Educational and Employment Outcomes for Students Whose Parents Never Attended College

Gaps in high school and postsecondary academic experiences exist between First-generation college students (students whose parents did not attend college) and their peers whose parents had either enrolled in or completed college. For example, among 2002 high school sophomores, 72 percent of them whose parents had never attended college had enrolled in postsecondary education by 2012. In contrast, 84 percent of their peers whose parents had some college education had done so, as had 93 percent of those whose parents had earned a bachelor’s degree. The National Center for Education Statistics released a new Statistics in Brief report today, February 8th, entitled First-Generation Students: College Access, Persistence, and Postbachelor’s Outcomes. This report examines various education and employment indicators for students whose parents had not attended college. In general, these students’ rates of high school graduation and postsecondary enrollment, persistence, and degree completion lag behind those of their peers whose parents had attended or completed college. However, once they attain a bachelor’s degree, first-generation students’ employment outcomes are not measurably different from those of their peers. The findings include the following: • Three years after first enrolling, comparatively more first-generation students who began postsecondary education in 2003–04 had left postsecondary education without earning a postsecondary credential (33 percent) than had their peers whose parents attended some college (26 percent) and those whose parents earned a bachelor’s degree (14 percent). • Among 2007–08 bachelor’s degree recipients, no statistically significant differences in the rates of full-time employment 4 years after completing their degrees were detected among groups who varied by parental education level: in all three groups (first-generation students; students whose parents attended college; and students whose parents earned a bachelor’s degree), between 57 and 59 percent were employed full time. • A smaller proportion of first-generation students who graduated from college (4 percent) and college graduates whose parents had some college (5 percent) had enrolled in doctoral or professional programs than had their counterparts whose parents had earned a bachelor’s degree (10 percent). This report uses data from the Education Longitudinal Study of 2002 (ELS:2002), the 2004/09 Beginning Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study (BPS:04/09), and the 2008/12 Baccalaureate and Beyond Longitudinal Study (B&B:08/12).