Cornell University
Library
Cornell UniversityLibrary

eCommons

Help
Log In(current)
  1. Home
  2. Cornell Centers, Laboratories, Institutes, Projects and Programs
  3. Center for the Study of Inequality
  4. CSI Affiliated Faculty Publications
  5. Occupational Plans, Beliefs about Educational Requirements, and Patterns of College Entry

Occupational Plans, Beliefs about Educational Requirements, and Patterns of College Entry

File(s)
eCommons Cover Occupational Plans Weeden 2013.pdf (593.4 KB)
Permanent Link(s)
https://hdl.handle.net/1813/52205
Collections
CSI Affiliated Faculty Publications
Author
Morgan, Stephen L.
Leenman, Theodore S.
Todd, Jennifer J.
Weeden, Kim A.
Abstract

In this article, a measure of students’ beliefs is constructed from three sources of information on 12,509 high school seniors from the Education Longitudinal Study (2002 to 2006). First, verbatim responses to questions on occupational plans, drawn from restricted-access data records, are coded into 1,220 categories to capture detailed information (specific job titles), extended information (the listing of multiple jobs), and contradictory information (the listing of multiple jobs with divergent characteristics). Second, the educational requirements of detailed jobs, as specified in the U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Information Network database, are matched to all jobs that students list within their verbatim occupational plans. Third, student perceptions of the educational requirements of their planned jobs, which were revealed in response to a follow-up question posed immediately after they provided their verbatim occupational plans, are used to identify students with puzzling beliefs about their educational and occupational trajectories. The authors then show that (1) students who are categorized as having uncertain and/or inaccurate beliefs about the educational requirements of their expected jobs have lower rates of college entry than those with certain and accurate beliefs, and (2) among entrants, these same students have lower rates of immediate college enrollment and lower attendance at four-year colleges.

Date Issued
2013
Publisher
Sociology of Education
Keywords
college entry
•
socialization
•
choice
•
beliefs
•
heterogeneity
Type
article

Site Statistics | Help

About eCommons | Policies | Terms of use | Contact Us

copyright © 2002-2026 Cornell University Library | Privacy | Web Accessibility Assistance