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The economy of the 1990s has been characterized by significant transformations in work practices and firm structure that require ever-increasing levels of workforce skill. In this report, the authors analyze the process of corporate restructuring and focus on the role of postsecondary institutions in meeting this increased need for training and skill development. Case studies reveal the ways in which firms are forming partnerships with community colleges, making them part of a broad skills development system that includes such 'soft' skills as oral and written communication, critical thinking, and problem solving. Although encouraging community colleges to play a central role in workforce development poses perplexing issues that require further study, the authors suggest that community colleges hold the potential to meet the changing workforce needs of American firms.

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This paper assesses the extent to which employers participate in school-to-work partnerships and work-based learning, using data from the National Employer Survey (NES). It opens with a brief discussion of the history of the school-to-work movement and the development of the School-to-Work Opportunities Act, which seeks to improve the preparation of college- and non-college-bound students for the workforce. The authors then present a review of the literature that focuses on incentives for employer participation in these programs and obstacles to bringing the program to a national scale. The authors then report on previous attempts to measure the number of participating employers and, finally, compare these estimates with a recent analysis of data from the NES. They find that, while 25 per cent of US companies participate in a school-to-work partnership and another 40 per cent provide a work-based learning experience, it is not clear how substantive such involvement and experiences are.

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This paper examines the growth of adult enrollment in recent decades in the United States and its impact on the educational attainment of the population. First, in order to better understand the growth of adult enrollment, the change between 1970 and 1990 is decomposed into its demographic elements. Next, the projected growth of enrollments over the next decade are analyzed. Finally, the paper examines the cumulative impact of adult enrollment on educational levels, as well as on race and sex differentials in educational attainment. The study draws on data from the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data Systems, the U.S. decennial censuses, and the School Enrollment Supplements of the October 1970, 1980, and 1990 Current Population Surveys. The results highlight the role of the baby-boom generation in spurring the growth of adult enrollments. They also show that adult enrollments contribute significantly to the educational attainment of the U.S. population.

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Using data from the 1997 and 1998 administrations of the National Employer Survey, this paper examines the one-year impact on employers of participating in school-to-work partnerships resulting from the 1994 School-to-Work Opportunities Act. The author finds a high degree of volatility in employers' participation in such partnerships. However, employers that sustained ongoing participation were more likely than others to increase their provision of work-based learning opportunities. The analysis also uncovered some evidence of a 'spillover' effect: even those employers without any formal affiliation with school-to-work partnerships seem to be increasing their provision of work-based learning opportunities.

Contrary to the expectations of some, the study finds that employers with the highest levels of participation in school-to-work partnerships were likely to increase the extent to which they provide their workers with remedial training. Those recently joining partnerships were actually likely to increase the percentage of their labor costs spent on recruiting new employees. Given that the School-to-Work Opportunities Act was passed only recently, it is premature to expect reductions in the need for remediation and investment in employee recruitment. Rather, participation in school-to-work seems to complement other strategies to invest in labor force skills - not serve as a substitution for them. On the one hand, participation seems to be attractive to employers already concerned with the skill levels of their youth labor force. On the other hand, participating with a school-to-work partnership also seems to raise employer consciousness concerning the issues of basic workplace skills and labor force recruitment. Finally, the study finds that an employer's affiliation with a school-to-work partnership is associated with a decreased firing rate for young employees as well as decreased quit rates. These shop-level effects represent the first places that the positive impact of a school-to-work partnership might be seen.

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Reviewing and synthesizing published research is a routine, yet critical, scholarly activity. Such reviews help document the current state of knowledge in particular fields of scientific inquiry while also serving to articulate themes and identify frameworks that are generated across a variety of studies. The purpose of this analysis is to review existing national data sets to determine their utility in studying teaching, learning, and assessment issues. In this report, the authors review, compare, and contrast the strengths and limitations of existing national data resources on postsecondary education. Their results help document the existing capacity to study teaching, learning, and assessment activities with existing data resources, while also suggesting directions and priorities for future data collection activities. While interest in assessing the outcomes of undergraduate education and other forms of postsecondary activities has continued to grow in recent years, unfortunately, the increased demand for empirical evidence on the relationship between teaching, learning, and assessment and student outcomes across the American postsecondary system has largely remained unmet.

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The need for school-to-work programs or other means of increasing early job market stability is predicated on the view that the 'chaotic' nature of youth labor markets in the U.S. is costly because workers drift from one job to another without developing skills, behavior, or other characteristics that in turn lead to higher adult earnings. However, there is also ample evidence that workers receive positive returns to job shopping. This paper asks whether youths in unstable or dead-end jobs early in their careers suffer adverse labor market consequences as adults. In particular, it accounts for the endogenous determination of early job stability as a response to job match quality - which may also influence adult wages - using labor market conditions in the early years in the labor market as instrumental variables for the job stability experienced during those years. The instrumental variables estimates generally point to substantial positive effects of early job stability on adult wages.

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The 1994 School-to-Work Opportunities Act signaled a new era in business-education partnerships - one many believed would foster more meaningful connections between the nation's classrooms and the worlds of employment and work. The Act defined a set of benchmarks for employer participation in school-to-work partnerships. To date, attempts to gauge the actual extent to which employer participation has met or surpassed these benchmarks have reflected the reports of school officials and agency personnel rather than employers themselves - making it difficult to draw a national and broadly based picture of the scale of employer involvement. This report, with support from the National School-to-Work Office, utilizes data from the 1997 administration of the National Employer Survey to gauge the national impact of school-to-work programs since the initiative's inception. A representative sample of establishments with 20 or more employees were asked by the U.S. Census Bureau to describe their involvement in school-to-work programs and work-based learning initiatives. This report analyzes their answers and offers two overarching conclusions. First, there is broad-based involvement of employers in both of these activities. Real involvement stretches across all industries and all establishment sizes. Second, for both manufacturing and non-manufacturing establishments, the best predictor of participation in school-to-work partnerships is involvement in community activities.

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