Findings From Vocational Education in the United States: The Early 1990s

December 1996

Highlights

Questions periodically arise about students' participation in voca-tional education at the secondary and postsecondary levels. This booklet is designed to answer such questions.

At the secondary level, this booklet provides information that addresses the following questions: Is participation in vocational edu-cation and different areas within vocational education increasing or decreasing? In what types of curricular areas are students most likely to specialize-vocational education, college preparatory, or neither? Do members of special populations, such as students with disabilities and students with limited English proficiency, participate in vocation-al education at the same rates as their counterparts? What is the rela-tionship between academic test scores and participation in vocational education? Do vocational and nonvocational teachers serve similar numbers of students?

At the postsecondary level, this booklet provides information that addresses the following questions: What proportion of students major in vocational subjects? In what types of vocational subjects, such as business or health, do students most commonly major? What sectors of postsecondary education have the highest propor-tion of enrollees? What is the relationship between employment in a field related to a vocational completer's training and earnings? Are differences in race and socioeconomic status associated with different levels of participation in vocational education? What is the relationship between majoring in vocational education and the receipt of financial aid?

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For more information about the content of this booklet, contact Lisa Hudson at Lisa.Hudson@ed.gov.