View Research by Author - Anthony P. Carnevale

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The Obama administration has emphasized postsecondary education as the key to its jobs policy, continuing a long-held federal strategy while broadening its goals beyond traditional four-year schools. But disadvantaged students and working adults may still fall through the cracks—and educating college-age youth alone can't meet the nation's employment and social policy objectives. While the focus on college has gone up, federal spending on adult employment and training programs and high school career and technical education has declined. As the nation recovers from the recession, we need to pay more attention to these alternative paths and do more to link education and jobs.

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act and the American Graduation Initiative emphasize Pell grant funding and focusing on community colleges and sub-baccalaureate degrees. As a result, the administration's postsecondary strategy shifts postsecondary resources to the least advantaged students and the two-year and less selective four-year institutions. This shift is part of a longer-term policy trend toward a reliance on postsecondary education as the primary element in domestic employment and social policy. As we proceed beyond the stimulus, the postsecondary emphasis needs to be leavened with more attention to employment policy and social policy goals, both for adults and working students.

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