Drawing from college and career readiness measures used in accountability systems and a connecting those measures to long-term outcomes, this summary provides actionable steps state leaders can take toward an evidence-based set of indicators—the State Student Readiness Index—to give governors and state leaders a clear view of high schoolers’ readiness to succeed as workers, taxpayers, and community members. This index will complement high school accountability systems and foundational tools such as the Education-to-Workforce Indicator Framework by focusing on end-of-high-school indicators that state leaders can use to monitor, plan, and set goals for the state’s students.

In the short term, governors can ensure they are monitoring the key measures that evidence says are most predictive of future success. States can also implement targeted policies and investments that are known to improve these metrics. In the long term, states can improve their data systems to directly measure students’ long-term success. As the education research and development field continues to develop additional skill-based measures that are predictive of adult success, states can monitor those, too, including them in a State Student Readiness Index.

Why This Matters

Ensuring high-quality education is part of a state’s commitment to a robust economy, thriving communities, and civic well-being. States have worked hard to establish clear sets of college and career indicators used for accountability and school improvement that they can build from. But relying on school accountability metrics is insufficient to inform governors’ and state legislators’ budgeting and planning; their efforts to improve alignment between PK–12 education, workforce and economic development, and postsecondary education; and their ability to evaluate how investments are boosting students’ economic mobility in adulthood.

By refining and using new metrics and data, state leaders gain a more forward-looking perspective and stronger insights into how the choices of interventions and resource allocations they make earlier in PK–12 education and youth have long-term benefits to their state’s populace.

Key Takeaways

This brief provides steps that state policymakers can take in the short and long term to improve their ability to monitor students’ readiness for adult success and ensure today’s students have the skills they need to thrive as future workers, taxpayers, and community members.

In the short term, states can immediately monitor college and career readiness measures that are linked to positive adult outcomes, including the following:

• enrollment in Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate classes
• academic early college or dual enrollment participation
• career and technical education (CTE) pathway completion or dual enrollment
• industry-recognized credential or dual enrollment CTE credential
• military enlistment
• mandatory ACT or SAT testing
• mandatory Free Application for Federal Student Aid completion

To make the most of the data they already collect, governors and state legislators can work with their state education and workforce agencies to do the following:

• Use individual-level data from state education data systems to track the metrics associated with postsecondary success.
• Add granularity in the data and analysis of CTE pathways and industry-recognized credentials.
• Disaggregate metrics by family income, gender, race, English language status, and disability status to deep understanding between these metrics and adult outcomes.
• Ensure indicators are contextualized with other evidence-based metrics known to promote positive long-term outcomes.
• Build metrics into public-facing State Student Readiness Index dashboards at the school, district, and state levels.
• Analyze the relationships between these metrics and economic self-sufficiency measures using state data.

In the long term, states can improve their data systems to directly measure students’ long-term success and earlier education innovation:

• Link education and workforce measures, including nondegree credential data.
• Create transparent information about different CTE pathways’ average wages post high school.
• Strengthen definitions and data systems for work-based learning.
• Create clearer definitions for industry-recognized credentials.
• Strengthen unemployment insurance data systems and create partnerships with state revenue or federal agencies to allow for more comprehensive adult outcome data.
• Ensure research partners can help states make these data meaningful.

As the Student Upward Mobility Initiative and others in the education research and development field continue to develop additional skill-based measures that are predictive of adult success, states can monitor those, too, including them in a State Student Readiness Index.

How We Did It

We reviewed comprehensive scans of how states currently measure students’ readiness for success through accountability systems and which of those indicators have a strong link to longer-term outcomes, such as postsecondary success, employment, and earnings. We then built upon existing frameworks and guides to summarize ways in which states can adjust their current systems to be more evidence based and pulled from the existing education literature and knowledge of state integrated data systems to recommend longer-term improvements. Additionally, we used expertise gained through the Student Upward Mobility Initiative to understand how new PK–12 skill-based measures predictive of long-term outcomes are being developed.