The Flow of High School Students to Schools, Colleges, and Jobs
ACT RESEARCH REPORTNo. 2626June, 1968THE FLOW OF HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS TO SCHOOLS, COLLEGES, AND JOBS.LEONARD L. BAIRD JOHN L. HOLLAND£ a. o i— QJ > QJ Q£ American College Testin g ProgramP. 0, Box 168, Iowa C ity , Iowa 52240 SummaryA sample of students was followed from high school senior status to their educational or vocational situation one year later. The majority of students were attending four-year or junior colleges, while smaller numbers of students were in trade or business schools, nursing schools, working full time, or in the military service. When student groups were compared on measures of academic and nonacademic potential, the distribution of students to training institutions or jobs was found to be based primarily on academic rather than nonacademic dimensions of talents.The aspirations of students were generally congruent with their educational or vocational outcomes. Some implications of the results for the assessment of ’’talent loss” are discussed. The Flow of High School Students to Schools, Colleges, and Jobs:A Reexamination of Some Old Questions by the Use of Multiple Indices of Talent Rather than by a Single Academic Index Leonard L. Baird and John L. Holland American College Testing Program Although the terms "talent" and "talent loss" can be variously defined, educators and social scientists customarily define "talent" in terms of a single dimension--academic aptitude--usually measured by school grades or academic aptitude test scores. Those students scoring above a certain level are "talented, " while the others, by implication, are "untalented. " And "talent loss" is the percentage of "talented" students who fail to attend college. I This kind of definition appears eminently practical at first glance, but the practical advantages of definitions based on academic measures do not justify their current popularity. Academic measures are not efficient forecasters of a great range of talented performance. At best, the only talented performance they predict well is academic performance. ^ Estimating talent loss with academic measures is analogous to fishing with a hook that will catch only a single species.For the assessment of human talent, a variety of hooks is needed to secure^For a more complete discussion of the definitions of "talent" and "talent loss" see Holland and Astin (1962).Holland and Richards (1967a) recently summarized some of the pertinent evidence. the variety of human talents.In this study, we examined the movement of high school students to schools, colleges, and jobs by multiple measures of talent rather than by academic measures alone. From our past work, we expected to find that the use of divergent, multiple measures of talent would reveal different and more informative estimates than academic measures alone of how talented students distribute themselves (and are distributed by other persons, institutions, and businesses). Consequently, we followed a large group of high school students from high school to their educational or vocational situations one year later.MethodInitial assessment devices. All the students in the sample took the ACT Assessment as part of the ACT program. The ACT Assessment includes reports of high school grades and tests of academic aptitude. The test scores for each student are converted to ACT standard scores with a mean of 20 and a standard deviation of 5, based on college-bound high school seniors (American College Testing Program, 1965).The ACT Assessment also includes the Student Profile Section. In this section, the student reports his expectations concerning work, housing, and extracurricular participation in college, his reasons for choice of college, his family background, his choice of major and vocation, his degree plans, and his nonacademic achievements. Scales of high school nonacademic achievements yield scores in science, art, leadership, writing, music, and drama. Students with high scores presumably have attained a high level of accomplishment requiring complex skills, long term persistence, or originality. These nonacademic accomplishment scales have been found to have useful reliability and validity (ACT Technical Manual, 1965; Richards, Holland, & Lutz, 1967.)Follow-up questionnaire. The follow-up instrument was a one-page questionnaire which included questions about the kinds of schools students had attended since leaving high school, student status, and work status. Other questions asked the students who had dropped out of college their reasons for doing so. Students in college were asked to indicate their source of financial support while they were in school. Those who had a fulltime job were asked what type of job it w
