Do individuals with high social background graduate from more rewarding fields of study? Changing patterns before and after the ‘Bologna process’

Triventi, Moris; Vergolini, Loris; Zanini, Nadir

doi:10.1016/j.rssm.2017.07.001

Cited by 29 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 53 publications

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“…Engineering and computer science (.35) and education (.35) majors showed the lowest probabilities of completing on time. This finding is particularly interesting as liberal arts graduates typically experience lower economic returns (Davies and Guppy 1997; Triventi et al 2017), while graduates of STEM fields typically do quite well in their early employment experiences (see Melguizo and Wolniak 2012). Yet, the higher earnings enjoyed by college graduates of STEM fields, especially those with degrees in engineering, may come with the cost of taking more time than expected to complete their degrees.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In many countries, SES continues to exert both direct and indirect effects on postsecondary entry (Jackson 2013); college transfer and stopout (Goldrick-Rab 2006; Goldrick-Rab and Pfeffer 2009); entry into particular fields of study (Ayalon and Yogev 2005; Goyette and Mullen 2006; Triventi, Vergolini and Zanini 2017; Zarifa 2012a); entry into highly selective, highly ranked, and well-resourced institutions (Davies and Guppy 1997; Davies, Maldonado, and Zarifa 2014; Zarifa 2012b); degree and program completion (Baker and Vélez 1996; Byun, Irwin, and Meece 2012; Diemer and Li 2012; Doren and Grodsky 2016; Goldrick-Rab 2016; Hamilton 2012; Mendoza 2012); and entry into various levels within the system such as graduate and professional schools (Mullen, Goyette, and Soares 2003; Torche 2011; Zarifa 2012c). Yet, the impact of social class on timely completion has received minimal attention.…”

Section: Review Of the Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The impact of parental social class background on completing a degree on time may be largely expressed indirectly via correlates with SES. As mentioned previously, scholars working on issues of “horizontal inequality” have understood the role parental SES plays in predicting educational expectations, academic performance, field of study and college major choice, and college selectivity (Armstrong and Hamilton 2013; Ayalon and Yogev 2005; Davies et al 2014; Davies and Guppy 1997; Goyette 2008; Goyette and Mullen 2006; Mullen et al 2003; Triventi et al 2017; Zarifa 2012a). Not only do these educational avenues further stratify students within credential tiers, but they in turn impact timely completion.…”

Section: Review Of the Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

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What’s Taking You So Long? Examining the Effects of Social Class on Completing a Bachelor’s Degree in Four Years

et al. 2018

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Despite improved access in expanded postsecondary systems, the great majority of bachelor's degree graduates are taking considerably longer than the allotted four years to complete their four-year degrees. Taking longer to finish one's BA has become so pervasive in the United States that it has become the norm for official statistics released by the Department of Education to report graduation rates across a six-year window. While higher education scholars have increasingly explored how social class impacts college dropout, attrition, and completion, they have yet to examine the role social class plays in completing a four-year bachelor's degree on time. In this paper, we draw on the most recent cohort of the Baccalaureate and Beyond Longitudinal Survey (2008-2009) to examine who completes their bachelor's degrees on time. Our results indicate that despite controlling for academic performance, educational behaviors, program characteristics, and institutional characteristics, graduates from lower socioeconomic backgrounds do experience difficulties completing their degrees on time. Moreover, our results also reveal that the nature of these relationships vary for traditional and nontraditional students. Our findings highlight another important, albeit less obvious, way where inequality is maintained in expanded postsecondary systems.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Review Of the Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Review Of the Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

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What’s Taking You So Long? Examining the Effects of Social Class on Completing a Bachelor’s Degree in Four Years

et al. 2018

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“…Financial aid is capable of modify only the first factor and nothing can do on the other two. In particular, expected returns are linked primarily to the chosen field of study (Triventi et al 2017) and to the economic situation (Vergolini 2018), while the probability of success strongly depends on the previous school career in terms of grade retention, marks and above all in terms of high school tracking. It is well known that graduating from an academic track provides higher chances to enrol at the university than having studied in a technical or vocational track (Azzolini and Vergolini 2014).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why should financial aid affect university participation? A review of the literature

Vettoretto¹,

Azzolini²,

Vergolini³

2019

Preprint

Self Cite

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This contribution reviews the literature on the role of financial aid in enhancing university participation. This aim will be reached through three main steps. First, we describe a theoretical framework based on rational action theory that could explain the effects exerted by the different measures. Second, we analyse the main forms of financial aid developed by the policy makers in Europe and in the US. More precisely, we look at the role played by: grants, tuition fees, loans and a novel approach in the financial aid debate: asset building. The paper attempts to provide an overview of the different measures’ effects on enrolment, academic performance and completion. Third, based on the reviewed literature, the paper tries to derive some general policy implications for the Italian case.

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“…This tends to further reinforce processes of horizontal stratification: according to the 'effectively maintained inequality' approach (Lucas 2001), parental education still plays a critical role in terms of quality, reputation and duration of the course attended, even in terms of prestige of the field of study. In a context of expansion of access to education more affluent families mobilize their resources to secure educational credentials that are qualitatively superior and more prestigious in order to guarantee better outcomes to their offspring (Gerber & Cheung, 2008;Triventi et al, 2017).…”

Section: Inequality Of Educational Opportunitiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The social dimension of participation and completion in MOOCs

Goglio¹,

Parigi²

2020

Preprint

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The rapid and impressive development of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) in less than half a decade has brought about contrasting arguments about their social dimension. This paper investigates how the socio-economic background of learners affects their own experience and their chances of course completion. The analyses test whether learners from low socio-economic status (SES) have lower chances of completing the online course and whether participation in online discussion forums mediates the role of SES. Analyzing data from two MOOCs provided by Stanford University, we find that in both cases a negative association between low SES, course completion and course engagement is observed. Moreover, we find that forum participation has an ambiguous role, reinforcing the advantage of well-educated learners enrolled in one course, while does not have any significant effect for the other course. The paper concludes with some policy implications on social stratification in MOOCs and with some design suggestions for creators of MOOCs.

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Do individuals with high social background graduate from more rewarding fields of study? Changing patterns before and after the ‘Bologna process’

Cited by 29 publications

References 53 publications

What’s Taking You So Long? Examining the Effects of Social Class on Completing a Bachelor’s Degree in Four Years

What’s Taking You So Long? Examining the Effects of Social Class on Completing a Bachelor’s Degree in Four Years

Why should financial aid affect university participation? A review of the literature

The social dimension of participation and completion in MOOCs

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