Did You Know?

Work experience in adolescence can facilitate educational attainment.

Jeremy Staff and Jeylan Mortimer (University of Minnesota) used data from the Youth Development Study (YDS) to examine how work and school roles from adolescence through young adulthood affect educational attainment in the United States.

Staff and Mortimer found that work experience during the high school years does not hinder postsecondary educational attainment, and that moderate part-time work coupled with schooling through high school and young adulthood can help low-promise youth attain a college degree.

Patterns of time-management established in high school persist through postsecondary schooling, say the researchers. Moderate steady work during high school led to a combination of part-time work and schooling in young adulthood, while those who were more invested in work during high school were also more involved in full-time work in subsequent years.

Educational Attainment by Teenage Work Typology and Educational Promise

Source: Staff, J., & Mortimer, J.T. (2007). Educational and work strategies from adolescence to early adulthood: Consequences for educational attainment. Social Forces, 85, 1169-1194.

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