper-class white students enrolled in academic, college-preparatory classes, immigrants, low-income youth, and students of color typically enrolled in low-level academic and vocational training. As Jeannie Oakes and her colleagues at the RAND Corporation found in their influential 1992 report, “Educational Matchmaking,” educators often characterized vocational programs as dumping grounds for students thought to be incapable of doing academic work.

CTE rejects this biased presorting. It combines academic coursework with technical and career skills for middle and high school students that offer pathways to jobs and further post-secondary education, training, and credentials. The coursework of CTE programs is a structured progression that builds knowledge and skills for good jobs. They immerse young people in education, training, and work by connecting them with local employers through experiences like internships and apprenticeships. These programs often include support services like job placement assistance after graduation. They also build social capital: strong relationships between participants and adult mentors.

Advance CTE has worked with stakeholders to create the National Career Clusters Framework, which organizes academic and technical knowledge and skills into a coherent sequence and pathways. The Framework is being revised but currently has 16 Career Clusters representing 79 Career Pathways. It is used in some form by all U.S. states and territories to organize CTE programs at the state and local levels.

Nearly all public school districts (98 percent) offer CTE programs to high school students, with about three-fourths offering CTE courses that earn dual credit from both high schools and postsecondary institutions. More than eight out of ten (85 percent) high school students earn at least one CTE credit, with technology courses being the most popular. Some 11 percent of high school teachers teach CTE as their primary assignment; almost two-thirds of them (61 percent) have ten or more years of teaching experience.

More than one-third (37 percent) of 9th grade students have a CTE concentration, meaning they are earning two or more credits in at least one CTE program of study. This concentration is associated with higher levels of student engagement, increased graduation rates, and reduced dropout rates. Those with a concentration in CTE also are more likely to be employed full time and have higher median annual earnings eight years after graduation.

The American Public on Pathways to Success

CTE pathways to success align with what the American public, including young people, want from schools. A recent Purpose of Education Index survey reports that of 57 educational priorities among the American public, getting kids ready for college had dropped from its pre-pandemic rank of 10th to the 47th priority today. Other surveys report similar findings: a 2023 Wall Street Journal–NORC poll found that 56 percent of Americans do not think a degree is worth the cost, up from 47 percent in 2017 and 40 percent in 2013. Skepticism today is strongest among those 18 to 34 years old and those with college degrees. The Index also reports that Americans’ top priority for students is “developing practical skills” (such as managing personal finances and the ability to do basic reading, writing, and arithmetic), with only one in four (26 percent) thinking schools currently do this.

Gen Z—those born between the mid-1990s and the early 2010s—agrees. Around half (51 percent) of Gen Z high schoolers plan to pursue a degree, down more than ten percentage points pre-pandemic and 20 points since shortly after Covid began. Gen Z middle schoolers are even less likely to say they plan to go to college. Moreover, Gen Z high schoolers aspire to continuous learning on the job and throughout life. Two-thirds (65 percent), for example, believe education after high school is necessary and prefer options like online courses, boot camps, internships, and apprenticeships. More than half (53 percent) want formal learning opportunities throughout life. Only a third of these students say their ideal learning occurs simply through coursework.

Gen Z high schoolers have a practical mindset. They want academic knowledge but also want to learn life skills like financial literacy, communication, and problem-solving, which they say are overlooked in classrooms. Nearly eight in ten (78 percent) believe it important to develop these skills before they graduate so they are better prepared to choose career paths. They also have an entrepreneurial spirit—a third want to start their own business.

Pathways in Action  

CTE programs are one way to respond to this opinion shift. These programs can be created from the top down or the bottom up. “Top-down” programs include those created by governors and legislators from both political parties. Delaware Pathways, for example, was started by Democratic Governor Jack Markell, while Tennessee’s Drive to 55 Alliance is an initiative of Republican Governor Bill Haslam. Similar programs exist in states as politically diverse states as California, Colorado, Indiana, and Texas.

“Bottom-up” CTE programs are developed by local stakeholders like K–12 schools, employers, and civic partners. Examples include 3DE Schools in Atlanta; YouthForce NOLA in New Orleans; and Washington, D.C.’s CityWorks D.C. Cristo Rey is an effort comprising 38 Catholic high schools in 24 states. Other organizations like Pathways to Prosperity Network, P-Tech Schools, and Linked Learning Alliance form regional or local partnerships that provide advice and practical assistance to those creating pathways programs.

Successful programs have five features, which I have detailed in another piece for Education Next: (1) an academic curriculum linked with labor-market needs that awards participants an employer-recognized credential; (2) work experience with mentors; (3) advisors to help participants navigate the program; (4) a written civic compact among K–12 schools, employers, and other partners; and (5) policies and regulations that support the program.

Many of these programs award credentials that certify the successful completion of a specific course of instruction. These individual credentials can be sequenced as building blocks or stackable credentials that can be combined over time and lead to an associate or bachelor’s college degree if that is what an individual chooses to do. Credential Engine identifies 1,076,358 unique U.S. credentials in 18 categories delivered through traditional institutions like secondary and post-secondary education but also including other types of non- and for-profit training organizations and Massive Open Online Courses, or MOOCs. U.S. spending on training and education programs by educational institutions, employers, federal grant programs, states, and the military is estimated to be $2.133 trillion.

While credentials are not of equal quality, many do add value and yield significant benefits for those who earn them. Studies by RAND and the Brookings Institution show how individuals (especially low-income students) who stack credentials (particularly in health and business) are more likely to be employed and earn more than those who do not stack credentials. And there are organizations like the American Institutes for Research CTE Research Network that focus on measuring the impact of CTE programs on student outcomes. Other organizations have conducted case studies that examine state CTE programs as varied as those found in Arkansas, Colorado,  Connecticut, Massachusetts, Ohio, and Texas. Additionally, studies like one conducted by economist Ann Huff Stevens of the University of Texas at Austin analyze CTE programs provided by public institutions like community colleges, for-profit organizations, and safety net or federal employment and training.

A Fordham Institute synthesis of this growing body of research identifies five benefits that come from participating in CTE programs: (1) they are not a path away from college, since students taking these courses are just as likely as peers to attend college; (2) they increase graduation rates; (3) they improve college outcomes, especially for women and disadvantaged students; (4) they boost students’ incomes; and (5) they enhance other skills like perseverance and self-efficacy.

CTE and Career Education

K–12 students often do not receive information from their schools on programs like CTE that offer practical pathways to careers and opportunity. A Morning Consult poll reports that less than half of Gen Z high schoolers say they had enough information to decide the best career or education pathway for them after high school. And two-thirds of high schoolers and graduates say they would have benefited from more career exploration in middle or high school. This gap between what students want and need and what schools provide in career preparation has consequences. Students often struggle in the transition from school to work and receive lower wages when they enter the workforce. It’s high time schools strategically invested in career education.

An effective CTE pathways agenda requires a thorough career education program with a  goal of instilling career aspirations in students and the opportunity to acquire the knowledge, skills, and relationships they need to reach their potential by the end of high school. The international 38-member Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has documented program models that integrate a young person’s school life with increasing levels of knowledge and employment options organized by three categories: exposure, exploration, and experience.

• Exposure activities introduce students to jobs and careers. These begin in preschool and include reading books or telling stories about jobs and careers and visits from those who work in different jobs. Exposure also entails age-appropriate, outside-the-school experiences like workplace visits as young people move through school.
• Exploration activities allow students to explore work by engaging them in volunteer work, job shadowing, resume development, and practice job interviews. These activities typically begin in middle school and continue through high school.
• Experience activities include work-based learning where young people engage in sustained and supervised projects and mentorships like internships and apprenticeships. These opportunities are an options multiplier, creating bridges to other opportunities that lead to full-time jobs, more education, or both.

There are other useful frameworks. Colorado’s work-based learning continuum uses an approach for middle and high schools organized by workplace activities: learning about work, learning through work, and learning at work. These approaches help young people develop new knowledge and skills, social and professional networks, and the capacity to navigate pathways that turn ambitions into reality. They can be combined with platforms like YouScience that use artificial intelligence to create assessments that help young people discover personal strengths and aptitudes and match them to potential careers.

Such career education programs have many benefits. OECD examined the link between young people’s participation in career-preparation activities and adult career outcomes in eight countries. They report that there is “evidence that secondary school students who explore, experience and think about their futures in work frequently encounter lower levels of unemployment, receive higher wages and are happier in their careers as adults.” These programs also nurture the technical and material aspects of success and its relational dimensions: social networks for young people, mentoring relationships, and professional networks that help them throughout life.

Consider the United States Youth Development Study, which followed those born in the mid-1970s to age 30. It finds a positive relationship between those who worked part-time at ages 14 and 15 in internships and apprenticeships and those likely to agree at age 30 that they hold a job they want. It seems almost undeniable that greater exposure to the workplace better equips students to prepare for the type of career that suits them.

Career education also deepens young people’s knowledge of the culture of work and fosters their capacity to aspire to, create, and navigate the work pathways that make a reality of their ambitions. It also helps them develop an occupational identity and vocational self, which gives them a better sense of their values and abilities. On a practical level, CTE creates faster and cheaper pathways to jobs and careers. Finally, career education fosters local civic engagement from employers and other community partners by cultivating the connections and bonds essential to innovation, economic dynamism, and a flourishing local civil society.

A Governing Agenda

K–12 education debates are often cast as a culture war between left and right, a story that divides Americans based on what we expect from schools. This story is mostly wrong and creates a false either-or narrative. In contrast, “opportunity pluralism” offers a both-and narrative, where CTE and other career pathways programs are discussed in the same breath as college preparation.

But broad agreement does not imply implementation uniformity. The give-and-take of negotiating legislation and regulatory proposals will produce diverse programs and priorities, or implementation pluralism. That’s all for the better as we test new approaches and tailor them to community needs and use states and local communities as “laboratories of democracy.”

Opportunity pluralism can provide policymakers across the political spectrum with a commonsense governing agenda that reorients the goals of K–12 public education. It’s a program led by civic pluralists who seek to nurture civil society by building different career pathways programs for young people. Taken together, it suggests a sea change in education—one that has the potential to allow students to flourish and reach their potential at the same time as we ease our seemingly intractable political divides.

Bruno V. Manno is senior advisor at the Progressive Policy Institute and a former U.S. Assistance Secretary of Education for Policy.

The nation’s Covid-19 health emergency is over, but the K–12 education emergency remains. If we do not supersize our education recovery efforts, our nation’s schoolchildren, especially its most vulnerable, face a diminished future.

What researchers call “education’s long Covid” has three related culprits, beginning with student learning loss. “Different test. Same story,” is how Mark Schneider, director of the federal Institute for Education Sciences, describes the situation.

It is worsened by the other two culprits.

Student mental health has declined. By April 2022, 70 percent of public schools reported an increase in the percentage of children seeking school mental-health services compared to pre-pandemic levels.

And finally, chronic absenteeism—on average, missing at least 18 days of school a year—rose to an all-time high. In 2021–22, 25% of students were chronically absent, up from 15% before the pandemic.

If not reversed, economist Eric Hanushek calculates that the average student’s lifetime earnings will be 5.9% lower, leading to a GDP that is 1.9% lower for the rest of the century.

U.S. Secretary of Education Miguel Cardona calls the pace of efforts to deal with this crisis “appalling and unacceptable. It’s like . . . we’ve normalized [this situation].”

But there’s a potential way out. I propose five principles to guide a supersized K–12 post-pandemic recovery that builds on what states and communities are doing.

1. Promote student learning and teacher development

This “north star” guides the recovery effort. Its foundation lies in states and school districts using high-quality classroom instructional materials with aligned teacher professional development. Two examples are ripe for expansion. The first is led by the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO). It provides assistance to 13 states that have adopted high-quality, standards-aligned curricula linked with teacher professional development and then has those states working with their school districts to adapt the materials and professional development to local needs. The second is state-directed, legislative, bipartisan, and endorsed by one of the nation’s teachers unions, the American Federation of Teachers. It is inspired by Mississippi’s successful work to improve literacy based on the “new” science of reading. Tennessee’s early literacy initiative is an example of the success of this approach where 40% of third graders now read on grade level, the highest since Tennessee raised academic standards nearly a decade ago. States can implement similar approaches by consulting the resources produced by the CCSSO network’s community of practice, including its state implementation roadmap.

2. Provide students with extra support

Some districts are using evidence-based programs that provide students with additional academic, social, and emotional support. Academic examples include intensive small-group and high dosage tutoring; competency-based instruction with students advancing based on what they know and do rather than by age; summer school; better use of student time on task; and offering financial incentives to students, parents, and teachers for reading books, attending classes, or—for teachers—achieving specific learning outcomes. Two studies on summer learning and tutoring programs provide a good lesson for supersizing these approaches: the key to implementation success is a school district program manager and support from principals, other school leaders, and parents. Additionally, schools need to provide students with “people-powered supports” that include mentors, tutors, and counselors. An example is the national effort led by the National Partnership for Student Success, a public-private partnership that has recruited an estimated 187,000 adults toward its goal of 250,000 by 2025. The Partnership has an easy-to-use online process for individuals, schools, districts, employers, colleges, and other community groups to get involved in this effort.

3. Give parents and children more options

School closures propelled parents to do two things. First, they discovered they could “unbundle” the all-in-one package of school services and separate them into separate services that meet particular student needs like extracurricular activities or tutoring. This led them to new, flexible learning arrangements like microschools, learning pods, and homeschooling. Second, parents chose new options for their children, including public charter and private and parochial schools. Policymakers have supercharged the ability of parents to pay for many of these options by creating new funding programs like education savings accounts that allowed families to pay for unbundled services and private school tuition. They also expanded other school-choice options like open enrollment across school district boundaries and tax-credit scholarships. This creates a more personalized and pluralistic K–12 system with educational options for families and kids.

4. Educate parents about the problem

There is a disconnect between the reality of pandemic learning loss and how well parents think their child is doing academically. Gallup reports that 3 out of 4 K–12 parents (76%) are “completely” or “somewhat satisfied” with the quality of education received by their oldest child, up from a 67% low in 2013 (contrast this with the American public at large where a record low of 36% are completely or somewhat satisfied). A Learning Heroes survey found around 9 of 10 parents believe their child is “at” or “above grade level” in math (89%) and reading (92%), with 8 in 10 (80%) saying they are confident they have a clear understanding of how their children are achieving academically. This disconnect between parents’ beliefs and the reality of learning loss is a barrier that K–12 stakeholders must overcome if young people are to recover from our education emergency. Learning Heroes has launched a muti-city campaign to get parents to ask teachers questions about how their child’s learning and what help them might need. Local leaders must undertake similar efforts.

5. Focus resources

States and districts still have at their disposal some of the federal $190 billion pandemic relief support, being spent at a “snail’s pace.” For example, the 25 largest school districts using remote learning for at least half the 2020–21 school year typically spent only about 15 percent of federal relief funds. Additionally, states continue to increase K–12 education spending, rising 8 percent in fiscal 2022. Finally, existing federal program dollars can be used for the recovery effort. The Tennessee literacy program mentioned above used federal Title I, Title II, and IDEA PART B to fund its work. Align these—and other resources—with the first four principles.

A Community Recovery Strategy

Based on this five point-agenda, here is a framework for developing a district plan for providing schools with the assistance they need to reverse learning loss and track their progress.

Communicate there is a problem. As mentioned above, parents generally do not realize the toll that learning loss has taken on students. That makes it vital that district and other community leaders communicate the severity and scope of the problem to parents and other stakeholders, ensuring they understand and acknowledge the pandemic’s harmful educational aftermath.

Develop a plan. The recovery plan must deal with at least a triad of issues: student learning loss, deteriorating student mental health, and increasing chronic absenteeism. It should describe how it will use high-quality classroom instructional materials and aligned teacher professional development and how students will receive academic, social, and emotional support. The plan would explain its use of initiatives, like high-intensity group tutoring, competency-based instruction, summer school, and people-powered supports like mentors and counselors. The idea is for all these efforts to build on the lessons learned from what has already been done.

Create a community report card. To ensure that the plan’s implementation remains on track and produces the desired outcomes, the community should establish a user-friendly Community Covid-Recovery Report Card. This would be a tracking system that reports progress on the various aspects of the plan, holding schools, local leaders, and other stakeholders accountable. The report card would provide a transparent look into how effectively strategies are being implemented, and which areas may need more attention or resources.

Focus community resources and action on the plan. A successful strategy needs financial, human, and other community resources to succeed. Aligning these resources with the recovery strategy and a unified community response will lay a strong foundation for student success.

Education’s long Covid will not go away by wishing it away. The burden is on K–12 advocates and stakeholders to up their game. This is an opportunity for genuine leadership, for rising to the challenge and mobilizing a recovery effort worthy of our students. If not, the consequence will be a Covid K–12 generation ill-equipped to pursue opportunity and reach their full potential.

Bruno V. Manno is senior advisor for the Walton Family Foundation program and a former Unites States Assistant Secretary of Education for Policy. Some of the organizations mentioned in this piece receive financial support from the Foundation.

The school and college lockdowns that came with the pandemic brought formal education’s friend-making and relationship-sustaining roles front and center in a way few could have imagined. Education-based friendships and other personal relationships—a form of social capital—help prepare young people to pursue opportunity and human flourishing. As young people return to schools and colleges for in-person learning, parents, educators, and policymakers should reflect on the importance of these social connections.

A massive new study by Harvard economist Raj Chetty and nearly two dozen colleagues published in the journal Nature provides ample food for thought on the importance of social relationships, including suggestions on how schools and colleges can foster them. It shows that economic connectedness, or the number of friendships between lower- and higher-income individuals, is a strong predictor of a community’s ability to support young people’s upward mobility in the income distribution. All this is especially relevant as young people return to the classroom.

The study examines 21 billion Facebook friendships based on data covering 84 percent of U.S. adults aged 25 to 44. The result is a detailed analysis of how friendships influence economic mobility, as well as a website where entering a zip code, high school, or college shows how common cross-class friendships are in those places. The analysis focuses on three forms of social capital—economic connectedness: the degree to which low- and high-income people interact with each other and become friends; social cohesion: the degree to which communities and social networks are tight knit; and civic engagement: how often individuals volunteer for community activities.

Economic Connectedness

The study finds that economic connectedness, or the number of cross-class friendships, is the strongest available predictor of a community’s ability to foster upward income mobility—even stronger than other measures like school quality, job availability, family structure, or a community’s racial makeup. For example, if low-income children grow up in counties with similar economic connectedness to the typical child with high-income parents, their future income increases on average by 20%, equivalent to the effect of attending two or so years of college. It’s not necessarily the friendships in and of themselves that do this. They more likely have what Chetty calls a “downstream effect,” shaping our aspirations and changing our behavior.

Furthermore, this relationship between economic connectedness and upward mobility is independent of the place’s affluence or poverty. For example, outcomes for poor children are better, even in poorer zip codes, where poor people have more rich friends. The research team concludes that “Areas with higher economic connectedness have large positive causal effects on children’s prospects for upward mobility.”

How social bonds are formed varies by income and setting. For example, the affluent tend to make more friends in college; low-income individuals make more friends in their neighborhoods; middle-class individuals do so at work. In many cases, these tendencies work to limit cross-class friendships.

Differences across settings in the number of cross-class friendships low-income individuals develop stem from a roughly 50/50 blend of two factors. The first is simply the exposure to higher-income individuals that occurs in different settings and institutions that connect people, like schools, work, or religious organizations. But mere exposure is often not enough. Equally important is the extent to which the setting or institution reduces friending bias, or our tendency to develop stronger relationships with people of the same background. The rate at which lower-income individuals go beyond exposure to engagement and friendship with higher-income individuals varies across settings and institutions, suggesting interactions are encouraged or discouraged by how a setting is structured and an institution functions. For example, academic tracking within schools produces higher friending bias and limits cross-class friendships even in schools that are socioeconomically diverse.

In short: Exposure + Engagement = Economic Connectedness

Friending Places: A Personal Detour

On a personal level, as I look back on growing up in Cleveland, Ohio during the late 1950s and early 1960s, there were three places where my cross-class friendships took root and developed. One was the local YMCA—where friendships started to build around age 10, especially at its two-week away-from-home summer camp. Back then, it was unusual for someone like me who attended a Catholic elementary school to participate in the Y’s activities rather than those of the Catholic Youth Organization, or CYO. But mom and dad (both high school graduates but with no college degrees) thought it would be good to be with kids I didn’t know. It sounded good to me. Another place involved my late elementary and high school years as a youth volunteer and school delegate at the Northeast Ohio Red Cross headquarters in downtown Cleveland. The third place was the high school I attended, St. Joseph Catholic High School on Cleveland’s far east side.

At all three places, I met (and, during summer camp, lived with) young people and adults from five counties across Northeast Ohio. They had different racial and ethnic backgrounds and income levels. The camp counselors and staff included laborers, teachers, coaches, nonprofit leaders, lawyers, and doctors. I made cross-class friendships with many of these young people and adults. The range of friendships I developed opened my eyes to personal and vocational possibilities I never would have imagined if I had stayed in my cheerful but small Italian American neighborhood. I cherish these memories and remain friends today with some of the young people I met back then.

Friending Places: The Study

The study explores six places where we make friends or, as Chetty puts it, settings and institutions that can bring opportunity to people: high school, college, religious groups, recreational groups, workplaces, and neighborhoods. Religious institutions are especially strong settings for increasing exposure and reducing friending bias, with recreational groups and the workplace also important.

High schools have various levels of exposure and friending bias, even among nearby schools with similar socioeconomic makeup. For example, large high schools generally exhibit a smaller share of cross-class connections, or worse friending bias, as they have less mixing and more income-related cliques. So do more racially diverse schools and those with high Advanced Placement enrollment and gifted and talented classes. On the other hand, smaller and less racially diverse high schools have more friendships between students with different class backgrounds. Greater racial diversity and higher enrollment are associated with worse friending bias across colleges, as well.

Friending bias can be overcome. For example, large high schools can assign students to smaller and intentionally diverse “houses” or “hives.” Their cafeterias, libraries, and science labs can be organized to mix students when they socialize or learn. Extracurricular activities can be structured to blend students from diverse backgrounds.

Charter schools are another contrast. Using the study’s public data, my colleague Jeff Dean analyzed the 214 charter high schools in the database. On average, these charter schools perform better than 80% of traditional public schools on friending bias, raising questions to research. For example, do the autonomy, community-building, and institutional aspects of public charter schools contribute to this? Or can their results be explained simply by their smaller size?

Friendships’ Power

This analysis is consistent with what experts have learned about two types of social capital. Bonding social capital grows in like-minded groups, while bridging social capital grows in groups that are mixed racially, professionally, socioeconomically, or in other ways. Social scientist Xavier de Souza Briggs observes that bonding social capital is for “getting by” while bridging social capital is for “getting ahead.”

These forms of social capital create strong and weak ties, important to our social networking and ability to collect information about different opportunities we might have. Strong ties are friends who are mostly like us. They know the same places, information networks, and opportunities as we do. Weak ties are acquaintances we know but who are different from us. They are likely to connect us to new networks and opportunities. They are valuable when we’re looking for a new job since they provide us with connections and information we wouldn’t get through our usual networks.

Over time, this combination of new connections and information can have a powerful effect. For example, the researchers’ analysis shows that young people who move out of concentrated poverty and into an economically diverse neighborhood at an early age tend to do better economically and socially than those who move in at a later age. Chetty calls this a “dosage effect”—i.e., a greater dosage over time produces a greater effect.

Closing schools, virtual learning, and the like during the heyday of the pandemic was a severe blow to the development of friendships in general and the types of cross-class friendships in particular that are crucial to a young person’s longer-term upward mobility and human flourishing.

As the Better Midler 1973 hit song says, “…you got to have friends.”

And we need to be exposed to and engaged with them across classes in diverse groups and institutional settings.

So as our young people return to school and college this fall, this research reminds us of the importance of cross-class friendships, social networks, and other personal connections to students’ success in both school and life.

That’s a welcome pandemic recovery back-to-school message.

Bruno V. Manno is a senior advisor for the Walton Family Foundation education program and a former U.S. Assistant Secretary of Education for Policy.

The shock of Covid-19 sparked “the big quit,” with large numbers of American workers voluntarily leaving their jobs.

This exodus led The Economist to proclaim 2022 “the year of the worker.”

Truth be told, this reappraisal of what individuals want from work is wrenching in many ways—for workers, employers, and the public.

But this disruption has an upside.

It’s forcing America’s outdated education and training regime—from K–12 to postsecondary and including corporate approaches—to reconsider how to prepare individuals for jobs and careers or reconnect those who have been displaced, so that all can be on a pathway to opportunity and human flourishing.

Economists tell us that this regime reassessment must include an examination of lessons learned from what’s come to be called the “economics of skill development.” This field studies the relationship between our cognitive and noncognitive domains—often referred to as “hard skills” and “soft skills”—especially how they affect wages and labor-market success, with the results advancing or hindering an individual’s pursuit of opportunity.

Understanding this relationship can help to guide the development of a renewed education and training regime, an opportunity framework that underscores the relational aspects of success rather than focusing on its technical or material dimensions.

Skill Development and Labor Market Success

Harvard economist David Deming, a premier analyst in this field, has shown in an analysis of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth that, since 2000, the significance of cognitive skills has declined as a predictor of labor-market wage success. Conversely, the economic importance of noncognitive skills, especially social skills, increased after 1997. He concludes, “Social skills are a significantly more important predictor of full-time employment and wages for youth in the 2004 to 2012 period, compared to the late 1980s and 1990s.”

These skills are characterized by high levels of nonroutine, interpersonal exchanges with others. They manifest themselves in capabilities like communication, cooperation, collaboration, social intelligence, and conflict resolution.

His analysis further reveals that, between 2000 and 2012, science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) jobs decreased as a share of U.S. employment, while the share of non-STEM professional jobs in management, nursing, and business support grew at a faster rate than it had in the prior decade. Overall, between 1980 and 2012, the share of social skill jobs grew nearly 12 percentage points as a share of all jobs, with wages for these jobs growing more rapidly than those for other occupations. These non-STEM jobs rely extensively on analytical skills and interpersonal interaction.

Moreover, individuals with social skills are team players with a sense of mutual obligation that has benefits and burdens. Deming and his Harvard colleague Ben Weidmann find “suggestive evidence” that these team players advance group performance by inspiring the efforts of teammates, leading Deming to define teamwork as “workers trading tasks…and reducing the worker-specific cost of coordination…with others.”

A 2021 analysis by Deming shows that, after age 35, life-cycle wage growth is substantially greater in occupations that rely on nonroutine, high variance jobs that are decision intensive and require worker adaptation. In other words, having social skills produces a wage premium. And since these people-intensive skills are learned and developed through practice and feedback over extended periods of time, peak earning years have progressed up the age spectrum to the 50s from the 30s.

He summarizes this perspective by saying, “Strong cognitive skills are increasingly a necessary—but not a sufficient—condition for obtaining a good, high paying job. You also need to have social skills.”

In a paper that examined the economic return of hard and soft skills, economist Laura Chioda and colleagues looked at the medium-term impacts of a three-week, residential mini-MBA program. They examined two separate programs using a sample that included 4,400 high school students in Uganda. One program featured a mix of approximately 75 percent hard skills and 25 percent soft skills, while the other reversed this mix. The program training did improve both hard and soft skills, though “only soft skills were directly linked to improvement in self-efficacy, persuasion, and negotiation.” Additionally, the skill upgrade produced “substantially higher earnings.”

An Opportunity Framework

What I call an “opportunity framework” can reorient the current education and training regime across the age continuum to develop both cognitive and noncognitive capabilities, especially social skills, so individuals can pursue opportunity and flourish as adults.

The essential elements of an opportunity framework are what individuals know and who they know—knowledge and networks (or relationships). Cultivating habits of mind and association—cognitive and noncognitive capabilities—are the building blocks of individual opportunity. They are habits because pursuing knowledge and developing networks require behaviors learned and internalized through practice. These habits are also moral strengths that can produce prosocial behavior. A combination of habits of mind and association enables the pursuit of opportunity and human flourishing.

In short, an opportunity equation emerges: Knowledge + Networks = Opportunity.

Habits of mind encompass the hard skills needed for any occupation—that is to say, subject or domain knowledge, including technical knowledge. They involve three modes of thinking: goals thinking, or defining and setting achievable learning goals and outcomes; pathways thinking, or creating a route to those outcomes; and agency thinking, or the mental energy and self-reliance needed to pursue one’s goals along defined pathways. Pathways and agency thinking work together to foster the pursuit of goals and outcomes.

Habits of association include social skills. They lead to personal and professional networks that involve two complementary kinds of relational or social capital: bonding and bridging. Bonding social capital occurs within a group, reflecting the need to be with others for emotional support and companionship. Bridging social capital occurs between social groups, reflecting the need to connect with individuals different than ourselves, expanding our social circles across demographics and interests. As social scientist Xavier de Souza Briggs says, binding social capital is for “getting by,” and bridging social capital is for “getting ahead.”

Social capital includes relationships with individuals, midlevel groups or firms, and large local and national institutions that order society—the legal and judicial institutions where social capital becomes civic capital. Social psychologists Jonathan Haidt and Selin Kesebir describe how these elements intermingle as “the puzzle of cooperation,” beginning with those “who share the same gene because of descent from a recent common ancestor [expanding to] non-kin cooperation in large groups,” echoing Deming’s notion of social skills and teamwork.

Jobs, a Career, and Opportunity Pluralism

Understanding opportunity as a combination of knowledge and networks produces a framework for creating an education and training regime that community organizations like K–12 schools, workforce organizations, and other education and training enterprises can develop to advance opportunity. It aims to build the capacity of our present and future workforce in both the cognitive and noncognitive domains, better connecting current demand and supply.

The relationship between knowledge and networks is summarized by American Enterprise Institute Senor Fellow Brett Orrell: ”A technical skill can help you get a job, but noncognitive skills are necessary to building and sustaining a career.” Knowledge and networks are individual and social resources that lead to the development and accumulation of human capital and opportunity networks.

This notion of an opportunity equation is complemented by University of Texas law professor Joseph Fishkin’s ideas on how opportunities are structured and accessed by individuals, including how credentialing processes for work and career contain bottlenecks that deter opportunity. His argues for opportunity pluralism, an approach that offers individuals multiple credentialing pathways to work and career. This makes the nation’s opportunity infrastructure more pluralistic so individuals can pursue opportunity through many avenues linked to labor-market demands. These include paths like apprenticeships and internships; career and technical education; dual enrollment in high school and postsecondary and other training institutions; job placement for on-the-job training; career academies; boot camps for acquiring discrete knowledge and skills; and staffing and placement services. In short, opportunity pluralism aims to ensure that every American—regardless of background or current condition—has multiple pathways to acquiring the knowledge and networks needed for jobs, careers, and human flourishing.

The benefits of such an opportunity program would reach far beyond economic preparedness. They would include the importance of the relational aspects of success in addition to the technical or material dimensions—in short, the fact that relationships matter for individual and societal wellbeing.

This program also would also help individuals develop an occupational identity and vocational self. Choosing an occupation and developing a broader vocational sense of one’s values, abilities, and personality is important for adult success.

Further, the program would foster local civic engagement from employers and other community partners. And it has the potential to provide faster and cheaper pathways to jobs and careers.

This regime disruption and reassessment is a form of creative destruction, or the process through which new approaches replace the existing ones that were made obsolete over time. What emerges from this is a development narrative, or an account that chronicles individual agency, with individuals acquiring and extending knowledge and networks to help them succeed and flourish. Finally, this opportunity program will better place individuals on a trajectory to economic and social wellbeing, informed citizenship, and civic responsibility, laying a foundation for adult success, a lifetime of opportunity, and human flourishing.

Bruno V. Manno is Senior Advisor for the Walton Family Foundation’s education program. A version of this article also appeared at RealClearEducation.

The American Rescue Plan Act of March 2021 expanded the Child Tax Credit for tax year 2021, resulting in more families receiving an increased monthly payment for each child they have, ranging from $250 to $300 a month, based on family income and child age.

Families can use their payments for any number of purposes—e.g., paying for food, debt, housing or even putting the money into a savings account. So it’s particularly interesting to learn that many parents or caregivers are choosing to invest in their children’s education. A Center on Budget and Policy Priorities analysis of Census Bureau data collected in July, August, and September 2021, as the school year approached, found 40 percent of low income families (defined as making less than $35,000 per year) using payments for education costs covering books and supplies, tuition, after-school programs, and transportation for school.

Some of these expenses may be for adults’ own education, as about 5 percent of adults in low-income households with children are enrolled in school, other Census data show.

Data were collected over five weeks from July 21 to September 27 using the Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey, sent to more than 1 million adults every two weeks. It provides near real-time data on how the pandemic is affecting Americans’ lives.

How does the credit work?

Anyone living in the U.S. earning less than $75,000 as a single person or $150,000 filing taxes with a spouse, receives $300 monthly for every child under six years old or $250 monthly for every child six or older, totaling $3,600 a year for every child under six and $3,000 a year for every child six and older.

Those making more than $75,000 as a single person or more than $150,00 filing taxes with a spouse get less money.

The child must be 17 years-old or younger as of December 31, 2021, be claimed on an individual’s taxes as a dependent, have lived with the claimant for at least half of 2021, and have a social security number.

Monthly payments are sent between July 2021 and December 2021, with the balance of the credit received when filing 2021 taxes.

The money can be used by parents in any way that meets their needs.

According to the IRS, about 35 million eligible families are receiving the advance payments.

Adults at all income levels reporting that they received a child-tax-credit payment were asked a question about how they had spent the money, allowing multiple choices from rent to groceries. A majority of respondents reported spending their dollars on more than one thing.

Several choices were school-related expenses, including books and supplies, tuition, tutoring services, after-school programs (other than tutoring and child care) and transportation to or from school.

Three in 10 families overall receiving the first three monthly payments (July to September) reported spending them on school expenses, with one in four families with young children using them for child care costs, according to the Census Bureau.

About 1 in 10 households reported using the child tax credit to help pay for child care.

The pattern of spending varied by the child’s age.

“Families with at least one school-age child were more likely to spend the CTC on school expenses than families with only children under 5 years old,” the Census Bureau said. “But families that only had young children were much more likely to spend it on child care—one in five in late July and one in four from early August to late September.”

The increase “may be linked to the beginning of the school year and parents’ work,” the Census Bureau said.

There was no difference between the shares of households that spent their tax credit on school expenses in late August and early September. By late September, adults in households that received the child tax credit were less likely to spend part of it on school-related expenses than early in the month.

Non-Hispanic Black and Hispanic families reported using the child tax credit for school expenses “in much higher proportions than non-Hispanic White households,” the census said. “By late September, an estimated 4 in 10 Black families (42 percent) and 3 in 10 Hispanic families (31 percent) used the CTC for school expenses, compared to about 1 in 4 non-Hispanic White families (26 percent).”

According to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities analysis, the finding that some not insignificant portion of CTC payments are used to cover education costs are consistent with evidence from Canada, where parents—particularly those with low incomes—spend their child allowances on essentials and education expenses.

Finally, a caution. These data are suggestive, not definitive. They rely on what the roughly 6 percent of people who responded to the government survey chose to tell the government about how they spent the money. The data collection was at the start of the school year, and the survey asked about a limited number of spending options. It’s early in a family spending process that will last at least one tax year—perhaps longer depending upon current Congressional negotiations on President Biden’s spending proposals. We should not rush to any final conclusions regarding longer term patterns of parental spending of federal cash assistance.

Even with all those important caveats, however, what the data suggest is potentially of great significance for education. An explicit proposal to channel an additional $60 billion a year in federal spending to households earning up to $150,000 a year to use for K-12 tuition, tutoring, and after-school programs might have met fierce resistance from both political parties for well-known reasons. Yet if the Census data and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities analysis is to be believed, a similar result is being obtained through the expanded child tax credit. The press and education policy establishment perhaps haven’t fully realized it yet. What the Census data suggest, though, is that parents seeing money in their bank accounts sure are figuring it out.

Bruno V. Manno is Senior Advisor for the Walton Family Foundation’s K-12 Program.

Additional Education Next coverage of the child tax credit:

“How a Turbocharged Child Tax Credit Could Electrify School Choice,” Frederick Hess, Fall 2021

“Should Congress Make the Expanded Child Tax Credit Permanent?” Forum, Fall 2021

Faith in the idea that a four year college degree is the key pathway to social and economic mobility and a prosperous life produces what the political philosopher Michael Sandel calls the credentialist prejudice. The result is a degree that becomes, in Sandel’s words, “a precondition for dignified work and social esteem…fueling prejudice against less educated members of society.” The K-12 mantra for this is “college for all.”

This view exists despite two facts. First, nearly two thirds (65 percent) of the U.S. labor force doesn’t have a college degree. Second, there are many good middle-skill jobs for individuals with a high school education who don’t have a college degree.

There’s a promising movement underway to replace the “bachelor’s degree for all” mentality with a broader approach to understanding opportunity. While not abandoning the degree pathway, the new opportunity agenda creates more specialized skills-based pathways and credentials linked with labor market demand. This approach makes the nation’s opportunity infrastructure more pluralistic by offering many publicly recognized and credentialed pathways to success. That’s good for the students who benefit from these programs and also for society, which can make better use of talents that might otherwise be overlooked.

The effects of the Covid-19 pandemic may help accelerate the transition away from the credentialist prejudice and toward opportunity pluralism.

The Receding Credentialist Prejudice

The credentialist prejudice manifests itself in different ways.

Four-year degrees are now required for jobs that once did not demand them. A Harvard Business School study documents the pervasiveness of this “degree inflation.” For example, while only 16 percent of existing production supervisors in 2015 had college degrees, two thirds (67 percent) of job postings for supervisors include degree requirements. Actual skill requirements haven’t changed, but the credential threshold for being hired has increased. Another analysis of degree inflation showed that while only 19 percent of administrative assistants have a university degree, about 65 percent of job postings ask for one. Given the significant racial gaps in college attainment, degree inflation is especially pernicious in the negative impact it has on hiring racial minorities.

Another manifestation of credentialist prejudice is the common assumption that low-wage workers without degrees are low skilled. A study whose lead author was Harvard economist Peter Q. Blair found 16 million U.S. workers with only a high school diploma had skills for high-wage work (defined as more than twice the national median wage). Eleven million of them were employed in low- or middle-wage work. Employers are missing out on talented workers.

A college degree has become what Burning Glass Technologies CEO Matt Sigelman calls a proxy that assures employers—rightly or wrongly—that the learner has successfully completed “a major exercise in deferred gratification.”

There are indications that Covid-19 is weakening the link between college and high-wage jobs. Burning Glass Technologies, a labor-market analytics firm, calculates that since the pandemic began, entry-level hiring for college grads decreased 45 percent. The pandemic also has produced soaring unemployment among 16-to-24-year-olds. At 11 percent in April 2021, it’s higher than it was in any month in 2017, 2018, or 2019. A survey of college graduates by human resources firm Monster found almost half (45 percent) of spring 2020 grads still looking for work.

As a Wall Street Journal article put it in a message to the class of 2021, “The good news: You’re entering one of the hottest job markets on record…as the economy pulls out of its pandemic lockdown. The bad news: The competition is ferocious. Many…who graduated last year are still trying to find their first big break.”

Finally, there’s also support from the American public as well as parents and young people for rethinking the connection between K-12, careers, and degrees.

A Strada Education Network-Gallup survey shows seven in 10 Americans believe employers should hire job candidates with the required skills and work experience, even without a college degree. Less than half say employers in their field do so.

A Carnegie Corporation-Gallup nationally representative survey of nearly 3,000 parents of 11-to-24-year-olds found nearly half (46 percent) want more post-high-school pathways other than four-year college. As parents learn more about these programs, they are more favorably disposed.

An FIL Inc. nationally representative survey of parents amid the pandemic found two of three call for rethinking “how we educate students, coming up with new ways to teach….” Eighty-two percent favor “work-based learning programs or apprenticeships” and 80 percent support “more vocational classes in high schools.”

More than half (52 percent) of Generation Z high schoolers now say they can achieve professional success with three years or less of post-high-school education, with only one in four saying a four-year degree is the only route to a good job.

A New Opportunity Program

How to replace the receding credentialist prejudice with opportunity pluralism? The essential elements of a new program are what students know—knowledge—and whom they know—relationships. The goal: ensure every American—especially those in K-12 schools—regardless of background or current condition, has multiple pathways to acquiring the knowledge and networks they need for jobs and careers preparing them to access opportunity and a flourishing life.

In short, Knowledge + Networks = Opportunity

Five features should guide pathways program design, creating a pathways success infrastructure.

Academic and Technical Skills and Credentials. Successful programs teach academic and technical skills that are aligned with labor market needs, supplying graduates that meet employer demands. There’s a timeline for program completion. When participants do complete the program, they receive a recognized credential, tied to a good job.

Work and Careers. Exposure to work and careers begins early in school through guest speakers and includes exploring job options through field trips. High school includes career experience via work placement and mentorships, integrated into classroom instruction. Exposure, exploration, and experience connect students with adults. That is especially important for students in high-poverty communities.

Advising. A well-functioning advising system prevents forced tracking into jobs based on race, ethnicity, gender, or social class. This ensures students make informed choices; barriers like financial assistance are addressed; and data are used to keep students progressing through the program. This fosters agency. With good advising, students eventually become knowledgeable enough to make their own choices about the correct pathway.

Authentic Partnerships. Employers, industry groups, and other institutions must collaborate for programs to succeed. Written agreements can help to define who is responsible for what and to formalize a management and governance structure—a civic partnership—between partners.

Supporting Policies. Local, state, and federal policies create frameworks and funding streams for program development.

Opportunity Pluralism

Not holding a college degree should not be a barrier to career pathways that lead to social and economic mobility and a prosperous life. The credentialist prejudice needs to give way to a broader array of opportunities. University of Texas law professor Joseph Fishkin writes on how opportunities are structured and accessed by individuals, including how the job credentialing process contains bottlenecks that constrain opportunity. He argues for opportunity pluralism, or offering individuals multiple education, training, and credentialing pathways to work and career, including the four-year college degree. Instead of struggling to equalize opportunity on a single pathway, the range of opportunities for individuals should be broadened and deepened, making the nation’s opportunity infrastructure more pluralistic, valuing both educational and employment outcomes.

An opportunity program is not about discouraging young people from pursing a two-year or four-year degree. Rather, it positions those options among many other possible valued credentials that recognize that knowledge, networked experience, and skills lead to good jobs and a fulfilled life. This same principle—that a wider array of options is better for both students and society—supports the idea of more colleges separating, or “unbundling,” the four-year degree into multiple certificates or credentials. These building blocks, or stackable credentials, would be acquired while working and learning through a career progression toward what we typically call an associate’s or bachelor’s degrees. David Osborne of reinventing government fame has proposed individual “career opportunity accounts” as a way to pay for this approach to education and training. It would combine federal and state dollars, potentially including individual contributions somewhat like individual retirement accounts.

These pathways programs that help young people acquire knowledge, networks, skills and experience also help them develop an occupational identity and vocational self. This includes a broader sense of who they are as adults. Such programs also provide faster and cheaper pathways to jobs and careers than traditional postsecondary education. Finally, they place students on a trajectory to economic and social well-being, informed citizenship, and civic responsibility, laying a foundation for adult success and a lifetime of opportunity.

Bruno V. Manno is Senior Advisor to the Walton Family Foundation’s K-12 Program.

After surveying 1,000 public and private school parents on how Covid-19 affected their view of schools, longtime pollster Frank Luntz of FIL Inc. expressed surprise: “Never in my lifetime have so many parents been so eager for so much educational change.”

An article in The Atlantic is headlined: “The Pandemic Has Parents Fleeing From Schools—Maybe Forever.”

Covid-19 shock put parents in charge of their child’s education in ways no one ever imagined, let alone experienced.

It made them think about schooling in new ways.

It drove them to seek different options for educating and supporting their children.

And it inspired imaginative individuals to expand existing or create novel ways to support that new demand.

The dynamics of parent response to Covid-19 shock are reminiscent of a conceptual framework described just over 50 years ago by economist Albert Hirschman in Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States. He describes how individuals as consumers in multiple domains respond when facing decreasing quality or benefit in the services they are receiving. In short, the response can be either exit or voice, with loyalty affecting one’s analysis of whether to use exit or voice.

The result of the Covid-19 shock dynamic in K-12 is a more pluralistic education system, one that’s being redefined to include more options from more providers for more families and students.

What are parents saying and doing about the response of public schools to Covid-19 shock? Or to use Hirschman’s words: what are they voicing; are they exiting or loyal?

According to the FIL poll, parents say they don’t want schools to “return to normal” after Covid-19.

Two of three (66 percent) say we need to rethink “how we educate students, coming up with new ways to teach children.”

They also want to try new ways to finance their children’s learning.

Nearly eight in ten (76 percent) want to see “education funding follow the student to whichever school they or their parents choose.”

And eight in ten (80 percent) want the government to provide education savings accounts for families, defined as “allowing parents to receive a deposit of public funds into government-authorized savings accounts.”

Gallup reports that parents saying they’re “completely satisfied” with public schools going into the 2020 school year dropped 9 points from the prior year, to 32 percent from 41 percent.

This dissatisfaction is driving them to vote with their feet—to exit. They’re withdrawing—or not enrolling—their children in schools. No, not all of them. Many are remaining loyal. But some portion of them are exiting.

Gallup reports that parents home schooling their child nearly doubled, to 10 percent from around 5 percent. And those enrolling their child in a public school decreased 7 points, to 76 percent from 83 percent.

The homeschooling number is reinforced by new data from the U.S. Census, which also found homeschooling increased, to 11.1 percent of households from 5.4 percent, even after a clarification was added to the question to make sure that households were reporting true homeschooling rather than virtual learning through a public or private school.

The Education Next survey also found shifts away from traditional district-run public schools, including a decline in district public school enrollment to 72 percent of students from 81 percent between the spring and fall of 2020. The Education Next survey found an increase in homeschooling to 8 percent from 6 percent, along with increases in private school and charter enrollments. Though the increases were too small to be statistically significant, they track with the other surveys.

How are policymakers and others responding to this dynamic, to this exit and demand for more and different options?

Lawmakers in nearly a third of the states have proposed bills to establish or expand a variety of taxpayer funded programs. These include education savings accounts and tax credit scholarships that allow taxpayers to receive tax credits when donating to nonprofits that provide private school scholarships.

And governors are using federal Covid-19 relief funds in inventive ways. For example, Idaho Republican Governor Brad Little has created a new $50 million Strong Families, Strong Students Initiative. Under the program, eligible families could receive $1,500 per student, with a maximum of $3,500 per family. The money can be used to purchase eligible educational materials, devices, and services. Other governors have created similar programs.

What other alternatives are exiting parents choosing?

Some are choosing traditional private schools, including Catholic schools. For example, Tom Carroll, the head of Boston’s Catholic Schools, said enrollment demand increased in “all our 100 schools” following the closing of public schools in Boston and its surrounding areas.

The best known of the newer alternatives are Parent Organized Discovery Sites—or pods—micro schools, and virtual schools.

Pods involve small groups of children learning together in person or virtually. A variety of actors—local government, non-profits, parents, corporations—start these programs. They use volunteers or hire teachers or other adults to supervise the program.

They typically serve families with children enrolled in a school’s online learning program, supplementing this with special services. These include tutoring, childcare, and afterschool programs so students socialize and pursue academics or extracurricular activities with friends.

Pods are paid for in different ways. Families pay directly “out of pocket” or receive them as employee benefits. Some pods provide scholarships for low-income families. Other approaches include using state or local tax dollars or support from nonprofit and philanthropic organizations.

San Francisco Mayor London Breed opened 84 pod locations called community learning hubs run by the city. The program was started as the city’s response to a dispute with the school district’s closing policies. It serves around 2,400 children, about 96 percent racial minorities.

In Columbus, Ohio, the YMCA is offering pods for students ages five to sixteen who are attending school virtually. Students can arrive as early as 6 a.m., with learning sessions starting at 8 a.m.

In Minnesota, the Minneapolis based African American Community Response Team is created the North Star Network of community ZOOM pods. They supplement online learning offered by schools, providing a quiet learning space, technology, and tutors.

JPMorgan Chase offers discounts on virtual tutors and pods for eligible employees accessed through its employer sponsored childcare provider, Bright Horizons. It’s also opened its 14 childcare centers for employee children as a no-cost place for remote learning with supervision.

Micro schools reinvent the one room schoolhouse. They’re usually groups of 15 students or less, engaging three to six families. They might employ one teacher, or alternatively, parents teach, hiring a college student or other “grown-up” to assist.

Prenda is an Arizona based network of micro schools, growing from seven students in one neighborhood in 2018 to over 200 schools. School can be held in homes or almost any public space like a community center or library. They are led by a Prenda Guide, a trained mentor who doesn’t need to be a certified teacher. During the pandemic, they’ve expanded to Colorado and grown to over 3,000 from 550 students. They follow social distancing guidelines of their local jurisdiction.

Florida Virtual School is an accredited online tuition-free school founded in 1997. It employs Florida certified teachers and works with public, private, charter, and homeschool families and school districts nationwide. Since the pandemic, it has seen an increase of over 231,100 new course enrollments—a 57% increase—in its open-registration, part-time Flex program.

The VELA Education Fund is supported by philanthropy. It invests in family education innovations that meet children’s academic and social-emotional needs. It awards microgrants of up to $25,000 to students, families, and educators innovating outside the traditional education system. For example, Zucchinis Homeschool Co-op is a parent led pod serving 4 to 10 year olds, including the younger siblings of students at The LIFE School, an accredited, project-based high school in downtown Atlanta. VELA also awards larger grants of up to $250,000 for programs that expand to serve more students and families. Prenda’s micro school expansion to Colorado was funded by VELA.

Websites like SchoolHouse, LearningPodsHub, and Selected for Families are helping families form pods and assist teachers and tutors in providing services to these families.

SitterStream is a startup created at the beginning of the pandemic. It offers on-demand babysitting and tutoring to students, individually or in pods. It has partnerships with small and large businesses who provide these services to employees, with Amazon one of their corporate clients.

iCode is a national computer science education franchise that offers onsite and virtual computer coding for young people. It now offers supervised, in-person or remote online learning support to help working parents manage school closures and online schooling for their children.

How much of this will “stick” beyond the pandemic? No one knows for sure. But it seems reasonable to bet that some will stick.

A Civis Analytics national survey reports that eight of ten (83 percent) K–12 parents who disenrolled children from school say they will reenroll them in their original school once it is safe to do so. In Hirschman’s words, loyalty is stronger than a permanent exit, for these parents.

An NPR/Ipsos national poll found that almost 3 in 10 (29 percent) of parents were likely to stick with remote learning indefinitely. That included about half of the parents who are currently enrolled in remote learning. Exit is the preferred option for this group.

And a RAND Corporation analysis of a survey from their new American School District Panel, which consists of leaders of more than 375 school districts and charter management organizations, found that about 1 in 5 are considering a remote school option after the end of the pandemic.

Cobb County, Georgia serves over 112,000 students. Itis the second largest district in the peach state and 23^rd largest in the nation. Superintendent Chris Ragsdale announced that the district would enact a classroom choice program for the 2021 school year. The online learning for grades 6-12 will be supported through Cobb Online Learning Academy. Local school based online learning will be in place for PK-5 along with Cobb Horizon Academy and Cobb Virtual Academy for part-time online learners. In this case, the organization is listening to voice and responding in new ways.

All this suggests some significant number of parents and students will return to some version of the “old normal.” But some won’t. Some have exited, permanently. So the long-term effect is a question of magnitude.

Covid-19 shock has thrown K–12 schooling into disarray. But it’s also catalyzed creative and determined parents, innovators, and policy leaders to respond in new ways. Their creativity and entrepreneurship is characteristically American and impressive, even if driven by urgency and exasperation.

Our best hope is that our emergence from COVID-19 shock positions us for what could be a new era in educational excellence, one in which families have more direct control over, and options for, their child’s education. One in which they are truly trusted and supported in making decisions about their children’s schooling. One that gives our children an effective education that prepares them for opportunity and success.

Bruno V. Manno is senior advisor to the Walton Family Foundation’s K-12 Program.

Do Generation Z and Millennials expect to be worse or better off than their parents? Do they think they will succeed in life and experience the American Dream? What do they believe will help them succeed?

Contrary to much of today’s conventional wisdom, young people—especially youth of color—are optimistic about their futures and believe they will succeed in life. They also believe in and think they will achieve the American Dream, defined on their terms. And they say education plays a key role in helping them unlock opportunity, create a better life, and reach that dream.

More than 4,000 U.S. respondents ages 13 to 23 (Gen Z) and 24 to 39 (Millennials) were surveyed in late June 2020 by Echelon Insights on their attitudes and thoughts concerning the American Dream, along with issues like education and their community.

Perhaps the most striking attitude of these young people is their faith in the work ethic. More than eight in ten—81 percent—think that “If I work hard, I…will…succeed in life”. Hard work not only brings success, seven in ten (71 percent) believe it allows them to move up the economic ladder.

This belief is affected by household income. Those with higher incomes are more likely to believe this than those with lower incomes. Still, more than six in ten (62 percent) of those making less than $30,000 believe they will move up the economic ladder.

Nearly eight in ten (79 percent) believe their individual lives will be better (49 percent) or the same (30 percent) as their parents—though Gen Z are more optimistic than Millennials (85 percent versus 74 percent).

Of those who think they will have a better life (49 percent), nearly half (49 percent) credit this belief to having improved and different opportunities than their parents, especially educational opportunities.

Of those who think their life will be worse than their parents (13 percent), nearly half (44 percent) give economic reasons as the key impediment.

Gen Z and Millennials of color are more likely than whites (57 percent versus 42 percent) to think they will have a better life than their parents.

On the other hand, nearly two in three (60 percent) Black Gen Z and Millennials see racial inequality as either “extremely” or “very” big problems that will keep them from pursing opportunity. Four in ten (40 percent) Hispanics and Asians and around one in four (26 percent) whites answer in a similar fashion.

What of the American Dream?

Overall, two in three (67 percent) believe that individually they have the opportunity to achieve it. A similar percentage of Gen Z and Millennials across racial and ethnic groups believe they are as likely as whites to realize it.

These young people were asked in an open-ended question to define the American Dream. Their answers were clustered under 18 categories. The top five were: freedom, especially to choose whatever one wants to be (20 percent); financial well-being (19 percent); family (15 percent); good job or career (14 percent); and housing (14 percent).

Focus group interviews with nearly 150 individuals provide more details on what the American Dream means to these young people. In responses similar to the top category of the open-ended question, they describe it as having the freedom and opportunity to build their life on their own terms.

Many used the word “opportunity” to define what it means. For them, opportunity is about creating many pathways to success. The opportunity structure they envision is pluralistic, running counter to the view that there is a “one size fits all” definition of success.

When asked about what might help them have the opportunity to live a better life, respondents were given 13 possible answers. The top three “extremely” or “very important” responses were family (83 percent), environment (74 percent), and public schools (72 percent).

So the school as a key local, community institution plays an essential role in making the American Dream a reality.

Nearly seven in ten (68 percent) believe education beyond high school is needed for getting ahead and having good opportunities in life. But over four in ten (43 percent) say higher education is too expensive or hard to access.

Less than half (46 percent) believe their K-12 education prepared them “extremely” or “very well” for good opportunities in life. In particular, young adults who did not pursue higher education are the least upbeat about their own high school education.

Almost three in four (77 percent) say they would now include career or job skills and basic financial skills as major priorities that schools should teach by high school graduation.

What makes for a good community in which to live and opens doors to opportunity?

When asked to choose the two or three items from a list of nine, they respond: affordable cost of living (56 percent); good job opportunities (49 percent); and good environment, as in clean air and water (39 percent). Good schools (32 percent) are fifth on the list.

How does Covid-19 affect their views?

Two in three (62 percent) believe that it’s made success in life a “lot” or “little” harder. Nearly four in ten (39 percent) think that after having an effect for a few years, “we will get past it.” Around a quarter (27 percent) believe it will cause permanent change.

What are we to make of this?

The American Dream is portrayed in two ways in this survey. One narrative is relative, defined in terms of others—being better or worse financially or in other ways than one’s parents, moving past some individuals, up the success ladder. The other is absolute, defined in terms of one’s self—choosing whatever one wants to do, a good job opportunity, my family.

Both narratives are present in the survey answers and reflections of these young people. But the open-ended questions and focus group discussions favor the absolute view.

The new American Dream Gen Z and Millennials are pursuing emphasizes freedom and the opportunity to build one’s own life on one’s own terms. Opportunity is not a “one size fits all” description of success. Rather, opportunity pluralism abounds—there are many pathways to success. Opportunity is about building the life one wants in a local community that’s affordable, has good jobs, and a clean environment. And education—while in need of change—unlocks the door to opportunity and the American Dream.

Bruno V. Manno is senior advisor for K-12 education reform with the Walton Family Foundation. The survey was conducted by Echelon Insights and commissioned by the Walton Family Foundation. Echelon retained control over survey development, administration, and reporting.

A college degree offers recipients a pathway to many positive life outcomes. Graduates are more likely than non-graduates to gain suitable employment, earn a respectable wage, and be upwardly mobile, especially those whose parents never attained a degree. There are other individual and societal benefits that accrue to degree recipients related to family, health, the economy, and citizenship.

But many current and former students reflecting on their educational experiences conclude that their high school and postsecondary preparation left much to be desired. There is a significant disconnect between what young people expect from education and what their educational experiences actually provide.

What follows is a story in three parts. The first part examines young peoples’ educational version of buyers’ remorse—the disappointment caused by the gap between expectations and reality. The second part offers an alternative framework for students evaluating what to do after high school. The final part illustrates different educational approaches that begin in high school and help young people develop occupational identities and vocational selves, placing them on a pathway to satisfying careers and responsible citizenship.

Part One: Buyer’s Remorse

The Demand Experience: College and K–12 Consumers Speak Out

Almost two-thirds of the nation’s high school graduates enroll immediately in some form of postsecondary education. Most of these students have a clear-cut motive. In 2019, 83.5 percent of entering freshmen, on average, said getting a better job was a “very important” reason for attending college, up from around 70 percent in the year 2000 and an all-time low of 68 percent in 1976. Are these young peoples’ expectations being realized? Mostly no.

According to Strada Education Network and Gallup, in 2017, about a third of college students strongly agreed they’d graduate with the skills and knowledge needed for job market and workplace success. Half strongly agreed their major would lead to a good job, though this varied by major and student demographics. On the other hand, a not-insignificant proportion of individuals would have changed at least one postsecondary decision they made: 36 percent their major; 28 percent their institution; 12 percent their degree. Only 26 percent of graduates strongly agreed their education was relevant to both career and day-to-day life.

Millennials, defined by Pew Research Center as those born between 1981 and 1996, who now number over 72 million, seem particularly disenchanted with the K–12 system. Reflecting on their high school educations, only 39 percent of college attendees think they were prepared to succeed in college or postsecondary coursework, according to a recent study by Echelon Insights. Millennials believe the K–12 system must change to meet their needs but doubt that will occur: 74 percent think schools need “big changes” to create opportunity for students, while 58 percent say “we won’t make significant enough changes in our schools, and the problems today will keep getting worse.”

Millennial parents have varying views on the most important purpose of an education. A plurality—38 percent—say it is “to prepare students for further learning, like college or trade school.” The second most common answer, garnering 30 percent of respondents, is “to prepare students for the workforce so they can succeed in a career and make a living.” That means 68 percent link education’s purpose with preparation for further learning or a successful career.

Meanwhile, more than half of Americans, 52 percent, believe higher education is headed in “the wrong direction,” while only 20 percent believe it is generally headed in the “right direction,” according to a survey by the think tank Populace. What’s more, 67 percent of Americans believe that colleges and universities put their own institutional interests first, compared to those who believe they put students (9 percent) or the greater good (4 percent) first.

College Is More Than Job Preparation

These data confirm that college and school consumers experience a version of buyer’s remorse—a disenchantment over the disconnect between their educational expectations and experiences. This consumer perspective on how colleges are doing collides with what college leaders think: 96 percent of chief academic officers believe their institutions are very or somewhat effective at preparing students for the workforce. Postsecondary institutions do not bear the full blame for this disconnect; students change, times change, ideas about how to live one’s life change. But these findings indicate that these institutions should take a hard look at how they are approaching students’ school-to-career transition.

Notably, this disenchantment exists despite a wealth of research that demonstrates that college graduates earn far more over a lifetime than nongraduates. This “college earnings premium” has fluctuated over the past century and varies by degree type, ethnicity, geography, and gender, but it has never disappeared. When compared with high school graduates, degree holders have lower incidences of poverty and unemployment, a higher likelihood of having health insurance and retirement plan, and a longer life expectancy. The Commission to Build a Heathier America reports that on average, college graduates live at least five years longer than those who did not complete high school.

Societal benefits include higher annual cash donations to charities; higher rates of volunteering and participating in civic, service and religious organizations; fewer incidents of criminal behavior; additional tax revenue; fewer recipients of means-tested public assistance and social insurance like unemployment compensation; and greater social capital, including more frequent speaking and exchanging favors with neighbors.

These advantages often accrue to society and the children of college graduates, who enjoy better long-term outcomes.

That said, the benefits of college may hit a ceiling. Nobel Prize winners Daniel Kahneman and Angus Deaton investigate income and wellbeing from another perspective. They distinguish between two aspects of happiness—experiencing and remembering—each of which gauges a different dimension of wellbeing. Emotional wellbeing derives from our experiencing selves and the frequency and intensity of the emotional qualities of everyday life like affection, joy, and sadness that make life pleasant or unpleasant. Conversely, life evaluation derives from our remembering selves and has a longer time frame. It describes our thoughts about our own lives from a broader perspective as we compare ourselves to others or as we achieve goals and meet expectations.

Kahneman and Deaton asked “whether money buys happiness, separately for these two aspects of wellbeing.” To measure this, they analyzed Gallup and the Healthways Corporation’s daily surveys of more than 1,000 randomly selected individuals across 2008 and 2009, yielding more than 450,000 responses. Emotional wellbeing was assessed by asking individuals how much time they had spent in positive and negative emotional states the previous day. Life evaluation was measured by asking individuals to rate their lives on a scale of zero to 10.

On average, life evaluations rise with household income, while emotional wellbeing levels off at approximately $75,000 (though this amount varies by geography and other factors). In their analysis, college graduates are more likely to have higher life evaluations but not necessarily better emotional wellbeing.

What to make of this? A college degree produces a wage premium and is associated with significant benefits for individuals, their children, and society. In addition, Kahneman and Deaton suggest that the higher income associated with a degree does bring individuals a life they think is better. But the emotional wellbeing of daily life has a point of “income satiation” after which it levels off.

Part Two: New Frameworks

College Mobility Report Cards

Given the many individual and societal benefits of higher education, what if students took a different approach to choosing a college, and what if the K–12 system took a different approach to preparing students for postsecondary opportunities?

Harvard economist Raj Chetty and colleagues at Opportunity Insights have demonstrated that a college degree is often a dependable path to upward social and economic mobility, especially for young people from low-income backgrounds, but the extent to which this is the case varies across institutions. Their mobility report cards provide a novel snapshot of how individual colleges are promoting or hindering long-term economic success and prosperity for low-income students. Rather than focusing exclusively on college graduation as a success metric, this approach emphasizes intergenerational upward economic mobility, or the degree to which children economically exceed, or lag behind, their parents.

These report cards for individual colleges are based on analysis of anonymous data on over 30 million college students between 1999 to 2013. A college’s upward mobility rate is calculated by multiplying an access rate (proportion of students in the bottom 20 percent of income distribution) and success rate (proportion of those students reaching the top 20 percent) to determine the percentage of enrollees rising from the bottom income quintile to the top quintile. Table 1 lists the top ten colleges ranked by their mobility rate.

Table 1

Top ten colleges by mobility rate, according to Opportunity Insights

Three key findings emerge from these report cards. First, mobility rates differ across institutions in part because low-income students’ access to them varies. For example, 16 percent of the State University of New York at Stony Brook students are from the bottom income quintile, compared with a 4 percent average at elite institutions like Harvard or Stanford, even with their generous financial aid awards. Rates of bottom-to-top quintile mobility are highest at mid-tier public universities like California State University, Los Angeles, Pace University, and Stony Brook, the top three institutions by mobility rate. Rates of bottom quintile to top 1 percent mobility are highest at elite institutions. Regrettably, between 2000 and 2011, the fraction of low-income students at mid-tier institutions with high mobility rates fell sharply, though it held steady at elite institutions.

Second, children from low- and high-income families who attend the same college tend to have similar earnings outcomes. For example, about 60 percent of Columbia University students from both low- and high-income families reach the top 20 percent of earners. This suggests institutions can create a level playing field for students with different socioeconomic backgrounds. Chetty believes increasing access to high-mobility mid-tier institutions is a sure way to expand upward economic mobility and earnings for many low-income students, since annual instructional expenditures average less than $6,500 per student, compared with elite colleges that average $87,000 per student. His analysis of these mid-tier colleges has identified what David Leonhardt, writing in The New York Times, calls “America’s great working class colleges,” able to propel students from low- and modest-income backgrounds to the middle class and beyond.

Third, the report cards reveal significant differences in mobility by race. For example, Black and Native American children have substantially lower rates of upward mobility, leaving them “stuck in place across generations.” Tragically, Black children born into the top 20 percent of the income distribution are almost as likely to fall to the bottom 20 percent as they are to remain there—a pattern driven by men’s rather than women’s outcomes. Latinos across generations move up in income distribution, with mobility rates just below those of whites, and Asian-Americans have the highest level of upward mobility.

Chetty’s analysis has its limits; it’s descriptive and therefore doesn’t explain the causes of these mobility outcomes. For example, what postsecondary courses, majors, or support services create an upward trajectory? Caroline Hoxby and Sarah Turner note that the mobility rates reported for public universities may be misleading in states with few academically prepared students with family incomes in the bottom 20 percent. Nevertheless, the analysis strongly suggests that college can be a significant engine of economic opportunity and social mobility—something that many “Top Colleges” lists ignore. Chetty’s mobility report cards embody a new college success metric and illustrate that many postsecondary institutions are providing a pathway to prosperity and social and economic mobility, especially for low-income students.

Chetty’s work also speaks to the frustration voiced in the aforementioned surveys. When 86 percent of entering freshmen say getting a better job is a “very important” reason for attending college, they’re voicing a desire for upward mobility. If prospective college students consult the mobility report cards and other similar resources to inform their institutional choice, they may be more likely to join the 26 percent of graduates who “strongly agree” their education is relevant to both career and day-to-day life.

Segmenting Demand: Jobs to be Done

Choosing the right college is only part of the story. Deciding what—if any—education to pursue after high school is more complicated than ever. And it’s not just high school graduates who worry about further education. Many adults are “upskilling” and looking for the right educational environment. These decisions have lasting consequences. For example, the average 2017 college loan borrower will have about $37,000 in debt after graduation, with the average bachelor’s degree holder taking 21 years to repay federal student loans.

Why seek further education, whether in a four-year university, two-year community college, or vocational or other training program? How can these learners make better decisions about what’s right for them? Michael Horn and Bob Moesta, both fellows at the Clayton Christensen Institute for Disruptive Innovation, interviewed over 200 individuals and surveyed more than 1,000 students, collecting detailed stories on their motivations for pursuing postsecondary education. They’ve categorized these findings using the “jobs to be done theory,” an approach that examines why individuals hire a product or service to get a job done in their lives. Their analysis suggests five potential “jobs” students hire postsecondary education providers to do for them (see Table 2). It also serves as a useful tool for young people and those helping them navigate the decision about what to do after high school.

 

Table 2

Jobs Students Hire Postsecondary Education to do After High School

In these jobs, there are two forces compelling individuals to change: the “push” of a problem causing dissatisfaction and the “pull” of a new solution. This push and pull raises questions that are practical, emotional, personal, and social. For example: will I get a raise with a degree or new credential? Am I better off staying with what I’m doing rather than doing something different? My friends are going to college, so should I? How can I challenge myself to learn more? In today’s world, individuals can experience several of these jobs—and perhaps all of them–multiple times.

In addition to traditional two- or four-year institutions, other educational options that respond to these “jobs to be done” include apprenticeships and internships; career and technical education; job placement and in-house training; and boot camps for acquiring discrete knowledge or skills. There are also new approaches to paying for programs, like income-share agreements that allow students to pay for education based on income. Understanding what motivates individuals and helping them be clear about their reasons for seeking more education—the job to be done—can help them make better choices and avoid unintended consequences.

Other Paths to Good Jobs

Of course, finding good-paying jobs doesn’t necessarily require a bachelor’s degree. While that degree has become a de facto proxy for employability, only around one-third of American adults possess a four-year degree. The impressive value attached to the college degree leads individuals to think that nothing less can yield as good—or almost as good—an outcome. In fact, there are “opportunity rich” employment options for those without a four-year degree that move individuals into the middle class and careers worth having.

According to Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce, there are about 65 million existing “good jobs.” The center defines a good job as paying at least $35,000 annually for those aged 25 to 44 and $45,000 for those in the 45 to 64 range, at a time when 2016 American median earnings were $65,000. Some people earning six figures may not view such jobs as “good,” but a great many people manage to get by, and even thrive, with them.

The first non-four-year pathway is the high school pathway, which includes those with a high school diploma or less and leads to 20 percent of good jobs. Workers who follow that path often advance to roles as managers and supervisors in fields like construction, manufacturing, food services and office support. Second, the middle skills pathway—aimed at 24 percent of 2016’s good jobs—embraces those with more than a high school diploma but less than a bachelor’s degree—e.g., holders of associate degrees or certificates. These “certified value” employees have jobs that span skilled services and a host of blue-collar fields, including healthcare technicians, surveying and mapping technicians, firefighters, and law enforcement.

The bachelor’s degree pathway assumes at least a four-year degree and points toward 56 percent of today’s good jobs. It includes professional and technical jobs and “frontier jobs” deploying new technologies like robot integration and search engine optimization. Not until 2008 did these workers hold more good jobs than those without a degree, marking the ascent of the “college economy.” From 1991 to 2016, bachelor’s degree pathway jobs doubled, from 18 to 36 million. Middle skills jobs grew by 3 million. While high school jobs decreased by about 2 million, employment opportunities for those following the high school pathway have remained stable, as the number of high school pathway workers moving to other pathways was greater than the number of jobs lost in the high school pathway.

Analysts at the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland examined labor market differences for those with and without bachelor’s degrees in 121 metro areas with 103.5 million employed workers, making up73 percent of total 2017 U.S. employment). Almost 22 percent of these were “opportunity jobs,” or positions filled by people without degrees who were paid at least the national annual median wage of nearly $37,000 (adjusted for regional differences).

These analysts also acquired data from Burning Glass Technologies, which tracks labor market data and talent, to understand the level of education that employers seek when filling open positions. Among the largest 25 livelihoods, at least nine—led by several occupations in health care and the skilled trades—are fully accessible to those without a four-year degree. For the other 16 occupations, there was no employer consensus regarding the education credentials needed for those jobs.

This lack of consensus may be due largely to labor market issues rather than the work’s true educational requirements. An employer’s requirement of a college degree may itself be a form of credential inflation, “an unnecessary barrier for [some] workers in some places relative to others,” according to the Cleveland Fed analysis. A more skills-based—or supply side—approach to hiring would make far more sense, although it’s understood that some employers treat education credentials as “signals” of character traits that they value (e.g., persistence), even if there’s no direct relationship between what’s actually learned and what the job actually demands. A key challenge for both employers and job seekers is pairing individuals without bachelor’s degrees to good jobs. This matching process requires schools, colleges, and placement organizations to build strong employer relationships so that potential workers get the right first job.

An example of this approach at the state level is the Delaware Pathways program, initiated during the 2014–15 school year by Governor Jack Markell as a statewide initiative to provide college and career preparation for youth. Students can take college classes at no cost to families, work as interns in real jobs, and earn work credentials (see “Summer School is the New Summer Job,” features, Summer 2020). Middle school students learn about career options and then, as high school sophomores or juniors, take courses related to careers. In the summer before senior year, students start a 240-hour paid internship that goes through the senior year. The program creates pathways from school to careers aligned with state and regional economies, especially middle-skills jobs. In Delaware, these jobs offer an average salary of nearly $45,000 a year, compared with low-skills jobs that offer an average salary of around $26,000 a year.

The program involves a diverse partnership, including K–12 education, businesses, postsecondary education, philanthropy and community agencies and organizations. For example, Delaware Technical Community College is the lead agency that arranges work-based experiences. The United Way coordinates support service for low-income students. Boys and Girls Clubs and libraries provide after-school service for youth. The initiative is governed by a steering committee composed of representatives from the public, private and nonprofit sectors, with financial support coming from public and private dollars, including philanthropy. Currently there are 26 pathways programs in fields like advanced manufacturing, computer science, digital marketing and communications, agricultural science, and health care. Over 16,000 students are enrolled. In some pathways, students take career-related courses at institutions of higher education and earn college credit which that be applied to an associate degree or certificate. In others, students take courses at their high school. Teachers for the courses have extensive industry experience.

Part Three: New Approaches

The Supply Side: Delivering an Education

The onus for accelerating upward mobility and making postsecondary education relevant to careers should not fall exclusively on colleges and universities. Innovations undertaken by K–12 and postsecondary education and other community organizations and enterprises are creating new pathways for young people that engage them in novel ways and lead them to in-demand twenty-first–century jobs and careers. These include apprenticeships, internships, and career and technical education; dual enrollment in high school and postsecondary institutions, including job placement and training; career academies; boot camps that focus on acquiring discreet knowledge or skills; staffing, placement and other support services; and income-share agreements, allowing students to repay tuition after acquiring a good-paying job.

This engagement allows young people, with the assistance of classroom educators and workforce mentors, to make a connection between school and work, education and career. It also prepares them to make a better-informed decision about their next step after high school. A better-informed decision on the front end will likely lead to greater satisfaction on the back end.

Here are five examples from different sectors and domains:

1. K–12 School District and Charter School Partnerships: Da Vinci Schools, a Los Angeles-area charter school created in 2009 by the Wiseburn School District, is a partnership between the district and charter school. It serves 2,100 students from 108 zip codes in grades K–16 and includes a K–8 home school-hybrid model, four high schools, a postsecondary college and career program, and a training institute. Ninety-eight percent of its students graduate from high school and meet the admissions requirements for the University of California system.

Da Vinci has more than 100 business and nonprofit partners that offer internships, mentorships, workshops, boot camps, project consultancies, and other student engagement programs. Student services to partners include website and social media design, graphic design, and youth marketing focus groups.

The Da Vinci Extension program integrates high school, college, careers, and student services like mental health and counseling. Students, some of whom are already working, have two pathways to further education, including associate’s or bachelor’s degrees via classroom and online instruction. One pathway is through UCLA Extension and El Camino College, at no cost to students. The other pathway is College for America, affiliated with Southern New Hampshire University. Program costs can be subsidized by Pell Grants and local funding. At both programs, students access tutoring, advising, and teacher support through Da Vinci.

2. National Catholic School Networks: Cristo Rey, founded in 1996, is a network of 37 Catholic schools enrolling 12,000 students in 24 states. On average, 40 percent of students in the network are not Catholic, and 98 percent are minority youth, with an average family income for four of $37,000. The network integrates four years of academics with work experience through its Corporate Work Study Program, a separate nonprofit that places high school students five days a month in an entry-level, professional job chosen from among over 3,400 corporate partners.

At full enrollment, a Cristo Rey school’s financial model reflects 60 percent of funds earned through the corporate work-study program, 30 percent through fundraising, and 10 percent through family contributions of, on average, $1,000 a year. Families access state school voucher and tax credit programs where available.

3. Public-Private Partnerships: In Georgia, Junior Achievement, Fulton County Schools, and the Atlanta business community launched a public-private partnership in 2015 to create a new school curriculum model within a traditional district high school. 3-D Education (3DE) says it “re-engineers high school education to be more relevant, experiential, and…connected to the…real world in order to more fully prepare today’s students for the demands of tomorrow’s economy.” Today, 3DE has expanded to six schools in four public school districts.

Examples of the workforce pathways it offers students include business and technology; entrepreneurship; marketing and management; and financial services. 3DE’s project-based learning design includes a six-week case study beginning in 11th grade that involves students in off-campus experiences with industries and professions, including work-based coaches. Not only do students excel academically, they feel prepared for what lies ahead: 98 percent of 3DE students feel excited about their futures.

4. Citywide Partnerships: In New Orleans, the education, business, and civic partnership YouthForce New Orleans has prepared students for high-wage and high-demand career pathways since 2015. YouthForce New Orleans works with open enrollment charter high schools, offering career exposure and work experiences, soft-skills training, coaching for students, and paid student internships for seniors. The internships consist of 60 hours of professionalism training, followed by 90 hours of work placement in a career pathway where opportunities include biology and health sciences, digital media and IT, and skilled crafts like architecture and water management.

YouthForce New Orleans has other programs, including an annual Career Expo for sophomores sponsored by Junior Achievement; a soft skills teacher fellowship where teachers learn the practice and teaching of soft skills; and a family engagement program educating parents about the career pathways program. The 12 organizations comprising the organization’s steering committee, including the New Orleans school district, workforce and economic development organizations, community advisory groups and philanthropic partners, are the secret sauce to getting on the other side of bureaucracy and putting New Orleans’ students first.

5. Private Enterprises: In Indianapolis, Kenzie Academy began in 2017 as a two-year venture-funded technology and apprenticeship program focused on software engineering skills for students from varying backgrounds, such 19-year-old high school graduates, formerly incarcerated individuals, and individuals with master’s degrees seeking new occupational opportunities. In year two of the program, students apprentice in Kenzie Studio, the company’s consulting arm.

To make the $24,000-a-year program accessible to more people, Kenzie encourages students to sign an income-share agreement that can delay payments until they complete the program and have a job paying at least $40,000. Kenzie also has a partnership with Butler University allowing students to receive a joint certificate from both organizations.

General Assembly, founded in 2011, is a for-profit “boot camp” that offers short and long, in-person and online courses in computer programming, data science, and product management. It leverages 30 campuses worldwide, more than 19,000 hiring partners, over 20,000 expert instructors, and a network of 70,000 global alumni. Through its Catalyst program, an enrollee can take courses at no upfront cost, paying back tuition in manageable monthly installments only after obtaining a job paying more than $40,000.

In sum, finding good paying jobs doesn’t necessarily require college degrees. There are other “opportunity rich” employment options for those without a bachelor’s degree that move individuals into the middle class and into careers worth having. And for those who do go on to college immediately after high school, there are new ways emerging of supporting young people while they are at college so that they attain a degree in no more than six years.

Creating an Occupational Identity and Vocational Self

These innovative programs help America’s young people develop an occupational identity—the conscious awareness of themselves as workers—and hence a vocational self. These pioneering efforts can counter young people’s disengagement in school and the disappointment millennials express when they talk about their educational experiences.

These types of programs also help young people build the social networks they need to prosper in life. As the saying goes, it’s not just what you know but who you know. This is a form of what analysts call a network approach to developing social capital—an approach based on the distinction between bonding social capital and bridging social capital.

Bonding social capital occurs within a group and reflects the need to be with others like ourselves, providing personal emotional support, companionship, and validation. Bridging social capital occurs between social groups and reflects the need to connect with individuals different from ourselves, expanding our knowledge, social circles, and resources across features like race, class, or religion. It also includes how people and institutions interact with each other in a power relationship or hierarchy, like a community organization and a government agency. Bonding and bridging social capital are complementary. As Xavier DeSousa Briggs says, bonding social capital is for “getting by” and bridging social capital is for “getting ahead.” It is the latter that propels young people to opportunity, general wellbeing, and responsible citizenship—all key dimensions of the American Dream.

Four-year college graduates are dissatisfied with the return they are getting on their investment, and they are dissatisfied even in the face of the benefits they receive by virtue of their bachelor’s degree. It’s possible to break this cycle, and it’s possible to get better outcomes. To start, students can choose their college based on how well it supports upward mobility, pursue an alternative to college, or find ways to integrate college and career readiness into their K–12 education. A host of innovative efforts are underway to help students do just that.

Bruno V. Manno is senior advisor for K–12 education reform with the Walton Family Foundation.