[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":3,"doc-seo-583253-105":59,"doc-detail-583253-en":130},{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":6},0,"success",[7,13,18,23,28,33,38,43,48,51,55],{"id":8,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":10,"show_sort_weight":11,"slug":12},1,"Document","Story & Novel",90,"story-novel",{"id":14,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":15,"show_sort_weight":16,"slug":17},2,"Literature",80,"literature",{"id":19,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":20,"show_sort_weight":21,"slug":22},4,"Exam",70,"exam",{"id":24,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":25,"show_sort_weight":26,"slug":27},5,"Comic",60,"comic",{"id":29,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":30,"show_sort_weight":31,"slug":32},6,"Technology",50,"technology",{"id":34,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":35,"show_sort_weight":36,"slug":37},7,"Healthcare",40,"healthcare",{"id":39,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":40,"show_sort_weight":41,"slug":42},8,"Research & Report",30,"research-report",{"id":44,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":45,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":47},9,"Religion & Spirituality",20,"religion-spirituality",{"id":46,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":49,"show_sort_weight":46,"slug":50},"World Cup","world-cup",{"id":52,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":53,"show_sort_weight":52,"slug":54},10,"Lifestyle","lifestyle",{"id":56,"doc_module":4,"doc_module_name":9,"category_name":57,"show_sort_weight":24,"slug":58},19,"General","general",{"code":4,"msg":60,"data":61},"ok",{"site_id":62,"language":63,"slug":64,"title":65,"keywords":66,"description":67,"schema_data":68,"social_meta":123,"head_meta":125,"extra_data":127,"updated_unix":129},105,"en","broadening-our-perspective-concerning-americas-education-attainment-growth-progress-and-data-gaps-april-2026","Broadening Our Perspective Concerning America's Education Attainment: Growth, Progress, and Data Gaps - April 2026","","Research on U.S. education attainment reframes claims of stagnation or decline by analyzing ages 15–25 and tracking growth across multiple postsecondary pathways. Findings show progress in Advanced Placement, dual enrollment, four-year colleges and universities, apprenticeships, certificates, and credentials, which expand students’ total years in education and raise attainment. The study also documents major data gaps in career and technical education, college transfer, and remedial education, limiting firm conclusions and indicating priorities for policymakers and researchers.",{"@graph":69,"@context":122},[70,84,105],{"@type":71,"itemListElement":72},"BreadcrumbList",[73,77,79,82],{"item":74,"name":75,"@type":76,"position":8},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",{"item":78,"name":9,"@type":76,"position":14},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/",{"item":80,"name":40,"@type":76,"position":81},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/",3,{"item":83,"name":65,"@type":76,"position":19},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/broadening-our-perspective-concerning-americas-education-attainment-growth-progress-and-data-gaps-april-2026/583253/",{"url":83,"name":65,"@type":85,"image":86,"author":91,"headline":65,"publisher":94,"fileFormat":97,"inLanguage":63,"description":67,"dateModified":98,"datePublished":99,"encodingFormat":97,"isAccessibleForFree":100,"interactionStatistic":101},"DigitalDocument",{"url":87,"@type":88,"width":89,"height":90},"https://docshare.wps.com/thumbnails/broadening-our-perspective-concerning-americas-education-attainment-growth-progress-and-data-gaps-april-2026/583253.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Jake","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-11-05","2026-10-15",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":34},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",{"@type":106,"mainEntity":107},"FAQPage",[108,114,118],{"name":109,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":111},"What question does the research address about U.S. education attainment?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"It challenges the narrative that education stagnates or declines by examining how postsecondary education and training have grown over decades for ages 15–25.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"Which postsecondary pathways show growth and progress in the study?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"Advanced Placement, dual enrollment, four-year colleges/universities, apprenticeships, certificates, and credentials are identified as contributing to increased educational attainment.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"Why does the study emphasize data gaps in several sectors?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"It finds that current research and data infrastructure fall short, so gaps in career and technical education, college transfer, and remedial education prevent overall conclusions and require further data collection.","https://schema.org",{"og:url":83,"og:type":124,"og:title":65,"og:site_name":95,"og:description":67},"article",{"robots":126,"canonical":83},"index,follow",{"doc_id":128,"site_id":62},583253,1792192564,{"code":4,"msg":5,"data":131},{"doc_id":128,"user_id":132,"nickname":92,"user_avatar":133,"doc_module":4,"category_id":39,"category_name":40,"doc_title":65,"doc_description":67,"doc_content":134,"file_id":135,"file_url":136,"file_type":137,"file_size":138,"view_count":34,"is_deleted":4,"is_public":8,"is_downloadable":8,"audit_status":8,"page_count":139,"language":140,"language_code":63,"site_id":62,"html_lang":63,"table_of_contents":141,"faqs":142,"seo_title":143,"seo_description":67,"update_tm":144,"read_time":145,"preview_page_count":4},962084928904,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_155a257f0dc6eb9ab79c44ca47cae57d","UC Berkeley  \nResearch and Occasional Papers Series  \nTitle  \nBroadening Our Perspective Concerning America's Education Attainment: Growth, Progress, and Data Gaps  \nPermalink  \n[https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6kf0842w](https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6kf0842w)  \nJournal  \nResearch and Occasional Paper Series  \nAuthors  \nKirst, Michael  \nChan, Victor  \nPublication Date  \n2026-04-21  \nPeer reviewed  \n[eScholarship.org](eScholarship.org) Powered by the California Digital Library  \nUniversity of California  \nResearch & Occasional Paper Series: CSHE.2.2026  \nBroadening Our Perspective Concerning America's Education Attainment:  \nGrowth, Progress, and Data Gaps  \nApril 2026  \nMichael Kirst1  \nStanford University  \nVictor Eliot Hau Hong Chan2  \nStanford University  \nCopyright 2026 Michael Kirst and Victor Eliot Hau Hong Chan, all rights reserved.  \nABSTRACT  \nOur research demonstrates that the current narrative of education stagnancy or decline is misleading. We focus on ages 15–25 and find a pattern of growth and progress in Advanced Placement, dual enrollment (i.e., combining high school and college), four-year colleges/universities growth and completion, apprenticeships, certificates, and credentials. Together, these elements significantly increase the number of years U.S. students spend in education and their attainment. Just as importantly, however, our analysis identifies where current research and data infrastructure fall short. While there are promising developments in sectors such as career and technical education, college transfer, and remedial education, the data gaps in these three sectors do not permit overall conclusions. Some sectors—like on-the-job training, military education, and credentials—lack sufficient data to determine trends. For this reason, our assessment offers not only a longitudinal scan of institutional and programmatic attainment growth, but also a guide to the questions policymakers and researchers must now prioritize and the places where further data must be gathered.  \nIntroduction  \nFor decades, the performance of the American education system has been largely judged by one narrow set of indicators: K–12 standardized test scores that encompass both national and international units of analysis (Hatch, 2021) . Proponents of such assessments argue that test scores matter for many things, including national economic prosperity and growth (Hanushek, 2015) . The predominant narrative about such data argues that over a long period of time, U.S. scores have either declined or remained stagnant (National Assessment of Educational Progress, n. d. ) . A resulting sense of alarm about the state of American education has only been intensified by recent test score declines, both before and after the pandemic.  \n1 Michael Kirst is a Professor Emeritus of Education at Stanford University and the longest serving President of the California State Board of Education.  \n2 Victor Eliot Hau Hong Chan, MA (Policy, Organization, and Leadership Studies), Stanford University  \nHowever, K–12 test benchmarks are insufficient proxies for measuring the long-term educational and economic value generated by American educational institutions and programs. While K–12 schools prepare students for education beyond high school, the prominent tests are limited to outcomes in high school alone (OECD, 2023) . As Nicholas Eberstadt (2025) has found, there is a “robust and remarkably stable correspondence between a country’s mean years of schooling and its per capita productivity,” meaning that test scores“are less powerful predictors of economic performance than … sheer years of schooling for a national population.” Simply put, students are in school for far longer than K–12 data alone would suggest, putting pressure on the continued reliance on test scores for assessing the state of national education. In order to obtain a fuller and more accurate picture of education attainment, it is important to look beyond K–12 test scores and, i","cbCaivUbrtVWHzeL","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaivUbrtVWHzeL","pdf",1147280,26,"English","# Abstract\n# Introduction\n## Limits of K–12 standardized test indicators\n## Need to broaden beyond high school graduation\n## Reframing public narratives about colleges and universities\n## Study approach for ages 15–25\n# Findings on postsecondary growth and attainment","[{\"question\":\"What question does the research address about U.S. education attainment?\",\"answer\":\"It challenges the narrative that education stagnates or declines by examining how postsecondary education and training have grown over decades for ages 15–25.\"},{\"question\":\"Which postsecondary pathways show growth and progress in the study?\",\"answer\":\"Advanced Placement, dual enrollment, four-year colleges/universities, apprenticeships, certificates, and credentials are identified as contributing to increased educational attainment.\"},{\"question\":\"Why does the study emphasize data gaps in several sectors?\",\"answer\":\"It finds that current research and data infrastructure fall short, so gaps in career and technical education, college transfer, and remedial education prevent overall conclusions and require further data collection.\"}]","Broadening Our Perspective Concerning America's Education Attainment: Growth, Progress, and Data Gaps - April 2026 | PDF",1792046474,66]