Research
Embedded Files
Measuring the Occupational Content of College: A Multidimensional Framework for Labor Market Alignment
As workplace technologies evolve, college-educated workers increasingly rely on combinations of skills that are difficult to automate and, to date, challenging to measure. This paper uses text-as-data methods to score standardized descriptions of postsecondary majors and courses based on their similarity to six comprehensive vocational dimensions: Realistic, Investigative, Artistic, Social, Enterprising, and Conventional. I generate score profiles on a 0-100 scale that replicate the structure of existing six-dimensional profiles for O*NET occupations.
Then, I apply these common measures in a longitudinal analysis of skills-based alignment using parallel national samples of postsecondary completions and workforce composition over two decades. I assess correspondence in the annual rates of change for each vocational dimension separately across five credential levels. Overall alignment with workforce compositional trends is strongest for new graduate awards and weakest for Bachelor’s degrees and Certificates; evidence of postsecondary overproduction and undersupply is concentrated in the Realistic and Enterprising dimensions. I discuss the implications of these findings for institutional accountability policy and curricular organization.
Additional Dissertation Studies
College Coursework Portfolios and Early Career Trajectories
In this paper, I apply the text-based measurement model described above to real course descriptions linked with transcript records for 10 cohorts of bachelor's degree recipients at four universities. I construct individual coursework "portfolios" as a summative measure of undergraduate learning across six occupational dimensions. Then, I use web-scraped resume data (38% sample match) to examine how variation in students' coursework portfolios influenced early-career job choices, tenure, and transitions.
Beyond Algebra II: The Impact of Four Years of High School Math on College and Major Choice
This paper examines how a 2009 state-level change to Tennessee's high school degree requirements, targeting math proficiency, affected course-taking and postsecondary outcomes across 11 public high school cohorts. I use a regression discontinuity design and a subsample of students near the state's ACT math threshold for college readiness (>= 19) to estimate the causal impact of enrolling in a 12th-grade advanced math course, rather than a transition course, on college enrollment and the “math intensity" of students' declared majors at distinct credit accumulation milestones.
Master's Thesis [Paper]
Award: Certificate of Excellence, Master’s Integrative Project (Teachers College, Columbia University)
The Who, Where, and When of Wages: Regional Returns to Social Skills
This paper examines how wage returns to interpersonal skills varied across U.S. regions over time. I find substantial geographic and gendered variation: coastal labor markets added socially intensive job content most rapidly, women entered these occupations earlier, and returns were strongest for men in the Northeast. My dissertation research builds on this foundation by developing a scheme to measure social and other labor-market-relevant skills as postsecondary learning outcomes.
Chapters and Reports
Higher Education Finance: Expenditures and Costs (with Kevin Stange) [Web Link]
This chapter in AEFP's "Live Handbook" surveys the empirical research on institutional resources, spending decisions, and revenue-generating strategies. We also conduct original analyses using annual finance and enrollment data from IPEDS. Our key findings:
Postsecondary students experience very different levels of resources depending on where they study.
State funding policies shape the resources available to public institutions and their revenue-generating strategies.
Institutional spending improves student outcomes.
Resource use varies across academic departments and programs.
Access to federal funding for financial aid and scientific research influences institutional spending decisions.
Policy efforts to mitigate rising costs have been unsuccessful because higher expenditures are associated with both educational quality and prestige.
Postsecondary Enrollments and Expenditures, 1978-2022
College & Beyond II (CBII)–Burning Glass Institute (BGI) Collaboration (with Kevin Stange) [Report Link]
The CBII-BGI data collaboration integrates longitudinal career histories with detailed student-level transcripts and administrative records across seven university systems. This report describes the exact and fuzzy matching procedures used with a starting sample of over 700,000 CBII bachelor's degree recipients. We find an overall match rate of 33%, with variation by gender, graduating cohort, and field of study.
Aligning Short-term Credentials with Community College Degree Programs (with Richard Kazis) [Report Link]
Based on interviews with state workforce leaders, we describe current state-level approaches and challenges in creating and scaling high-value occupational certificates embedded in stackable pathways to a college degree. This study is one of three in a CCRC volume on policy strategies for improving credential attainment among nontraditional and underserved adult populations.
The Implementation and Effects of Lesson Study in Community College Mathematics (with Sue Bickerstaff, Jacqueline Raphael, Michelle Hodara, and Sam Riggs) [Report Link]
"Lesson study" is an instructor-led professional development model grounded in routine observation and peer pedagogical feedback. This mixed-method report details the implementation of the lesson study model with developmental math instructors at three community colleges, as well as the impact of participation on faculty beliefs and student learning.
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