1. Getting Ahead… The American Dream

2. Carolina Dreams

3. Family Dreams

4. 1st Generation

5. Family Dreams Part IV

6. North Carolina Dreams
1959, NC per Capita Income ~ 63% of US

7. Education is Economic Development
1999, NC per Capita Income ~ 94% of US

8. “The singular focus of public debate on the “top 1 percent” of households overlooks the component of earnings inequality that is arguably most consequential for the “other 99 percent” of citizens: the dramatic growth in the wage premium associated with higher education and cognitive ability”
-- David Autor, MIT
MIT economist, David Autor, Science Magazine, “Skills, Education and the Rise of Inequality Among the Other 99 Percent”, May 23, 2014 Science Magazine
Notes that the focus on income inequality causes us to miss the single greatest cause of rising income disparity which is attainment, or lack thereof, of postsecondary education. He notes that the median annual earnings gap between 1979 and 2012 for college graduates and those with only a high school degree grew by roughly $28,000 per household. That amount is four times the amount that could be gained if you took all the earnings gains from the top 1% of households during that same time period and redistributed them among the other 99%.
“The singular focus of public debate on the “top 1 percent” of households overlooks the component of earnings inequality that is arguably most consequential for the “other 99 percent” of citizens: the dramatic growth in the wage premium associated with higher education and cognitive ability.
D H Autor Science 2014;344:
Published by AAAS

9. The research is clear that college graduates are much more likely to be married and much less likely to raise a child in poverty.
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10. It is often noted by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation that intergenerational poverty is now at its highest rate in the United States, meaning if you are born poor in the United States today, you are more likely to stay poor than at any time in our history. It is this reason that they began a focus on post-secondary education. Because the data clearly suggests that if you are born in the lowest income quintiles and you do not have a college degree chances are you will stay poor in the United States.
And beyond that, the one characteristic we often associate with making America most exceptional, the American Dream and the notion that each generation will do better than the past by no means any longer exceptional. Economists now suggest that social mobility from lower income to higher income status is more likely now in most European nations and Canada. And today in the US for those young people whose parents did not go to college, like my mother, only 5 percent of those first generation Americans will complete college themselves compared to 23 percent in other wealthy,, industrialized countries.

11. There has been plenty of suggestion for several yeas that the pathway to prosperity the American Dream, higher education, is breaking down for too many people.
Lawrence Katz and Claudia Goldin – 2008 The Race Between Technology and Education
Noted that over the past 30 years, US developed the most unequal distribution of income and wages among developed countries, primarily created by a divergence between educational advancement and technology advances that began starting in the 1970s.
Prior to the 1970’s, education raced ahead of technology with each successive generation achieving a little more than two years of schooling on average than the generation before. Starting in the 70’s, high school graduations flatlined and while college graduation rates languished, even while enrollments were growing, while technology raced ahead placing a premium on those who did complete college Thus while the average college graduate in 1970 earned 45 percent more than the average high school graduate, three decades later the dynamics of the race between education and technology increased that premium to in excess of 80 percent.

12. Further evidence of the worrisome issue of intergenerational education performance is seen in the educational performance of males.
Today there are more young American men in America (29%) that have less education than their parents than have more education (20%).

13. An another indicator of the educational breakdown of the path to the American Dream, since the recession began in 2008, the college attendance rate for students from low-income rates has been declining.

14. But there are clearly other factors at work as well.
High SAT test scoring students (1200 to 1600 range) from low-income families are less likely to graduate from college (44%) than low-scoring students (800 to 1000) range from high income families.

15. And one of those factors is most probably the cost of higher education which has seen a precipitous increase across sectors since 2000 while median incomes have crept alone.

16. One of the factors assuredly having an impact on lower-income students is cost. Today for students in the lowest 20%, it costs an average of 114% of total family income to cover all annual costs at a four-year college, compared to only 40% forty years ago.

17. And as a result of costs and perhaps other factors, higher education institutions are becoming socioeconomically split.
Poor students and first-generation college students go to community colleges and and richer students and those whose parents went to college go to four-year colleges.
Now it is not the case that only poor students are turning to community colleges, just a couple of years ago during the recession, the percentage of students from families making approximately $100,0000 going to community colleges jumped from 12% to 23% in just a one-year period of time.
Today at the 193 most selective four-year colleges, only 14% of students are from the bottom half of income brackets and only 5% are from the lowest quartile. At community colleges, low income students outnumber wealthier students 2:1.

18. And these socioeconomic differences in college enrollment play out in the racial make-up of our institutions.
According to the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce, since % of new white college enrollments have gone to the most selective four-year institutions while 72% of new Hispanic enrollments and 68% of new African-American enrollments have gone to two-year and four-year open access insitutions.

19. And is the case in public education, there is deep stratification in per-student operating expenditures between the colleges where most poor students go – namely community colleges – and other sectors of higher education.
In fact, research from the Delta Cost Project indicated that over a ten-year period heading into the recession, per student expenditures for community colleges across the nation increased by only $1. Since the recession recent reports have suggested that community colleges have suffered the most in per student funding thanks to the double whammy of state budget cuts and spiking enrollments.
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20. 11/7/2018

21. But here’s our dirty little secret.
While community colleges have been the open door of access for low-income students, too often that door has been revolving.
Our program completion rates are our Achilles heel, and those challenges are greatest for low-income and first-generation students.
So what are we doing about it.

22. Importance of Pathways
“Research suggests that individuals presented with many options often do not make good decisions, and there is evidence that community colleges could be more successful in helping students persist and complete a program of study if they offered a set of tightly structured program options whose requirements and expected outcomes are clearly defined” -Jenkins and Cho (2012)

23. Career Pathway
“A career pathway is a coherent, articulated sequence of rigorous academic and career/technical courses, commencing in the ninth grade and leading to an associate degree, baccalaureate degree and beyond, and industry recognized certification and/or state regulated license.” - National Career Pathway Network
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24. 11/7/2018

25. Straighter Paths with Bumper Guards
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26. The Secret Sauce – Supporting Horatio Algers