High School Students "Talk Back" in New Center Report

Prepared by Assistant Professor Stephen Clements and Professor Edward “Skip” Kifer of the University of Kentucky Department of Education Policy Studies and Evaluation in the College of Education, the report, Talking Back, examines, among other things, the postsecondary decisionmaking process—who influences young people at what point in their lives and how prepared and informed they are about going to college. The study also looks at how young people spend their time, why they have chosen college, how they grade high school courses and supporting personnel, and what they think future prospects in their home communities will be.

The report underscores the difficulty of achieving the state’s ambitious goals for increasing postsecondary enrollment and graduation rates in light of the Commonwealth’s history of what the authors term “educational malnutrition.” High school graduates traditionally form the largest pool of entering college students, but the decision to go to college is strongly linked to parental education levels and income. Studies, Clements and Kifer note, have shown generational links between poor, undereducated parents and lower academic performance, lack of preparation for college, and actual college-going rates. As this study further illustrates, parents remain young people’s strongest influence, and the challenge of motivating first-generation college-goers is formidable.

The study finds Kentucky’s college-bound youth academically generally well prepared and in possession of computer skills widely regarded as important to the workplace, but the best-prepared students are those who plan to leave the state to attend college.

Other noteworthy findings include:

• Students rate the instruction they have received in math, science, and English relatively highly, but foreign language instruction receives substantially lower marks. School services such as education and career planning are also given low marks.

• Most students have access to a computer, know how to use it, and—perhaps reflecting the success of the state’s efforts to boost computer literacy—have learned basic skills such as word processing and spreadsheets in school.

• Kentucky students want to go to college for the same reasons as other youth across the nation: to get a more rewarding job, to make more money, to learn more about things that interest them, or to prepare for a specific career.

• In an especially important finding, the survey shows that students decide to pursue higher education quite early in their careers; over half make the decision by middle school or earlier. Those planning on four-year schools make the decision sooner than those going to community or technical schools. Kentucky students also are less likely than their U.S. counterparts to say they are going to college to train for a specific career.

• Family, friends, and their own deliberations have more influence on youth educational choices than do school personnel such as teachers and counselors.

• Students spend most of their out-of-school time working for pay, socializing with their friends, engaging in sports or hobbies, and relaxing with their families. They devote only about five hours per week to homework—about the same amount of time they spend on the phone.

• Students know very little about ways to finance college. With the exception of the Kentucky Educational Excellence Scholarship, only a small number regard themselves as very familiar with any of the state and federal financial aid programs, and large percentages regard themselves as not at all familiar.

In light of the survey results, the study’s authors offer specific recommendations:

• Alter the discourse on education to include benefits beyond the economic. The current emphasis on the economic benefits of postsecondary education may set some students up for disappointment, undercut the willingness to take academically enriching courses that may not necessarily be economically beneficial, and discourage the pursuit of relatively less remunerative careers in such fields as teaching or public service.

• Develop new mechanisms to encourage enrollment in postsecondary education and target these toward those who traditionally do not pursue education beyond high school. Such mechanisms should focus on students no later than middle school and possibly in grade school. State leaders should also enable high school students, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, to participate in introductory-level postsecondary courses to familiarize them with higher education, enrich their high school experience, and possibly encourage them to continue their education.

• Sponsor additional research into the fates of good students who leave the state for college and those who come here from out of state.

• Sponsor another, more representative, survey that plumbs the attitudes of those who do not plan to pursue education beyond high school. This group is crucial to the state’s goal of increasing the number of Kentuckians in postsecondary education, and greater insight into their attitudes and reasoning would offer policymakers an important vantage point as they craft the policies and programs to accomplish their goal.

The report’s findings are based on a 2000 mail survey of randomly selected 16- and 17-year-old licensed Kentucky drivers conducted by the University of Kentucky Survey Research Center for the Kentucky Long-Term Policy Research Center.