According to exit polling in ten key states of the 2024 presidential election in the United States, almost two-thirds of voters who had never attended college reported voting for Donald Trump. In comparison, a similar share of voters with advanced degrees reported voting for Kamala Harris.

The University of Washington - Beyond High School (UW-BHS) project surveyed students in Washington State to examine factors impacting educational attainment and the transition to adulthood among high school seniors. The project began in 1999 in an effort to assess the impact of I-200 (the referendum that ended Affirmative Action) on minority enrollment in higher education in Washington. The research objectives of the project were: (1) to describe and explain differences in the transition from high school to college by race and ethnicity, socioeconomic origins, and other characteristics, (2) to evaluate the impact of the Washington State Achievers Program, and (3) to explore the implications of multiple race and ethnic identities. Following a successful pilot survey in the spring of 2000, the project eventually included baseline and one-year follow-up surveys (conducted in 2002, 2003, 2004, and 2005) of almost 10,000 high school seniors in five cohorts across several Washington school districts. The high school senior surveys included questions that explored students' educational aspirations and future career plans, as well as questions on family background, home life, perceptions of school and home environments, self-esteem, and participation in school related and non-school related activities. To supplement the 2000, 2002, and 2003 student surveys, parents of high school seniors were also queried to determine their expectations and aspirations for their child's education, as well as their own educational backgrounds and fields of employment. Parents were also asked to report any financial measures undertaken to prepare for their child's continued education, and whether the household received any form of financial assistance. In 2010, a ten-year follow-up with the 2000 senior cohort was conducted to assess educational, career, and familial outcomes. The ten year follow-up surveys collected information on educational attainment, early employment experiences, family and partnership, civic engagement, and health status. The baseline, parent, and follow-up surveys also collected detailed demographic information, including age, sex, ethnicity, language, religion, education level, employment, income, marital status, and parental status.

Of those aged 20 to 21 years of age in the United States, 52.8 percent were enrolled in higher education as of 2020, a considerable increase when compared to 31.9 percent in 1970. For those aged 18 to 19, 49 percent were enrolled in higher education in 2020.

The principal purposes of this national longitudinal study of the higher education system in the United States are to describe the characteristics of new college freshmen and to explore the effects of college on students. For each wave of this survey, students complete a questionnaire during freshman orientation or registration containing some 200 items covering information on academic skills and preparation, high school activities and experiences, educational and career plans, majors and careers, student values, financing college, and a variety of demographic questions such as sex, age, parental education and occupation, household income, race, religious preference, and state of birth. Specific questions asked of respondents in the 1968 survey included average grade in secondary school, how many colleges they had applied to for admission, accomplishments during their high school years, highest academic degree they intended to obtain, concerns about financing their education, if they were a twin, source of financing for the first year of school, academic standards and individual ranking at their high schools, size of locality in which they lived when growing up, and what they hoped to accomplish in college. Respondents were also asked to list their probable career occupation, first, second, and least appealing major field of study, and activities they engaged in during their previous year in school. Also elicited were respondents' opinions on the importance of various individuals and events in their decision to enroll in college, assessments of achieving certain goals during their college years, and general attitudes about faculty and other students.

Participation rate in education, population aged 18 to 34, by age group and type of institution attended, Canada, provinces and territories. This table is included in Section E: Transitions and outcomes: Transitions to postsecondary education of the Pan Canadian Education Indicators Program (PCEIP). PCEIP draws from a wide variety of data sources to provide information on the school-age population, elementary, secondary and postsecondary education, transitions, and labour market outcomes. The program presents indicators for all of Canada, the provinces, the territories, as well as selected international comparisons and comparisons over time. PCEIP is an ongoing initiative of the Canadian Education Statistics Council, a partnership between Statistics Canada and the Council of Ministers of Education, Canada that provides a set of statistical measures on education systems in Canada.

Data on labor force activity for the week prior to the survey are supplied in this collection. Information is available on the employment status, occupation, and industry of persons 14 years old and over. Demographic variables such as age, sex, race, marital status, veteran status, household relationship, educational background, and Spanish origin are included. In addition to providing these core data, the October survey also contains a special supplement on school enrollment. This supplement includes the following items: current grade attending at public or private school, whether attending college full- or part-time at a two- or four-year institution, year last attended a regular school, and year graduated from high school. (Source: downloaded from ICPSR 7/13/10)

Please Note: This dataset is part of the historical CISER Data Archive Collection and is also available at ICPSR at https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR09546.v1. We highly recommend using the ICPSR version as they may make this dataset available in multiple data formats in the future.

Open Science in (Higher) Education – data of the February 2017 survey

This data set contains:

Full raw (anonymised) data set (completed responses) of Open Science in (Higher) Education February 2017 survey. Data are in xlsx and sav format.

Survey questionnaires with variables and settings (German original and English translation) in pdf. The English questionnaire was not used in the February 2017 survey, but only serves as translation.

Readme file (txt)

Survey structure

The survey includes 24 questions and its structure can be separated in five major themes: material used in courses (5), OER awareness, usage and development (6), collaborative tools used in courses (2), assessment and participation options (5), demographics (4). The last two questions include an open text questions about general issues on the topics and singular open education experiences, and a request on forwarding the respondent's e-mail address for further questionings. The online survey was created with Limesurvey[1]. Several questions include filters, i.e. these questions were only shown if a participants did choose a specific answer beforehand ([n/a] in Excel file, [.] In SPSS).

Demographic questions

Demographic questions asked about the current position, the discipline, birth year and gender. The classification of research disciplines was adapted to general disciplines at German higher education institutions. As we wanted to have a broad classification, we summarised several disciplines and came up with the following list, including the option "other" for respondents who do not feel confident with the proposed classification:

Natural Sciences

Arts and Humanities or Social Sciences

Economics

Law

Medicine

Computer Sciences, Engineering, Technics

Other

The current job position classification was also chosen according to common positions in Germany, including positions with a teaching responsibility at higher education institutions. Here, we also included the option "other" for respondents who do not feel confident with the proposed classification:

Professor

Special education teacher

Academic/scientific assistant or research fellow (research and teaching)

Academic staff (teaching)

Student assistant

Other

We chose to have a free text (numerical) for asking about a respondent's year of birth because we did not want to pre-classify respondents' age intervals. It leaves us options to have different analysis on answers and possible correlations to the respondents' age. Asking about the country was left out as the survey was designed for academics in Germany.

Remark on OER question

Data from earlier surveys revealed that academics suffer confusion about the proper definition of OER[2]. Some seem to understand OER as free resources, or only refer to open source software (Allen & Seaman, 2016, p. 11). Allen and Seaman (2016) decided to give a broad explanation of OER, avoiding details to not tempt the participant to claim "aware". Thus, there is a danger of having a bias when giving an explanation. We decided not to give an explanation, but keep this question simple. We assume that either someone knows about OER or not. If they had not heard of the term before, they do not probably use OER (at least not consciously) or create them.

Data collection

The target group of the survey was academics at German institutions of higher education, mainly universities and universities of applied sciences. To reach them we sent the survey to diverse institutional-intern and extern mailing lists and via personal contacts. Included lists were discipline-based lists, lists deriving from higher education and higher education didactic communities as well as lists from open science and OER communities. Additionally, personal e-mails were sent to presidents and contact persons from those communities, and Twitter was used to spread the survey.

The survey was online from Feb 6th to March 3rd 2017, e-mails were mainly sent at the beginning and around mid-term.

Data clearance

We got 360 responses, whereof Limesurvey counted 208 completes and 152 incompletes. Two responses were marked as incomplete, but after checking them turned out to be complete, and we added them to the complete responses dataset. Thus, this data set includes 210 complete responses. From those 150 incomplete responses, 58 respondents did not answer 1st question, 40 respondents discontinued after 1st question. Data shows a constant decline in response answers, we did not detect any striking survey question with a high dropout rate. We deleted incomplete responses and they are not in this data set.

Due to data privacy reasons, we deleted seven variables automatically assigned by Limesurvey: submitdate, lastpage, startlanguage, startdate, datestamp, ipaddr, refurl. We also deleted answers to question No 24 (email address).

References

Allen, E., & Seaman, J. (2016). Opening the Textbook: Educational Resources in U.S. Higher Education, 2015-16.

First results of the survey are presented in the poster:

Heck, Tamara, Blümel, Ina, Heller, Lambert, Mazarakis, Athanasios, Peters, Isabella, Scherp, Ansgar, & Weisel, Luzian. (2017). Survey: Open Science in Higher Education. Zenodo. http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.400561

Contact:

Open Science in (Higher) Education working group, see http://www.leibniz-science20.de/forschung/projekte/laufende-projekte/open-science-in-higher-education/.

[1] https://www.limesurvey.org

[2] The survey question about the awareness of OER gave a broad explanation, avoiding details to not tempt the participant to claim "aware".

In 2021, about 41 percent of the United States population aged 25 to 34 years had attained a bachelor's degree or higher. In comparison, only 33 percent of the U.S. population aged 65 years or older had a bachelor's degree.

United States Unemployment Rate: Age 25 & Over: Some College But Number Degree data was reported at 2.900 % in Oct 2018. This records a decrease from the previous number of 3.100 % for Sep 2018. United States Unemployment Rate: Age 25 & Over: Some College But Number Degree data is updated monthly, averaging 4.200 % from Jan 1992 (Median) to Oct 2018, with 322 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 9.000 % in Aug 2010 and a record low of 2.300 % in Oct 2000. United States Unemployment Rate: Age 25 & Over: Some College But Number Degree data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Bureau of Labor Statistics. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United States – Table US.G018: Current Population Survey: Unemployment Rate.

In 2021, about 37.7 percent of the U.S. population who were aged 25 and above had graduated from college or another higher education institution, a slight decline from 37.9 the previous year. However, this is a significant increase from 1960, when only 7.7 percent of the U.S. population had graduated from college.

Demographics

Educational attainment varies by gender, location, race, and age throughout the United States. Asian-American and Pacific Islanders had the highest level of education, on average, while Massachusetts and the District of Colombia are areas home to the highest rates of residents with a bachelor’s degree or higher. However, education levels are correlated with wealth. While public education is free up until the 12th grade, the cost of university is out of reach for many Americans, making social mobility increasingly difficult.

Earnings

White Americans with a professional degree earned the most money on average, compared to other educational levels and races. However, regardless of educational attainment, males typically earned far more on average compared to females. Despite the decreasing wage gap over the years in the country, it remains an issue to this day. Not only is there a large wage gap between males and females, but there is also a large income gap linked to race as well.

United States Labour Force Parti Rate: Age 25 & Over: Some College But Number Degree data was reported at 65.700 % in Oct 2018. This records an increase from the previous number of 65.200 % for Sep 2018. United States Labour Force Parti Rate: Age 25 & Over: Some College But Number Degree data is updated monthly, averaging 72.300 % from Jan 1992 (Median) to Oct 2018, with 322 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 75.600 % in Jan 1994 and a record low of 64.900 % in Aug 2018. United States Labour Force Parti Rate: Age 25 & Over: Some College But Number Degree data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Bureau of Labor Statistics. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United States – Table US.G008: Current Population Survey: Labour Force.

Educational attainment of the population aged 25 to 64, by age group and sex, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Canada, provinces and territories. This table is included in Section D: Postsecondary education: Educational attainment of the population aged 25 to 64 of the Pan Canadian Education Indicators Program (PCEIP). PCEIP draws from a wide variety of data sources to provide information on the school-age population, elementary, secondary and postsecondary education, transitions, education finance and labour market outcomes. The program presents indicators for all of Canada, the provinces, the territories, as well as selected international comparisons and comparisons over time. PCEIP is an ongoing initiative of the Canadian Education Statistics Council, a partnership between Statistics Canada and the Council of Ministers of Education, Canada that provides a set of statistical measures on education systems in Canada.

This data collection is comprised of responses from two sets of survey questionnaires, the basic Current Population Survey (CPS) and a survey on the topics of School Enrollment and Internet Use in the United States, which was administered as a supplement to the 2010 October CPS. The Census Bureau and the National Center for Education Statistics jointly sponsored the supplemental questions for October.The CPS, administered monthly, is a labor force survey providing current estimates of the economic status and activities of the population of the United States, for the week prior to the survey. Specifically, the CPS provides estimates of total employment (both farm and nonfarm), nonfarm self-employed persons, domestics, and unpaid helpers in nonfarm family enterprises, wage and salaried employees, and estimates of total unemployment.The October 2010 supplemental survey queried respondents on school enrollment for all persons in the household aged three years and over. Supplement data includes information collected on current grade at public or private school, whether currently attending college full- or part-time at a two- or four-year institution, year last attended a regular school, year graduated from high school, grade retention, and whether any business, vocational, technical, trade, or correspondence courses were ever taken. Respondents were also queried on Internet and computer use, particularly if members of the household use the Internet, and how access to the Internet is obtained. Demographic variables include age, sex, race, Hispanic origin, marital status, veteran status, educational attainment, occupation, and income.

United States Unemployment: Age 25 & Over: Some College But Number Degree data was reported at 1,102.000 Person th in Oct 2018. This records a decrease from the previous number of 1,160.000 Person th for Sep 2018. United States Unemployment: Age 25 & Over: Some College But Number Degree data is updated monthly, averaging 1,437.500 Person th from Jan 1992 (Median) to Oct 2018, with 322 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 3,323.000 Person th in Aug 2010 and a record low of 756.000 Person th in Dec 1999. United States Unemployment: Age 25 & Over: Some College But Number Degree data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Bureau of Labor Statistics. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United States – Table US.G016: Current Population Survey: Unemployment.

United States WE: Age 25 & Over: Female: Some College or Degree: First Decile data was reported at 450.000 USD in Mar 2020. This records an increase from the previous number of 421.000 USD for Dec 2019. United States WE: Age 25 & Over: Female: Some College or Degree: First Decile data is updated quarterly, averaging 354.000 USD from Mar 2000 (Median) to Mar 2020, with 81 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 450.000 USD in Mar 2020 and a record low of 283.000 USD in Jun 2000. United States WE: Age 25 & Over: Female: Some College or Degree: First Decile data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Bureau of Labor Statistics. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United States – Table US.G030: Current Population Survey: Usual Weekly Earnings.

United States Emp Population Ratio: Age 25 & Over: Some College or Assoc Degree data was reported at 61.000 Unit in Oct 2018. This records an increase from the previous number of 60.600 Unit for Sep 2018. United States Emp Population Ratio: Age 25 & Over: Some College or Assoc Degree data is updated monthly, averaging 67.300 Unit from Jan 1992 (Median) to Oct 2018, with 322 observations. The data reached an all-time high of 71.000 Unit in Oct 1996 and a record low of 59.700 Unit in Feb 2014. United States Emp Population Ratio: Age 25 & Over: Some College or Assoc Degree data remains active status in CEIC and is reported by Bureau of Labor Statistics. The data is categorized under Global Database’s United States – Table US.G015: Current Population Survey: Employment Population Ratio.

Economically Active Population Survey: Population aged 16 years old and over who have completed higher secondary education by sector of the level of education attained, sex and Autonomous Community. Percentages with respect to the total of each Autonomous Community. Annual. Autonomous Communities and Cities.

In an impressive increase from years past, 39 percent of women in the United States had completed four years or more of college in 2022. This figure is up from 3.8 percent of women in 1940. A significant increase can also be seen in males, with 36.2 percent of the U.S. male population having completed four years or more of college in 2022, up from 5.5 percent in 1940.

4- and 2-year colleges

In the United States, college students are able to choose between attending a 2-year postsecondary program and a 4-year postsecondary program. Generally, attending a 2-year program results in an Associate’s Degree, and 4-year programs result in a Bachelor’s Degree.

Many 2-year programs are designed so that attendees can transfer to a college or university offering a 4-year program upon completing their Associate’s. Completion of a 4-year program is the generally accepted standard for entry-level positions when looking for a job.

Earnings after college

Factors such as gender, degree achieved, and the level of postsecondary education can have an impact on employment and earnings later in life. Some Bachelor’s degrees continue to attract more male students than female, particularly in STEM fields, while liberal arts degrees such as education, languages and literatures, and communication tend to see higher female attendance.

All of these factors have an impact on earnings after college, and despite nearly the same rate of attendance within the American population between males and females, men with a Bachelor’s Degree continue to have higher weekly earnings on average than their female counterparts.

Graph and download economic data for Labor Force Participation Rate - High School Graduates, No College, 25 Yrs. & over (LNU01327660) from Jan 1992 to May 2025 about secondary schooling, secondary, 25 years +, participation, tertiary schooling, civilian, education, labor force, labor, household survey, rate, and USA.

Although the American Community Survey (ACS) produces population, demographic and housing unit estimates, the decennial census is the official source of population totals for April 1st of each decennial year. In between censuses, the Census Bureau's Population Estimates Program produces and disseminates the official estimates of the population for the nation, states, counties, cities, and towns and estimates of housing units and the group quarters population for states and counties..Information about the American Community Survey (ACS) can be found on the ACS website. Supporting documentation including code lists, subject definitions, data accuracy, and statistical testing, and a full list of ACS tables and table shells (without estimates) can be found on the Technical Documentation section of the ACS website.Sample size and data quality measures (including coverage rates, allocation rates, and response rates) can be found on the American Community Survey website in the Methodology section..Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2023 American Community Survey 1-Year Estimates.ACS data generally reflect the geographic boundaries of legal and statistical areas as of January 1 of the estimate year. For more information, see Geography Boundaries by Year..Data are based on a sample and are subject to sampling variability. The degree of uncertainty for an estimate arising from sampling variability is represented through the use of a margin of error. The value shown here is the 90 percent margin of error. The margin of error can be interpreted roughly as providing a 90 percent probability that the interval defined by the estimate minus the margin of error and the estimate plus the margin of error (the lower and upper confidence bounds) contains the true value. In addition to sampling variability, the ACS estimates are subject to nonsampling error (for a discussion of nonsampling variability, see ACS Technical Documentation). The effect of nonsampling error is not represented in these tables..Users must consider potential differences in geographic boundaries, questionnaire content or coding, or other methodological issues when comparing ACS data from different years. Statistically significant differences shown in ACS Comparison Profiles, or in data users' own analysis, may be the result of these differences and thus might not necessarily reflect changes to the social, economic, housing, or demographic characteristics being compared. For more information, see Comparing ACS Data..The category "Not enrolled in college or graduate school" includes those who were not enrolled in school as well as those who were enrolled in levels other than college or graduate school..Estimates of urban and rural populations, housing units, and characteristics reflect boundaries of urban areas defined based on 2020 Census data. As a result, data for urban and rural areas from the ACS do not necessarily reflect the results of ongoing urbanization..Explanation of Symbols:- The estimate could not be computed because there were an insufficient number of sample observations. For a ratio of medians estimate, one or both of the median estimates falls in the lowest interval or highest interval of an open-ended distribution. For a 5-year median estimate, the margin of error associated with a median was larger than the median itself.N The estimate or margin of error cannot be displayed because there were an insufficient number of sample cases in the selected geographic area. (X) The estimate or margin of error is not applicable or not available.median- The median falls in the lowest interval of an open-ended distribution (for example "2,500-")median+ The median falls in the highest interval of an open-ended distribution (for example "250,000+").** The margin of error could not be computed because there were an insufficient number of sample observations.*** The margin of error could not be computed because the median falls in the lowest interval or highest interval of an open-ended distribution.***** A margin of error is not appropriate because the corresponding estimate is controlled to an independent population or housing estimate. Effectively, the corresponding estimate has no sampling error and the margin of error may be treated as zero.