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institute for higher education
leadership &policy
Realizing the Potential o Career Technical Education in
the Caliornia Community Colleges
THE ROAD LESS TR AVELED:
Institute or Higher Education Leadership & Policy
6000 J Street, Tahoe Hall 3063 | Sacramento, CA 95819-6081
T (916) 278-3888 | F (916) 278-3907 | www.csus.edu/ihelp
Nancy Shulock
Colleen Moore
Jeremy Oenstein
Februar y 2011
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Executive Summary
Potential o Career Technical EducationMission is Not Fully Tapped
The Career Technical Education (CTE) mission o Caliornias
community colleges is not well understood by policymakers
in comparison to the transer mission o the colleges. This
exploratory study, to be ollowed by a more comprehensive
research agenda, is motivated by the belie that CTE is a vital
piece o the college completion agenda but is not receiving
sucient attention. While students can be successul in CTE
in ways besides earning a certicate or degree, the issuing
o workorce-related credentials is an undeniably important
unction o the colleges.
CTE is important to the college completion agenda becauseit can help Caliornia:
n Meet completion goals
n Meet workorce goals
n Meet equity goals
n Increase postsecondary productivity
n Realize benets o high school reorms.
Caliornia is not yet poised to take ull advantage o thepotential o the CTE mission area because CTE is generally
characterized by:
n A lack o priority across the system
n Weak credential structures and transer pathways
n Underdeveloped data and accountability systems
n Higher costs that are not well addressed
n A lack o integration with core institutional operations.
There is solid evidence o good job prospects or students
with certicates and associate degrees in career elds.
Student interest in vocational coursework is high, with 30%
o course enrollments in vocational courses. Yet o the more
than 255,000 degree/certicate-seeking students in the
2003-04 entering cohort (dened as enrolling in more than 6
units in the rst year), only 5% earned certicates and only 3%
earned vocational associate degrees within six years.
Key Findings: Apparent Lack o Priorityon Technical Credentials
As a basis or exploring CTE more generally, we studied
patterns o student enrollment and progress in our high-
wage, high-need pathways (inormation technology,
engineering technology, engineering, and nursing), visited
CTE programs, interviewed aculty and sta, and reviewed
college catalogs and other materials. We know we cant
generalize to all programs in all colleges, given the great
variety in both, but the ollowing ndings strike us as
important to any eort to understand and improve student
outcomes in CTE programs.
1. Data constraints limit knowledge and college actions.The absence o provisions or students to declare a
program o study seriously impedes eorts to understand
and improve student success in CTE programs because
it is dicult to know which students are pursuing which
programs.
2. Good student progress is not translating into
credentials. Few certicates and degrees were awarded
despite considerable student progress. Far more
students accrue 30 or more college-level credits and
pass degree-applicable math than the relatively ew whoearn certicates or degrees. Additionally, more students
completed at least 60 transerable credits than the number
who transerred.
3. Pathway structures do not promote attainment
o technical credentials. A picture emerged o CTE
pathways that do not refect a high priority on career-
oriented credentials or on sequencing lower-to-higher
credentials within a eld. The route by which entering
students are expected to attain the basic skills needed or
their programs was unclear. There was no strong pattern
o students attaining credentials in the chosen eld o
study, with the great majority o associate degrees in
interdisciplinary studies rather than in a technical eld.
There is a huge variety o programs in some elds and
an equally huge variation across colleges in unit and
programmatic requirements or the same credential. Few
students who transerred earned associate degrees and ew
who earned associate degrees earned certicates.
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Recommendations: More Structure toHelp Students Meet Career Goals
This study is the rst stage o a broader research agenda aimed at
understanding how state and system policies might best promote
the success o students pursuing occupational programs. CTE is a
richly complex mission area that we believe can benet rom more
attention and greater understanding by policymakers and other
stakeholders. We have much to learn rom the work ahead, but
this exploratory research, in the context o national momentum to
increase structure and simpliy pathways or students, leads us to
make the ollowing recommendations:
1. Require students to declare a program o study and
colleges to ensure access to programs
Having students ormally select, and colleges provide access
to, well-dened programs o study would have tremendous
advantages or student success. Students would have a clear
roadmap toward completion, colleges could better align the
course schedule with student needs, and the means to monitor
and improve program outcomes would be greatly enhanced.
2. Consider ewer and more consistent program oferings
Hand-in-hand with requiring students to declare programs
o study should be a commitment by colleges to ensurethat the programs they oer are accessible to students and
responsive to regional needs. The sheer number o and
variation across programs lead us to question how students
can navigate all o the choices and whether all programs
on the books are still vital. Leading national researchers
are calling or community colleges to review their multiple,
variable program oerings to ensure they meet labor market
needs, based on research ndings that many choices and a
lack o structure can deter student success.
3. Focus on basic skills or CTE
The system's high-priority Basic Skills Initiative has not included
an explicit ocus on students in CTE programs and it does not
appear to be serving CTE well. Few CTE students enroll in basic
skills courses and many CTE aculty believe such courses do
not benet their students. Yet there is no systematic alternative
or addressing basic skills deciencies among students in CTE
programs. Few certicate programs require English or math,
raising the question whether they are producing graduates with
the skills to succeed in the workplace. It is important that the
system address basic skills or the CTE mission - both curricular
requirements and means to help students meet them.
4. Reexamine associate degree
The associate degree in Caliornia has been asked to serve
the dual purpose o preparing students or transer and or
entry to the workforce. The passage of SB 1440 in 2010 is an
acknowledgement that the current degree does not work well
for transfer. But the degree may not work well for workforce-
bound students either. Most degrees earned by students
in the career pathways we studied were in interdisciplinary
studies a degree that does not signal to employers that a
student has subject matter expertise in a eld. As work begins
to develop a new set o associate degrees or transer, paralleleorts should examine how the existing associate degree
might better serve students who are not intending to transer.
5. Conduct additional research
The data we reviewed raised specic questions that, i the
Chancellors Oce could answer with additional research,
would expedite eorts to understand and improve CTE
outcomes. Why do students amass so many excess units
along the way to earning certicates and associate degrees?
What levels o math and English prociency do and
should individual certicate programs require? Are there
sucient opportunities or incoming students to receive
knowledgeable academic and career advising about CTE
program options? How many students satisy certicate
requirements but ail to ocially earn one and why?
Strengthening the CTE mission area in these ways should yield
substantial benets or students, colleges, employers, and all
Caliornians.
Acknowledgements
We thank the ollowing individuals who reviewed and
provided helpul comments on an earlier drat but,
o course, we take responsibility or the ndings and
conclusions: Pamela Burdman, Darla Cooper, Hazel Hill,
Davis Jenkins, Kelley Karandje, Nick Kremer, Jane Patton,
Jessica Pitt, David Rattray, Barry Russell, Kim Schenk, Eva
Schiorring, Bill Scroggins, Ron Selge, Vince Stewart, Chuck
Wiseley, David Wol, and the Caliornia Community College
Vocational Research and Accountability Committee.
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Career-Technical Education (CTE) andthe Community College Completion Agenda
and most certicates are awarded in occupational elds,
and there is evidence that the market value o associate
degrees in occupational elds is greater than other associatedegrees.2 That nding is especially relevant amid the
growing concerns that the completion agenda cannot just
be about the number o credentials but must be about
quality credentials with labor market value. Certicates, in
particular, can reduce time-to-completion o a meaningul
credential, removing a signicant barrier to completion or
the many students whose lives don't accommodate many
years o college-going. Researchers have ound that students
with clear occupational goals are more likely to complete
their programs o study,3 suggesting that community college
CTE programs can make important contributions to thecompletion agenda.
Meeting Workorce Goals
Caliornia aces a severe shortage o educated workers as the
baby boom generation retires, the economy shits to ever-
higher dependence on high-level knowledge and skills, and
the astest-growing populations are not being educated at
levels to ll job openings. Data conrm projected shortalls
in both jobs requiring a bachelors degree and middle
skill jobs requiring more than a high school education but
less than a bachelors degree (e.g., engineering technician,radiological technician, dental hygienist). A recent study
ound that Caliornia could have jobs or one million more
bachelors degree holders than the state is currently on track
to produce.4 Other research has documented that a large
share o uture job openings are middle skills jobs.5 Clearly,
more Caliornians with occupationally-oriented certicates
and associate degrees are needed to supply the states
uture workorce.
Meeting Equity Goals
Dierential rates o completion across racial/ethnic groups
in the Caliornia Community Colleges (CCC) present a
severe social and economic challenge to Caliornias
eorts to increase educational attainment.6 Structured
career pathways that include certiicates and associate
degrees could be an important means to improve social
mobility or economically disadvantaged Caliornians.
Research suggests that high school students who take CTE
coursework along with traditional academic courses have
better employment outcomes, and at least comparable
Caliornia, along with most other states, has made community
college completion a major priority in the eort to boost
educational attainment or broad sectors o the populationand strengthen economic health. The research presented
in this report is motivated by the belie that the career
technical education (CTE) mission o Caliornias community
colleges is a vital piece o the college completion agenda
but is not yet receiving sucient attention. We are well aware
that students succeed in CTE in ways that do not involve
completing certicates or degrees. At the same time, the
issuing o workorce-related credentials is an undeniably
important unction o community colleges. In this study we
are interested in the CTE mission as it relates to completion o
certicates and degrees.
While eorts to address student success and college
completion are generally relevant to CTE, there are unique
aspects o CTE that warrant more specic study. In this
research we examine student progress through our career
pathways as a basis or exploring more broadly how CTE can
contribute to the college completion agenda. This report is
the rst part o a larger project to study whether state and
system policies could better support student success in
CTE programs. Although admittedly an exploratory study,
our ndings conrm our initial supposition that there isuntapped potential across the system or CTE to better serve
students and the state.
High Potential in the CTE Mission Area
CTE is important to the college completion agenda or the
reasons described below.
Meeting Completion Goals
National college completion goals, such as those
articulated by the Gates and Lumina oundations, includeassociate degrees as well as bachelors degrees, and
both oundations are investing in eorts to improve
understanding o the role and value o certiicates. The
Obama administration, by calling or more Americans to
get a year or more o college, also signaled the importance
o postsecondary certiicates. The report recently released
by the Caliornia Community College Leagues Commission
on the Future sets targets or increases in certiicates
as well as associate degrees.1 Many associate degrees
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postsecondary outcomes, compared to students taking
only academic courses.7 In the postsecondary arena,
research suggests that there are economic beneits tolow-income students who pursue longer-term certiicates
(30 or more units),8 and that such programs can lead to
well-paid careers, particularly among low-perorming
students.9 Students who earn credentials in occupational
programs can have substantial earnings advantages over
those earning traditional academic degrees.10 Todays
economy oers good-paying careers in many technical
ields that dont require our-year degrees. Moreover,
by one estimate 85% o occupational enrollments in
community colleges are in ields that have counterparts in
our-year colleges, raising the prospect o career laddersto higher paying positions i educational pathways are
structured well.11
Increasing Productivity
Streamlining and strengthening career pathways can
increase postsecondary education productivity. Poorly
structured career pathways can result in students taking
courses in pursuit o lower-unit credentials that dont
count towards higher-unit certicates and degrees. This
ineciency in the accumulation o units has been well
documented in the literature on community college transerbut may also be a actor impeding student movement
rom lower-unit certicates to higher-unit certicates and
associate degrees. I relevant units dont carry orward to
the next highest credential, the cost to the state and the
cost to students in time and money increase. Additionally,
CTE programs lend themselves to a cohort approach and to
integrating basic skills instruction into the curriculum, both
o which can contribute to increased rates o persistence
and completion.12
Complementing High School Reorms
A growing body o research points to the benets o
multiple orms o career-oriented education in high schools
and a growing body o practice is producing promising
results.13 Since community colleges serve the vast majority
o Caliornia high school graduates who proceed to
postsecondary institutions, strong career-oriented oerings
that align well with those in high schools would optimize
the benets o high school reorm eorts.
CTE Potential is as yet Unrealized
Caliornia is not yet poised to take ull advantage o the great
potential o the community college CTE mission area to help
with the states college completion agenda.
Lack o Priority
The legislature periodically rearms that the three core
mission areas o the CCC are transer, CTE, and basic skills
education, yet the attention paid to the CTE mission has
not matched that given the other two areas. Lawmakers
express ar more interest in and understanding o the
transer unction, even though they know o the important
contribution community colleges make to the states
workforce through career education. The Basic Skills
Initiative, a top priority o the system or several years,
has been pursued largely apart rom the CTE mission.
CTE programs are highly complex, as they oten involve
partnerships with state, local, and community organizations,
have multiple unding streams, serve students with a variety
o goals and prior experiences, and oer a wide array o
certications. Whether due to the sheer complexity o the
mission area, the dominance o academic aculty in college
leadership positions, or purposeul ordering o priorities by
policymakers and the college system itsel, CTE carries less
status across the colleges.
Weak Credential Structures and Transer Pathways
Despite the national research ndings that certicates o at
least one year and associate degrees in occupational elds
have good economic returns,14 such credentials appear
to be undervalued in Caliornia. Relatively ew students
indicate a goal o earning a certicate or an associate
degree and relatively ew certicates and associate degrees
are awarded. Many CTE students amass credits in career
elds without acquiring a certicate or degree or they earn
an interdisciplinary studies degree that does not refecttheir eld o study. The CCC does not di erentiate applied
associate degrees rom associate degrees as is done in
many states. The associate degree has been orced to serve
a dual unction but it has not served the transer unction
well nor does it clearly signal career-relevant competencies.
While the newly authorized associate degrees or
transer15 are aimed to align a subset o associate degrees
with transer requirements, there has been no parallel
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Career-Technical Education (CTE) andthe Community College Completion Agenda
discussion o the need to retool existing associate degrees
to better prepare students or the workorce and better
communicate to employers the learning outcomes romassociate degree programs.
Underdeveloped Data and Accountability Systems
Data and accountability systems are poorly suited to monitor
progress and success within the CTE mission. The CCC
systems Accountability Reporting or Community Colleges
(ARCC) reports student success rates without accounting
separately or CTE. The section o ARCC on vocational and
career education reports only the numbero certicates and
associate degrees awarded by program area, providing no
inormation about rates o student progress and success.
Only certicates o 18 units or more are required to be
reported, so there is no uniormity in reporting short-term
certicates and no basis or determining the extent to which
short-term certicates are earned as a step toward higher-
unit certicates or degrees. This would be important data
since research has ailed to document economic returns to
short-term certicates alone.16
There are two other major shortcomings o CTE accountability.
First, systemwide data do not record the program o
enrollment or students because, with a ew exceptions like
nursing, community college students in Caliornia do not
ormally declare a program o enrollment. Colleges report CTE
outcomes to the ederal government under the Carl D. Perkins
Vocational and Technical Education Act but this is limited by
the lack o data on program o enrollment. Student course-
taking patterns rather than declared program intent is the
basis or reported program outcomes. This method is unable
to identiy students until they are well along in their programs,
and is thus more valuable or compliance with ederal
requirements than or inorming college eorts to improve
student success. Second, there is no systematic reporting o
employment outcomes or CTE programs even though the
purpose o most programs is to help students obtain paying
(or higher paying) employment. Anecdotal reports that
students get job oers or raises beore earning a credential
are sometimes oered as explanations or successul
non-completions but lack rigorous labor market outcomes
data by program to back up the claims.
Higher Costs Not Well Addressed
CTE programs tend to be more costly than other
instructional programs. They are heavily dependent onequipment, many have class size restrictions due to access
to equipment or specialized accreditation requirements,
and they involve more requent curriculum change as well
as structured engagement with the employer community.
The state unding ormulas employed at most colleges do
not accommodate these higher costs (even accounting or
ederal Perkins unds received or CTE programs) and CTE
program administrators must seek external unding or
what many would consider core instructional costs.
Lack o Integration with Core Institutional
Operations
Finally, at many colleges CTE seems to operate quite
separately rom other instructional units, with separate
administrative structures, less integration with core student
support areas, and separate unding structures that leave
CTE program administrators much more dependent on
external resources to keep their programs operating.
Eorts to strengthen CTE are generally undertaken as
separate projects or initiatives apart rom the states multi-
billion dollar investment in its community colleges
usually through grant application opportunities at localor regional levels that aect small numbers o students.17
This lack o integration suggests that emerging eorts to
address college completion could have less impact on
CTE programs and student outcomes unless special care is
taken to reduce silos that can interere with college-wide
planning or student success.
The Complexities o Studying CTEStudent Success
Any eort to study student progress in CTE conronts aproblem o language and denition. Career technical
education has largely replaced vocational education as
the term used to describe educational programs designed
to prepare students or employment opportunities that do
not initially require our-year degrees. Yet neither career nor
technical helps us understand the distinct nature o these
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community college programs. Many our-year programs are
just as career oriented as are one- and two-year programs
and many are highly technical. Some elds designated asCTE in the community colleges, like nursing, have well-
established transer pathways to universities and others
do not. The Chancellors Oce data system classies
certain programs and courses as vocational or purposes
o compliance with the Perkins Act but about 20% o the
vocational courses are transerable and eorts are underway
to increase the transerability o CTE coursework.18 The term
sub-baccalaureate credentials to reerence certicates and
associate degrees connotes something o lesser value and
could impede eorts to strengthen these pathways into
well-paying careers that are a prominent eature o todayseconomy.
While the nation could benet rom new terminology that
better refects the economy, which oers good technical
career options at all levels o postsecondary education, we
raise the issue here as context or our eorts to examine
student success within the CTE mission. Our prior work has
documented patterns o student success or all degree/
certicate-seekers, but in this report we examine success in
occupational programs specically. We learned that both the
denitions o CTE programs and the pathways along whichone might measure progress are ambiguous. For example,
we chose engineering as one pathway to study but wrestled
with whether engineering technology and engineering
are one pathway or two, and certainly between them they
span the CTE and the transer missions o the colleges. We
chose nursing, which could potentially be the upper end o
a career pathway that includes allied health elds, and which
certainly encompasses the transer unction. We settled on
our pathways (explained on page 9) that admittedly do not
represent the ull breadth o CTE oerings and consider the
research merely exploratory and illustrative o issues thatshould be addressed on a larger scale.
Tracking student progress toward occupational program
completion is complicated by variability in the value o
certicates and degrees across occupations and by thedierent goals o the diverse populations that enroll in CTE
courses and course sequences. Genuine questions have
arisen, with respect to the national college completion
agenda, about the wisdom o using the number o
baccalaureate degrees as a measure o college success,
irrespective o degree eld and measures o degree quality.
But with CTE we encounter more fundamental questions of
whether and which credentials should be counted and how
well a count o completed credentials measures the value o
these programs. As examples:
n Associate degrees in some transerable technical elds
lack or are perceived to lack market value, so many
transer-bound students do not bother to satisy degree
requirements.
n Many students earn an interdisciplinary studies associate
degree that does not accurately refect their occupational
eld o study, making it hard to dene and monitor success
in those occupational programs.
n Many CTE students are older, working proessionals who
need coursework rather than degrees, oten or improvedjob security or advancement; many already have degrees
(10% o the students who earned certicates in our study
already had bachelors degrees).
n There is a huge variety o certicates o varying lengths,
many o which are shorter than the 30 units ound by
researchers as a threshold or economic return but may
nevertheless have career advancement value or students,
raising questions about which certicates should be
counted as completions.
n Some students are seeking industry certication and/
or licensure as opposed to college-awarded certicates,
outcomes that are not tracked by the colleges.
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Career-Technical Education (CTE) andthe Community College Completion Agenda
A Summary Look at CTE Enrollmentsand Outcomes
In spite o deinitional issues and the challenges
o studying student progress and completion, the
importance o preparing Caliornians to ill good middle
skill positions in the economy and to acquire the
oundation or urther education justiies the eort to
understand these complex issues. To that end, we present
some summary data as background or the analysis that
ollows.
Unlike the transer mission o the colleges, the CTE mission
area exists in a highly competitive arena in which or-prot
institutions play a large and growing role. Figure 1 showsthat while the or-prot sector enrolls ewer than 10%
o all undergraduates in two-year (or less) institutions in
Caliornia, it awards over 20% o the associate degrees
in career elds19 and between one-hal and two-thirds
o certicates. Figures 2 and 3 compare the career elds
in which certicates and associate degrees are awarded
by the or-prot and public sectors. Each graph shows
the our largest program areas in that sector and, or
comparison purposes, the share o awards in the other
sectors top our programs. (Not shown in the or-prot
TotalUndergraduate
Enrollment
AssociateDegrees in
Career Fields
Certifcateo Less than
1 Year
Certifcate o1-2 Years
Certifcate o2-4 Years
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Source: The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS). Survey year 2009.
Figure 1
Share o Total Enrollment Compared to Share o Completion in Career Fields, For-Profts and Community Colleges in Caliornia
Public Private, or-proft < 2 years Private, or-proft, 2 years
graph is amily and consumer sciences, which accounts
or 11 percent o CCC awards but a negligible share at the
or-prots.) Health proessions account or the largest sharein both sectors and business is also among the top our in
each sector. While 91% o the awards by the or-prot sector
are in our areas (health, mechanic and repair, business, and
personal/culinary), those our areas account or only 55% o
the awards by community colleges, which have a broader
range o oerings.
Figures 4 and 5 present data on CTE course-taking, progress,
and completion in the CCC. Figure 4 shows that nearly
one-third o all credit enrollment in the community colleges
is in vocational courses.
Despite these robust course enrollments, ew students
earn certicates or associate degrees in vocational areas.
Figure 5 shows that o the 255,253 degree-seeking students
entering the CCC in 2003-04, only 5% and 3%, respectively,
had earned certicates or vocational associate degrees ater
six-years - ar ewer than the share that transerred to a our-
year institution. (We dene degree-seeking as enrolling in
more than six units in the rst year.) Only 29% o all associate
degrees awarded across the CCC in 2008 were in elds
identied by the system as CTE, while 56% o all degrees
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Source: The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS). Survey year 2009.
Health proessionals and related clinical sciences
Mechanic and repair technologies/technicians
Business, management, marketing, and related support services
Personal and culinary services
Security and protective services
Family and consumer sciences/human sciences
Other
5%11%
27%21%
13%
5% 18%
Figure 2
Certiicates and Associate Degrees Awarded in Career Fields by Private For-Proit 2-Year Colleges in Caliornia by Field
Source: The Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS). Survey year 2009.
Health proessionals and related clinical sciences
Mechanic and repair technologies/technicians
Business, management, marketing, and related support services
Personal and culinary services
Security and protective services
Other
67%11%
8%
7%
6%1%
Figure 3
Certiicates and Associate Degrees Awarded in Career Fields by Public 2-Year Colleges in Caliornia by Field
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Career-Technical Education (CTE) andthe Community College Completion Agenda
Figure 4
Distribution o Credit Enrollments, Fall 2009
Transer, not vocational
Basic Skills
Vocational - transerable
Vocational - non-transerable61%
16%
15%7%
Figure 5
Milestone Attainment within 6 Years among All Degree Seekers
Source: Community College Chancellors Oice Data M art, relec ting the systems course classiication deinitions
Note: Students may be included in more than one completion measure as they could have, or example, earned both
a certiicate and an associate degree.
Source: Divided We Fail, IHELP, 2010.
100%90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%PercentofDegreeSeekersAchievingMilestone
Retained2nd
Term
73%
3%
23%
Retained2ndYear
Certifcate Non-VocationalAssociate
Degree
VocationalAssociate
Degree
Transerred
56%
5%8%
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were in interdisciplinary studies.20 We know that these
general purpose associate degrees dont serve students well
in qualiying them to transer as juniors into specic majors,
21
and this has been addressed through new legislation
(Chapter 428, Statutes of 2010 - SB 1440) to develop associate
degrees or transer. We also suspect that they dont help
students qualiy or jobs in technical elds since they dont
provide students with core content in a technical area or
signal to employers what skills students have gained.
With nearly one-third o course enrollments in vocational
courses and an economy that is growing more dependent
on workers with technical postsecondary preparation, it
seems reasonable to explore how students pursue and
progress through CTE programs, why so ew students earn
vocational credentials in the community colleges, and
whether community college programs are structured to
meet student and employer needs. This report only begins
to address these questions.
Research Plan
Our research methods were necessarily adaptive because
o the undamental data constraint o not being able to
identiy which CCC students are attempting to pursuewhich occupational pathway. Most students do not declare
a program o enrollment so system data cannot track
enrollment by academic program. We had to use course-
taking behavior to judge which students were likelypursuing
each pathway. The ndings are necessarily less conclusive
than our previous studies o student success where we did
not try to draw any conclusions about specic academic
programs. We take care to oer appropriate caveats in the
presentation o our ndings.
Our research involved the ollowing steps:
1. Select CTE pathways. We selected our pathways that
were o interest in their own right as high-wage, high-
need elds, but primarily as a sample o the universe o
CTE programs in order to learn more generally about
issues o student progress and success in CTE programs.
2. Learn about the pathways. We studied the
demographics and the enrollment patterns o
community college students who completed programsin these our areas those who had earned certicates
or associate degrees at a community college or had
transerred and earned a bachelors degree at a
Caliornia State University. This helped us know what
patterns o progress and success to look or when we
studied a new cohort o incoming students. In order
to learn more about the pathways, we visited CTE
programs at several colleges, conducted telephone
interviews with CTE program sta and other experts,
reviewed catalogs or 20 colleges o varying sizes
and rom dierent regions o the state to understandcurricular requirements in these our elds, and
reviewed published material.
3. Learn about progress o students attempting the
pathways. As best we could, given data limitations, we
applied the milestone and success indicator ramework
we have used in previous research22 to learn where
students may be encountering obstacles on the path to
completion. We drew on the ndings about completers
(step 2 above) to determine what milestones and
success indicators to monitor.
The remainder o this report describes these steps in order and
oers ndings and recommendations that are necessarily
preliminary given the exploratory nature o this study.
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Four Career Pathways Setting the Stage
Choosing Pathways to Study
To select the high-wage, high-need, career pathways or
study, we examined the Occupational Employment Projections
2008-2018 o the Caliornia Employment Development
Department to nd elds with relatively high expected
growth in employment and relatively high median
wages.23 We also examined data on the annual number o
undergraduate certicates and degrees awarded by the
CCC and Caliornia State University (CSU) systems in related
programs.24 Based on these data, as well as conversations
with workorce and education experts, we selected our
occupational areas or study:
1. Nursing
2. Engineering
3. Engineering technology
4. Inormation technology
Our ocus on high-need, high-wage elds led to a selection
o elds with more rigorous math and science requirements
and more obvious opportunities at the baccalaureate level
than is the case or many CTE programs. While this limits
the ability to ex trapolate specic ndings to other CTE
programs, examining student success in these elds may stillserve as a oundation or a broader research agenda on the
CTE mission o the community colleges.
Each o the elds includes a number o occupations. Nursing
occupations include registered and vocational nurses and
nursing assistants. Engineering includes the various subelds o
engineering (e.g., electrical, civil) and engineering technology
occupations include engineering technologists, draters, and
designers. We had originally grouped engineering technology
and engineering into one pathway o engineering-related
occupations, on the presumption that pathways might
exist rom engineering technology in community college
to engineering at the university level. But our early research
indicated that, despite similarities, the two disciplines unction
as separate pathways with dierent levels o oundational
skills and little movement between the pathways. So we
studied engineering technology as a separate pathway despite
airly modest growth and numbers o people employed.
Inormation technology occupations include computer
programmers, sotware and hardware engineers, network
administrators, and various inormation technology specialists.
Description o PathwaysNursing
There are our major nursing pathways in the community
colleges:
1. Programs, typically certicates, that prepare students to
become licensed vocational nurses (LVN)
2. Programs that prepare students or registered nursing
(RN) and award an associate degree in nursing (ADN)
3. Programs that prepare LVNs or RN licensure
4. Preparation or transer to bachelors programs in
nursing (BSN) at four-year universities; BSN students holdthe same licensure as ADN students but take additional
coursework in subjects such as public health and
management.
Nursing programs generally admit students in cohorts that
progress through coursework and clinical training on a ull-
time basis. Admission to an ADN program in the community
colleges requires that students pass an entrance exam that
tests skills in math, reading, English, and science. Students also
have to complete prerequisite coursework prior to admission
to the ADN program. Although prerequisite courses varyby community college, college-level English, microbiology,
chemistry, human physiology, and human anatomy are
common. There are ewer requirements or admission into
LVN programs than or ADN programs. LVN applicants are
not required to take an admissions exam (although they may
have to demonstrate competency in math, English, or other
subjects) and generally have ewer prerequisites. Although
some community colleges oer programs that train LVNs to
become RNs, articulation between LVN and ADN programs
remains dicult because the programs have dierent
prerequisites. The dierence in prerequisites occurs bothbetween programs oered in dierent community colleges
and between programs in a single college or district.
Although some consistency is achieved through accreditation
requirements, the lack o a statewide ADN curriculum creates
articulation problems between ADN and BSN programs and has
led to a system that requires program-by-program articulation.
Through our interviews we learned that articulation
problems are greatest between the community colleges
and the CSU and University o Caliornia (UC). Students who
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earned an ADN degree in the community colleges have an
easier time transferring to BSN programs in private universities.
Engineering
There is one dominant pathway in engineering ollowed by
community college students transerring to a our-year
university without earning a community college certicate
or associate degree. Lack o alignment between associate
degree requirements and transer requirements is partly
accountable or this pattern, as the heavy unit requirement
or some majors does not t well within the current associate
degree format. (This should change under SB 1440, the
newly passed law that requires development o associate
degrees or transerin specic disciplines.) In addition,
there is little market demand or engineers with less than
a bachelors degree, refecting licensure requirements.
Consequently, while most colleges have engineering
articulation agreements with universities, many lack ormal
engineering programs that coner associate degrees. O
the twenty colleges whose catalogs we reviewed, 11 oer
associate degrees in engineering and two oer certicate
programs. Students seeking to transer in engineering, with
or without the associate degree, take a heavy load o math
and physical science courses, but ewer engineering courses,
as most o those courses are taken at the university ollowing
transer. As engineering elds become more specialized,
evolving into dierent disciplines, transer becomes more
problematic. The choices are more dicult or students to
navigate and the array o specialized course oerings are
more dicult or community colleges to oer.
Relatively ew associate degrees are awarded in Engineering
compared to the number o colleges oering the degree,
likely because students nd they are better served by
ollowing individual articulation agreements or transer
requirements than by satisying degree requirements. Most
o the associate degree programs we identied were generalengineering programs, suggesting that they may become
even more under-subscribed as the eld becomes more
specialized. They were also extremely variable, ranging
rom 19 to 29 general education units and 9 to 53 major
units. The new legislation authorizing associate degrees
or transer could change this situation dramatically. New
engineering transer degrees should be designed to ensure
that students take an ecient route toward meeting lower
division major requirements or transer to CSU in their
engineering specialty. Determining the core competencies
or such two-year engineering degrees is a challenge acing
the engineering eld nationally.
25
Calculus and physics are the gateway courses that students
must pass in order to proceed to the subsequent set o
calculus-based math and physics courses. These courses
set this pathway apart rom the engineering technology
pathway.
Engineering Technology
There are two major pathways in the community colleges or
students studying engineering technology:
1. Certicate and associate degree programs covering a seto entry-level technical skills, with the associate degree
adding general education coursework to the technical
courses that the certicate requires
2. Preparation or transer into baccalaureate programs
in engineering technology and related elds - elds
less prevalent in the states public universities than
engineering but ones that are increasingly viewed as
preparing important parts o the engineering team.26
Students preparing or direct entry into the workorce
may have more opportunities i they earn the associatedegree because o the addition o the general education
coursework, but the certicates and the degrees are both
aimed at preparing students or the workorce and cover a
diverse set o elds such as laser technology, mechanical
drating, and surveying. O the 20 colleges whose catalogs
we reviewed, 11 oer certicate programs and most o them
oer more than one engineering technology certicate. One
college oers 11 dierent certicate programs in engineering
technology elds. We ound a huge variety o certicate
program lengths as well, ranging rom 4 to 55 units o credit.
Only 5 o the 36 certicate programs require a math courseand none requires English. The associate degree oered
at 11 o our 20 sample colleges alls under the systemwide
requirements or English and math but beyond that, they
exhibit signicant variation as well, ranging rom a low o 18
to a high o 35 general education units required and rom 18
to 50 required major units.
Table 1 (top hal) shows more specically the variation we
ound across one particular certicate program in three
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Four Career Pathways Setting the Stage
colleges in southern Caliornia. One college requires ar
ewer total units and, or the two colleges with the same unit
requirement, specic requirements vary considerably.
Engineering technology coursework is rarely transerable to
engineering because it is not calculus-based or suciently
science-oriented. One program aculty we interviewed
thought, however, that a curriculum could be designed
to provide such a pathway. Transer is possible into other
our-year programs such as engineering technology,
manuacturing technology, and construction management.
The variety o associate degree requirements and an
unsettled denition o a lower division engineering
technology core amid rapidly changing elds, make it
problematic or students to use the associate degree as a
route to transer eligibility.
Inormation Technology
In the area o inormation technology, there are three major
pathways in the community colleges:
1. Industry certication, where students pursue
coursework to prepare them or exams that lead to
certication o skills by industry associations (e.g., Cisco
Certied Networking Associate, Microsot Certied
Systems Administrator)
2. Community college certicate and degree programs
covering a set o entry-level skills, with the coursework
or a certicate oten applicable to a related associate
degree
3. Preparation or transer into baccalaureate programs in
computer science, computer engineering, or other IT
programs.
Students intending to transer generally do not seek
an IT-related associate degree along the way, as therequirements or those degrees are not well aligned with
the requirements or transer. Those interested in industry
certication may or may not seek a CCC certicate in the
process (some colleges have certicates that consist o
courses students would take to prepare or certication
exams). In addition to these pathways, many students,
including some who already have related degrees, take IT
courses to upgrade specic skills, and others take courses
to learn computer skills needed as part o non-IT certicate
and degree programs. The wide range o roles played by the
CCC in the IT area increases the complexity o understanding
student pathways and student success in these programs.
Even or the pathways involving completion o a CCC
credential, there is wide variation across the colleges in
the types o certicates and degrees oered and the
requirements to obtain them. O the 20 colleges whose
catalogs we reviewed, IT-related programs were oered at
19. On average, each college oered 7 dierent certicates
and 3 dierent associate degrees, but one college oered
28 dierent IT certicates and another oered 9 dierent IT
associate degrees. Certicate unit requirements also varied
considerably, including, or example, an 8-credit certicate
in Cisco Networking Associate and a 39-credit certicate
in Computer Network Engineering. Fewer than 10% o the
certicate programs require English or math courses. Associate
degree program requirements or units in the major varied
rom 16 to 43 with comparable variations in general education
requirements.
Table 1 (bottom hal ) illustrates the variation we ound or one
associate o science program in the IT pathway. Among three
southern Caliornia colleges, there is considerable variation
in general education requirements, number o credits
required in the major, core course requirements, and thelevel o math required. The breadth and variation o program
oerings, combined with the various pathways, suggests
that it may be challenging or students to understand
their options. The numerous short-term certicates oered
also raises questions about market value given research
demonstrating that workorce and economic benets may
only be associated with longer-term certicates o at least 30
credits.27 Some colleges are moving to structure programs
as a series o stackable short-term certicates to encourage
completion, but that may prove to be a benet only to the
extent that completion o the shorter-term certicates actuallyencourages students to continue the program.
Our interviews and review o documents revealed several
common issues conronted by colleges oering IT programs
including the prevalence o math barriers, the challenge o
proessional development in ast-changing elds, limited
adoption o new pedagogical approaches that may be more
eective in engaging students, and employer opinion that
such programs do better at providing technical skills than the
business and project management skills employers value. 28
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Table 1
Certifcate and Associate Degree Program Variability Across Colleges
Certicate: Drating/Computer-Aided Design (CAD)
El Camino College Citrus College Santa Barbara City College
31 credits
n Intro to Mechanical Drating
n Wirerame w/Suraces, Solid Modeling &Assemblies
n Advanced Parametric Solid Modeling &Assemblies
n Orientation to CATIA
n Product Mo deling w/CATIA
n Analyses & Simulations w/CATIA
n Adv. CATIA Functions
n Geometrical Dimensioning and Tolerancing
n 2-Dimensional Mechanical CADD I & II
n Technical Mathematics
19 credits
n Beginning Drawing
n Digital Media Production I
n Computer Aided Design and MechanicalDrawing OR Beginning Computer AidedDesign (CAD)
n Intermediate Computer Aided DratingOR Introduction to Engineering CAD
n Technical Illustration
n Advanced Mechanical Drawing
n Advanced Computer Aided Design andDrating - Mechanical (CADD)
31 credits
n Basic Drafting
n Computer-Assisted Drat and DesignI and II
n 18 credits o drating elec tives, up to 16 owhich may be Work Experience in Drating
Associate o Science Degree: Computer Science
Glendale Community College Chabot College Santa Barbara City College
37 major credits
30 GE/other required credits
n Intro to Programming
n Concepts o Programming Languages
n Programming in C /C++
n Java
n Computer Architecture & AssemblyLanguage I & II
n Data Structures I & II
n Intro to Algorithms using Pascal
n Math required: Interm ediate Algebra, Calculusoptional
31-33 major credits
19 GE/other required credits
n Intro to Programming Using VisualBasic.Net
n Intro to Programming in C++
n Object-Oriented Programming in C++
n Java Programming
n Intro to UNIX
n Intro to HTML
n Math required: Statisti cs or Trigonometr y,Calculus optional
40.5 45.5 major credits
29-31 GE/other required credits
n Programming Fundamentals
n Computer Concepts
n C Programming
n Java Programming
n Intro to UNIX
n Assembly Language Programming
n Intro to Data Structures
n Math required: Discrete Math andCalculus I & II
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Four Career Pathways What Can We Learnrom those Who Succeed?
Data Used to Study SuccessulCerticate/Degree Earners
The CCC Chancellors Oce maintains student-level data or
each college or each term with inormation on every course
enrollment as o the census date, and certicates and degrees
awarded. The CSU Chancellors Oce maintains student-level
data or each university or each term including all degrees
awarded by major eld. We obtained two sets o data or the
analysis o certicate/degree earners:
1. Records or all CCC students who earned associate
degrees or certicates in one o the our pathways in 2007
or 2008. All o the course enrollments or these students,over whatever period o time they attended a community
college, were included (records dated back to 1992-93). All
certicates and degrees earned as o 2008 were included,
although colleges are required to report only certicates
o 18 credits or more, so shorter-term certicates are not
ully represented in the data.
2. Records or all CCC transer students who earned a
bachelors degree rom CSU in one o the our career areas
in 2007 or 2008. The CSU Chancellors Oce provided the
relevant student identiers to the CCC Chancellors Oce,
which then provided all CCC records or those students
(the same inormation as described in item 1 above).
As an initial eort to learn about students in these
our career areas and their progress along the
educational pathway, we studied the patterns exhibitedby community college students who successully
completed a postsecondary credential in one o these
areas. There are limits to what can be concluded based
on studying successes because there is no way to
determine whether the patterns observed among
successul students are any dierent rom what we
would observe among unsuccessul students (i.e., no
way to conclude that the observed patterns were the
reasons or the students success). Nevertheless, we
hoped to gather some initial inormation about the kinds
o course-taking patterns students who succeeded hadengaged in that might have helped to account or their
success, inormation to be used in additional analyses
and as the basis or interviews with subject-area experts.
We examined data or all transer students who earned
a bachelors degree rom the CSU or a certiicate or
associate degree rom a CCC in one o the our areas in
2007 or 2008 (see box at right).29
Figure 6 shows the total number o students studied by
pathway and type o credential earned. The our pathways
present an interesting variation in the mix o credentials.Engineering is almost exclusively a bachelors degree eld.
While there were a small number o associate degrees
Figure 6
Certifcate/Degree Earners in the Four Pathways (CSU and CCC, 2007 and 2008)
Bachelor's degree Associate degree Certifcate
16,000
14,000
12,000
10,000
8,000
6,000
4,000
2,000
0
Nursing Engineering EngineeringTechnology
IT
14,531
2,621
1,169
2,952
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Table 2
Demographic Characteristics o Completers
awarded (imperceptible in the graph), nearly all completions
in the eld were bachelors degrees awarded to students
entering the CCC directly rom high school and transerringto the CSU. The other three elds are a mix o credentials
at all levels with the associate degree dominating the
nursing pathway and engineering technology being the
most balanced across the three credential levels. The mix o
certicates, associate degrees, and bachelors degrees across
the our program areas allows us to explore pathway issues
rom certicates to associate and rom associate, via transer,
to bachelors degrees.
Demographic Patterns o GraduatesTable 2 shows demographic inormation about these
certiicate and degree completers, organized by
the highest credential earned as o 2008 (students
included in the group with an associate degree as the
highest credential could have also earned a certiicate
at some point, and the CSU graduates could have
earned a certiicate and/or associate degree during
their enrollment at the CCC). Among the interesting
demographic indings:
Gender.There were signicant gender disparities in thesecareer pathways. A large majority o students earning
certicates and degrees in nursing were emale, while
similarly large majorities o graduates in IT, engineering, and
engineering technology were male. The gender gap in IT
programs increases with each higher level credential.
Age. Students earning a certicate as their highest
credential were more likely to be older at the time o initial
enrollment in the CCC than students earning a degree.
Most bachelors degree earners entered the CCC shortly
ater high school graduation, especially those earning
degrees in engineering, engineering technology, or IT.
Race/ethnicity. Black and Latino students were generally
underrepresented among completers in these pathways
compared to their shares o enrollment in the CCC, while
white and Asian students were generally over-represented
among graduates compared to their shares o enrollment.
In general, the racial gaps in each ield grow with progress
along the educational pipeline, with smaller gaps at the
certiicate level and larger gaps at the baccalaureate level.
Highest Credential Completed
Cer ticate Associate Bachelor's
Nursing
GenderMaleFemale
16%84%
16%84%
15%85%
Average Age at CCCEnrollment 25.9 24.2 22.7
Race/EthnicityAsianBlack
LatinoWhite
29%8%
26%37%
28%6%
21%44%
30%7%
18%44%
Engineering
GenderMaleFemale
--
86%14%
84%16%
Average Age at CCCEnrollment - 21.1 19.5
Race/EthnicityAsianBlackLatinoWhite
----
15%0%
25%60%
34%4%
21%41%
Engineering Technology
GenderMaleFemale
85%15%
84%16%
90%10%
Average Age at CCCEnrollment 26.8 24.8 19.3
Race/EthnicityAsianBlackLatinoWhite
16%6%
39%38%
15%3%
30%51%
18%1%
20%60%
Inormation Technology
GenderMaleFemale
72%28%
77%23%
87%13%
Average Age at CCCEnrollment 30.5 24.9 20.3
Race/EthnicityAsianBlackLatinoWhite
24%7%
24%43%
22%6%
20%50%
34%4%
15%46%
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Four Career Pathways What Can We Learn romthose Who Succeed?
Course-taking Patterns o GraduatesIn examining the course-taking patterns o graduates or
signs o what might be important milestones and indicators
o likely success, we ound some interesting results that span
across the our career areas:
Basic skills. Students completing certicates and degrees
earned very ew credits in basic skills courses (i.e., pre-college
level courses), an average o only a credit or two. This tells us
that a majority o graduates completed no basic skills courses.
Excess credits. On average, graduates had completed
signicant numbers o excess credits, i.e., more credits than
would have been required or the level o credential earned.The total number o CCC credits earned ranged rom 60 to
80 or students earning a certicate as the highest credential,
where the number o credits required would be 18 to 60
(with certicates o less than 30 credits most common).
Associate degree completers earned an average o 90 to
over 100 credits, while 60 credits are generally required.
Those earning a bachelors degree had earned an average
o 80 to 90 CCC credits beore transer. While more research
is needed on the reasons or so many credits, the patterns
may suggest a need to simpliy and/or clariy options or
students through better advising, curriculum design, and/orcourse scheduling.
Technical coursework. As would be expected, the number
o math and science courses taken increased with the level
o credential completed. Also as expected, given the ocus
o transer students on general education and lower-division
prerequisites, students earning bachelors degrees in these
elds took substantially less major coursework in the specic
discipline (i.e., engineering technology, nursing, IT) than did
those earning certicates or associate degrees.
Pathway issues. Successul students navigated througha complex environment in which the pathway was more
aligned at the certicate and associate degree levels:
n Associate degrees in these elds are not generally
serving as a step on the pathway to a bachelors degree.
Among students who completed an associate degree
beore transerring to CSU, ar more earned that degree
in interdisciplinary studies than in a specic eld. The
exception is nursing, where about hal o the associate
degrees were in nursing. This is likely because manystudents who earned a bachelors degree were practicing
nurses who had earned an associate degree at an earlier
point, and returned to college to get a BSN (a number of
CSUs have specic programs designed or practicing RNs
to get a BSN degree).
n A certicate in one o these elds is somewhat likely to
serve as a step on the pathway to an associate degree, as
about one-third to one-hal o the associate degree earners
had also earned a certicate, most in the same eld. This
was less the case in nursing, where the transition rom a
nursing assistant certicate to a degree in vocational or
registered nursing is more dicult. Associate degrees in
engineering technology and inormation technology are
oten specically designed to layer general education
coursework on top o the technical courses that count
toward a certicate. We imposed no backward time limit
or when a student earning an associate degree might
have earned the related certicate, so some o these
students may have earned the certicate well beore they
proceeded to the next credential level.
Questions Raised about CTE Pathwaysrom the Data on CompletersOur analysis o the patterns among certicate and degree
earners in these our career pathways raises a number o
general questions about CTE pathways in the CCC.
Why have the students completing certicates and
degrees in CTE areas earned so ew basic skills credits?
We know that a substantial majority o CCC students enter
college with skills in English/Language Arts and/or math that
place them below college level.30 There would seem to be
several possible explanations or nding so ew basic skills
enrollments among the completers:
1. A lack o requirement or math/English coursework (e.g.,
most certicates involve only technical coursework with
no English or math course requirements, possibly allowing
certicate-earning students to avoid basic skills courses)
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2. A preerence among CTE program aculty or addressing
students basic skills deciencies in the context o the
occupational curriculum over relying on the college basicskills oerings
3. A low rate o completion or students who enter the
CCC with remedial needs. Certainly the amount o math
and science coursework required or degrees in nursing,
engineering, engineering technology, and IT could pose
a challenge or students who enter the CCC without a
good oundation in math skills.
In our site visits and our consultation with the systems
Vocational Research and Accountability Committee, we learned
that many CTE aculty do believe that students stand a betterchance o persisting i they avoid regular basic skills sequences
and learn requisite skills in their CTE coursework. A 2011
research study ound better outcomes or CCC students who
took contextualized developmental math compared to those
in the basic skills math sequence.31 Given the importance o
sound basic skills or career and college pursuits and the very
poor completion rates o students beginning in developmental
math,32 it is important to learn more about the degree to which
basic skills are required in certicate programs and the extent
to which skill deciencies are impeding the completion o
certicates and degrees, especially in high-growth elds suchas the ones we have studied.
Why are so many students in technical elds earning
their associate degrees in interdisciplinary studies?
We know that associate degree requirements are not
ully aligned with the requirements or transer, leading
most transer students to transer without irst earning an
associate degree.33 The transer students who did earn an
associate degree beore earning their bachelors degree
in one o our selected ields mostly earned a degree in
interdisciplinary studies rather than in their ield o study.Most advanced occupational courses at the CCC are not
transerable, so students intending to transer ocus on
general education courses at the community college,
saving the technical coursework or the university. Since the
associate degree is not serving the transer mission well,
we might assume that the current set o associate degrees
is designed or direct entry into the workorce. Yet we
learned rom interviews and other conversations that the
associate degree in many technical ields does not have
strong market value and does not give employers suicientinormation about students skills and competencies. This
raises the prospect that the current array o associate degrees
may not be serving the needs o either transer students or
those seeking to go directly to the workorce.
Does it serve students well to have so many diferent
oferings o certicates and associate degrees within
the same general eld, and so much variation within
and across colleges in subject matter and credit
requirements or certicates and degrees in similar
elds?
The considerable curricular variation we ound across
colleges could be an accurate refection o the specialization
within these elds. Alternatively, it could refect some
lag in curriculum planning by which emerging programs
are added aster than lower priority ones are removed. I
greater consistency is easible, it could simpliy the choices
acing students and possibly reduce the excess credits
that we documented among completers especially at
the certicate and associate degree levels. Additionally,
more consistency across programs and colleges could
send clearer signals to employers about the set o skills
and competencies they could expect rom a student with
a given credential. That could, in turn, increase the market
value o the credentials that the colleges oer but that are
apparently not highly valued by students.
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Four Career Pathways What Can We Learnrom Students Attempting these Pathways?
Data and Methods Used to IdentiyNew Students Pursuing the SelectedPathways
We obtained a data set rom the CCC Chancellors Oce
that included all rst-time students who entered thesystem in the 2003-2004 academic year and tracked them
or six years through 2008-09.* The data included student
demographic characteristics, all course enrollments, and
degrees and certicates earned and transers to a university.
Because the data do not contain information on program
intent, we used enrollment behaviors as a proxy to identiy
students pursuing a degree, certicate, or transer in
one o the our areas o interest.** To limit our analysis
to degree/certicate-seekers we selected students who
enrolled in more than six units o any type in the rst year,
Identiying Students in Each Pathway
Building on what we learned from our interviews,
literature and catalog reviews, and analysis o students
who successully completed a program o study in one o
the our career pathways, we examined a cohort o rst-
time students who entered the system in the 2003-2004
a criterion we have applied in other research. Guided
by our analysis o course-taking patterns by completers,
interviews with CCC aculty and administrators and
other experts in these elds, and a review o program
requirements as specied in a sample o college catalogs,
we chose a set o enrollment behaviors that wouldbest identiy certicate/degree-seeking students in
each pathway. We used multiple criteria to dierentiate
students in the targeted pathways rom students in
related pathways (e.g., identiy nursing students but not
biology majors).
* Concurrently enrolled high school students and students enrolled only
in non-credit courses were not included.
** See Appendix 4 in the online appendices at http://www.csus.edu/ihelp/
pds/cte_web_appendix.pd or the specic enrollment behaviors used
to identiy students pursuing one o the our elds o interest.
Degree-Seekers
(>6 units year 1)
(N = 255,253)
Nursing
(N = 10,034)
Engineering
(N = 4,350)
Engineering Technology
(N = 1,381)
IT
(N = 8,136)
Gender Male 47.0% 33.4% 55.7% 80.5% 69.1%
Female 53.0% 66.6% 44.3% 19.5% 30.9%
Age Mean 23.5 22.7 20.2 24.8 25.7
Race/Ethnicity White 39.2% 37.5% 43.1% 42.5% 39.2%
Latino 33.5% 22.4% 27.0% 38.2% 22.2%
Asian 17.7% 33.2% 23.7% 16.1% 30.1%
Black 8.6% 6.3% 5.3% 2.7% 7.9%
Table 3
Characteristics o 2003-04 Cohort o First-Time CCC Students in Selected Career Pathways
academic year to learn about the patterns o student
progress in and through these pathways (see box below).
Table 3 shows the number o students in each o the career
pathways, as we were able to identiy them with our criteria,
and their demographic composition.
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Cautions Due to Proxy Method oIdentiying Students in Pathways
To the extent that we have misidentied students in a
pathway, our results would be skewed. For example, some
students who ailed to reach a pathway milestone (e.g.,
completing our nursing courses) may have aced barriers
that would be important to understand; others who ailed to
complete those courses may not have been seeking a nursing
credential. While we used course-taking behaviors as best
we could to identiy students in each pathway, the ndings
cannot be interpreted with the same level o condence as our
ndings or the entire degree-seeking cohort, where it was not
necessary to determine students academic program goals.
The proxy method o using enrollment behaviors to identiy
students in pathways also likely overstates completion. We
cannot recognize students as belonging to a pathway until
they have achieved a air amount o success, i.e., enrolled
in the courses that we set as criteria or pathway status. We
miss those students who intended to pursue the pathways
but dropped out beore enrolling in those courses. Our
analysis is necessarily limited to those students who areurther along and, thereore, more likely to be successul. In
addition, the criteria applied to each pathway are dierent
and thereore completion ndings across the pathways are
not meaningully compared. For example, completions could
look better in nursing than in IT because more students
who intended to complete a nursing program dropped
out beore meeting the criteria or us to identiy them as a
nursing student than was the case or IT.
Milestone Attainment How Far DoStudents Get?
We used the milestone and success indicator ramework that
we have developed or previous research (see Steps to Success,
Divided We Fail) to analyze student progress along the pathways
and to determine whether certain enrollment behaviors were
more predictive o student success. We included the generic
milestones and success indicators that we have applied to all
degree-seekers as well as ones that we developed specically or
students enrolled in the our pathways. Our ndings come with
a caveat due to the proxy method required to determine which
students belong in each pathway (see box below).
Figures 7 through 10 show the number o students who
reached the intermediate milestones or each o the our
pathways, as well as those who completed a credentialor transer.34 The analysis shows that across all elds many
students are lost beore completing 30 college-level credits
and many more are lost between completing 30 or more
college-level credits and earning a certicate or degree
or transerring. Math seems to be a more serious barrier
or engineering and IT than or nursing or engineering
technology, perhaps because o the higher levels o math
required in engineering and because many IT students are
returning adults who may have lost some o their math skills.
Specialists in each o these ields may ind some speciicpatterns o note in the attainment o intermediate
milestones. Here we point to just a ew ield-speciic
indings that suggest how such an analysis could help
target eorts at key stall points particularly with better
data that allowed earlier and more accurate identiication
o students in the pathway.
n Nursing. Anatomy/physiology seems to be a bigger
barrier than either math or chemistry, likely accounting
signicantly or low rates o completing all nursing
prerequisites.35
It is likely that our data refect studentailure to pass anatomy/physiology rather than their
inability to enroll in the courses. Because we used
enrollment in prerequisite courses to identiy students
seeking a nursing degree, most students that stopped
pursuing a nursing program because they could not
enroll in a prerequisite class were probably excluded
rom our analysis.
n Engineering. Math seems to be a bigger barrier than
physical science.
n Engineering technology. No single barrier stands out,
particularly as the drop o to the second year and beyond
could be partially explained by students completing
short-term certicates, which are a bigger portion o the
completions in this pathway than in the others.
n Inormation technology. Math appears to be a
signicant barrier and ew students persist to the point
o completing our IT courses.
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Four Career Pathways What Can We Learn romStudents Attempting these Pathways?
Figure 7
Milestone Attainment among Students in the Nursing Pathway
Figure 8
Milestone Attainment among Students in the Engineering Pathway
Award in Interdisciplinary Studies
Award in Other Field
Award in Field
Award in Interdisciplinary Studies
Award in Other Field
Award in Field
Note: Students can be counted in more than one category o completion, e.g., they may earn a certiicate and an associate degree.
Note: Students can be counted in more than one category o completion, e.g., they may earn a certiicate and an associate degree.
Completion
Completion
12000
10000
8000
6000
4000
2000
0
Number inPathway
30+College-level
Credits
DegreeApplicable
MathCourse
Anatomy/Physiology
Course
ChemistryCourse
NursingPrerequisite
Courses
Four Nursing/HealthCourses
TranserCurriculum
Transerw/o Assc.
Degree
Transerw/ Assc.Degree
Certifcate AssociateDegree
Intermediate Milestones
Intermediate Milestones
5000
4500
4000
3500
3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0
Number inPathway
30+College-level
Credits
Two transerablePhysical Science
Courses
Two TranserableMath
Courses
TranserCurriculum
Transerw/o Assc.
Degree
Transerw/ Assc.Degree
Certifcate AssociateDegree
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Figure 9
Milestone Attainment among Students in the Engineering Technology Pathway
Figure 10
Milestone Attainment among Students in the IT Pathway
Award in Interdisciplinary Studies
Award in Other Field
Award in Field
Award in Interdisciplinary Studies
Award in Other Field
Award in Field
Note: Students can be counted in mo re than one category o completion, e.g., they may earn a cer tiicate and an associate degree.
Note: Students can be counted in mo re than one category o completion, e.g., they may earn a cer tiicate and an associate degree.
Completion
Completion
Intermediate Milestones
Intermediate Milestones
Number inPathway
Number inPathway
30+College-level
Credits
30+College-level
Credits
DegreeApplicable
Math
Course
DegreeApplicable
Physical Science
Course
Four Eng TechCourses
TranserCurriculum
TranserCurriculum
Four IT CoursesTwo DegreeApplicable Math
Courses
Transerw/o Assc.
Degree
Transerw/o Assc.
Degree
Transerw/ Assc.Degree
Transerw/ Assc.Degree
AssociateDegree
AssociateDegree
Certifcate
Certifcate
9000
8000
7000
6000
5000
4000
3000
2000
1000
0
1600
1400
1200
1000
800
600
400
200
0
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Four Career Pathways What Can We Learn romStudents Attempting these Pathways?
Observations about Completions andPathway Structure
The ndings in Figures 7-10 show a generally low level o
associate and certicate awards, particularly certicates,
with the exception o the engineering technology pathway
where the completions are more evenly balanced across
transer, certicate, and associate degree. The last three bars
in each gure are intended to help us understand the extent
to which there may be eective pathways rom certicates
to associate degrees to transer in each eld. Those bars
show the alignment o degrees earned to the eld o study.
Most certicates and degrees are outside the eld o
study. In all our pathways (Figures 7-10), the bottom slice othe associate degree and certicate bars indicating those
awards in the eld o study is the smallest. We assume
that this partly refects some misidentication o students
in the pathway. Beyond that, we suspect that some of the
other elds are closely related. For example, aeronautical
and aviation technology, automotive technology, and
electro-mechanical technology are not included in the
engineering technology eld (as we dened it based on
Classication o Instructional Program [CIP] codes and the
corresponding Taxonomy o Programs [TOP] codes used by
the CCC36) but those elds seem closely enough related tosuggest that more o the awards are refective o a students
eld o study than the graph suggests. It could also be that
students struggle with the huge variety o certicate and
degree programs oered (especially certicate) and the
limited advising resources available at the colleges, and
end up with certicates that dont best refect their career
intentions. Our nding that most associate degrees are
outside the eld (mostly in interdisciplinary studies top bar
in the gures) suggests that those degrees are not serving
well those students who want to use their degree to enter
the workorce in a technical eld. Another possibility is that
colleges do not have the resources to oer courses required
or all o the programs in their catalogs. Students may end
up earning awards in other programs or interdisciplinary
studies because they are unable to nd the courses needed
to complete their intended program o study.
Most associate degree earners do not earn
certicates. With the exception o engineering technology,
many more students earn associate degrees than certicatesduring the six year period meaning that the certicate
does not unction as a stepping stone or the majority o
degree earners in the elds we studied, although some
students who earned only a certicate within the six years
could go on to earn an associate degree at a later point.
However, the proportions o certicate and degree earners
within the eld is much closer, suggesting that when the
associate degree is well aligned with the certicate
involving mostly the addition o general education the
certicate does unction as a step toward a degree.
Few transer students earn associate degrees; most
degrees are outside the eld o study. The majority
o transer students do not earn an associate degree prior
to transer and most o those who do, earn it outside the
eld o study. This is consistent with what we heard rom
those we interviewed and other research ndings about
the poor articulation between community college degree
programs in career elds and the transer requirements into
our-year programs.37 In particular, interviewees