Monthly Archives: August 2013

Obama’s Education Initiative

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President Obama recently proposed a set of measures to make college more affordable. Some experts have argued for more innovation to drive down education costs, and the President is suggesting drastic changes to how the federal government promotes postsecondary education. Pending Congressional approval, federal financial aid would be partly linked to college rankings on measures like tuition, graduation rates, the percentage of lower-income students attending, and how much money graduates make. Some of this information is already available through an online college scorecard released earlier this year. The motivation for this approach is to encourage institutional innovation and allow students attending highly ranked colleges to receive better financial aid.

The President has also proposed other ideas, including experimenting with competency-based degrees that reflect students’ knowledge more than the hours they’ve spent in the classroom, massive open online courses, three-year degree programs, performance-based financial aid, and more.

With changes likely coming to post-secondary education in the coming years, it is crucial to base policy decisions on the best research available. The Future of Children‘s issue on Postsecondary Education in the United States is a good place to start.

For example, while online learning is often believed to be an institutional cost-cutting measure, Bell and Federman explain that the evidence is inconclusive. There are significant start-up and recurrent technological support costs, yet implementation may result in savings in instructor compensation costs over time–particularly if institutions adopt more machine-guided courses. Research shows online learning can be effective for students, but we know little about how to do it right. One challenge colleges will likely face is a high dropout rate–especially among low income students without a fast Internet connection. In promoting innovation, the federal government will need to consider how to support technology delivery and use among disadvantaged students.

Obama has proposed performance-based financial aid. Dynarski and Scott-Clayton found that linking student financial aid to achievement can improve college performance and completion more than grants with no strings attached. This measure will likely be effective for enrolled students, but another issue is outreach to prospective students. For instance, many of them overestimate the cost of attending college by as much as three times, and a recent national survey of young adults found that fewer than three in ten individuals people without a college degree knew what the Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA) was. In revamping the financial aid program, policymakers should keep in mind that program complexity undermines aid’s effectiveness. Aid needs to have simple, easy-to-understand eligibility rules and application procedures. To find more research and policy recommendations see the Future of Children‘s issue on Postsecondary Education in the United States.

Family Relationships Following the Great Recession

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Research from the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing Study suggests that stress or uncertainty about external circumstances can impact family relationships. One recent study by Dohoon Lee, Jeanne Brooks-Gunn, Sara McLanahan, Daniel Notterman, and Irwin Garfinkel finds that mothers used more harsh parenting practices, such as corporal punishment, following the Great Recession. Moreover, macroeconomic conditions like consumer sentiment (that is, how people feel generally about the economy), rather than actual conditions (for example, local unemployment rate), are associated with harsh parenting.

Findings from another study suggest that macroeconomic stress has caused couples to delay or forego separation or divorce, especially among those hardest hit by the recession. Based on research presented in the Future of Children suggesting positive outcomes of marriage for children, such a finding could have good implications for low-conflict families but serious consequences for families experiencing violence or abuse.

Future of Children authors Philip A. Cowan, Carolyn Pape Cowan, and Virginia Knox explain that some low-income family intervention programs have begun to address how parents and partners can cope with the stress and uncertainty caused by external circumstances such as a dragging economy. The authors highlight one such program that has had encouraging early results. Participants in the Supporting Healthy Marriage project, a yearlong marriage and relationship education program for couples with children, report less abuse, more positive communication, and greater marital happiness than control-group counterparts.

With the proportion of children born to unmarried mothers at more than 40 percent, similar programs for unmarried couples with children are being evaluated. One such project called Building Strong Families found little evidence of relationship quality improvement among participants, but Cowan and colleagues indicate that more analyses are needed to understand these findings. Research on the challenges that unmarried families face can be found in the Future of Children issue on Fragile Families. Also see our issue The Next Generation of Antipoverty Policies.

Decreases in Childhood Obesity

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Rates of childhood obesity have risen for decades in the U.S., and there are many reasons why its prevention and treatment ought to be a focus of public policy. For one, preschoolers who are overweight or obese are five times more likely than normal-weight preschoolers to have weight problems during adulthood. And one preschooler in eight is obese, with higher rates among some racial minorities.

Recently, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) found encouraging evidence that these trends might be improving. In a study of 11.6 million low-income preschoolers, the CDC found a small decrease in childhood obesity rates in 19 U.S. states and territories from 2008 to 2011. Experts attribute the good news partially to programs that encourage child exercise, an increase in breast-feeding, and improved nutrition in foods provided to low-income families through federal programs. This research suggests that the problem of childhood obesity can be ameliorated.

In the Future of Children, Ana C. Lindsay, Katarina M. Sussner, Juhee Kim, and Steven Gortmaker argue that successful interventions must involve parents from the earliest developmental stages to promote healthful practices in and outside the home. Regarding the racial and economic disparity in childhood obesity rates, Shiriki Kumanyika and Sonya Grier observe that low-income and minority children tend to watch more television than do white, non-poor children and are potentially exposed to more commercials advertising unhealthy foods. One strategy would be for Congress and the Federal Communications Commission to reduce or eliminate advertising time for non-nutritious foods aimed at children. For more recommendations on how to promote childhood health, see the Future of Children issue on Childhood Obesity.