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Title: Higher Education and Social Inequality: The Role of Community Colleges
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1. Levey, Tania Gabrielle
Higher Education and Social Inequality: The Role of Community Colleges
Ph.D. Dissertation, City University of New York, 2006. DAI-A 67/04, Oct 2006
Cohort(s): Children of the NLSY79, NLSY79
Publisher: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses (PQDT)
Keyword(s): College Education; Home Observation for Measurement of Environment (HOME); Intergenerational Patterns/Transmission; Mothers, Education; Parent-Child Relationship/Closeness

Permission to reprint the abstract has not been received from the publisher.

There is a consensus among sociologists that educational attainment is one of the most important influences on individuals' life chances. Despite a flowering of research on community college effects since the 1970s, there is less agreement over the effects of community college attendance than there is for four-year college attendance. Using nationally representative longitudinal datasets, the NLSY79 and the NELS:88, new statistical methods, and a broad range of outcomes, this dissertation reexamines the lengthy debate about the influence of community colleges in perpetuating a cycle of diminished educational and occupational attainments. This study is also the first to ask whether community colleges produce payoffs across the generations. This dissertation makes several novel contributions to research on community colleges. Because community college students take longer to complete degrees, I follow students for more years than previous studies. In addition to regression models, I use a statistical technique known as the Counterfactual Model of Causal Inference. This technique is considered superior to regression analysis in its treatment of selection bias. I will test whether some of the negative effects attributed to community colleges have been overestimated due to failure to control adequately for the characteristics of students. I compare community college students to both four-year college students and high school graduates. Finally, I include outcomes rarely or never before examined in relation to community colleges, outcomes that have important implications not only for individual opportunity but also for opportunity in the succeeding generation: household income, wealth, family formation, parenting practices, and the educational progress of children of attendees. I will pay particular attention to whether community college effects differ by gender, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. Analyses suggest that the impact of community colleges is more complex than simplistic debates would lead us to believe, producing important benefits for enrollees as well as their children. Overall, I find that community colleges can be an inexpensive and flexible route to long-term upward mobility.
Bibliography Citation
Levey, Tania Gabrielle. Higher Education and Social Inequality: The Role of Community Colleges. Ph.D. Dissertation, City University of New York, 2006. DAI-A 67/04, Oct 2006.