Understanding large-scale patterns in student course enrollment is a problem of great interest to university administrators and educational researchers. Yet important decisions are often made without a good quantitative framework of the process underlying student choices. We propose a probabilistic approach to modelling course enrollment…

In this paper, I assess labor market returns of a substantial skill upgrade: college enrollment of the vocationally trained, non-traditional students who do not have the formal entry requirement. Using propensity-score-adjusted regressions and the National Educational Panel Study, I find that these enrollees face high opportunity costs as they…

Today, many undergraduates are themselves raising children. But does college-going by parents improve their offspring's educational attainment? I address this question using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth--1979 and linked Children and Young Adults Survey. I first model postnatal college enrollment and bachelor's completion by…

This paper evaluates the effects of a high school curriculum reform on students' probability to enroll at university and to choose a Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics (STEM) major. The reform increased the difficulty of graduating from high school by increasing the instruction time in core subjects and by raising the graduation…

Attending high-quality early childhood care and education (ECCE) is associated with higher cognitive and social-emotional skills, especially for children growing up in poverty, but access to high-quality ECCE is limited. This study capitalizes on the random assignment design of the Head Start Impact Study to better understand whether the…

Objective: Colleges have increased postsecondary educational access for youth, including individuals with disabilities, but completion rates remain low. This study tests the hypothesis that health conditions that reduce social integration predict lower educational attainment among college students. Method: The sample from the nationally…

This study investigates the impact that different financial aid packages have on student stopout, reenrollment, and graduation probabilities. The authors simulate how various financial aid packaging regimes affect the occurrence and timing of these events. Their findings indicate that the number and duration of enrollment and stopout spells affect…

The purpose of this study was to examine the educational experiences and outcomes of low-skill adults in West Virginia's community and technical colleges, providing a more detailed profile of these students. Data for the variables were obtained from archival databases through a cooperative agreement between state agencies. Descriptive statistics…

This study examines the differential effects on student subgroups of using the ACT® College Readiness Assessment Composite (ACTC) score and high school grade point average (HSGPA) for making admission decisions. The subgroup characteristics investigated include race/ethnicity, gender, and income. For each student subgroup, we examine the effect of…

This study applies competing risks survival analysis to describe outcome attainment for an entire cohort of students who first attended a Midwestern community college in the Fall Semester 2001. Outcome attainment included transfer to a four-year institution, degree/ certificate attainment from the community college under study, and transfer to a…