[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"detail-sidebar-cat-0-en-105":3,"doc-seo-264382-105":59,"doc-detail-264382-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","high-schools-tailored-to-adults-can-help-them-complete-a-traditional-diploma-and-excel-in-the-labor-market","High Schools Tailored to Adults Can Help Them Complete a Traditional Diploma and Excel in the Labor Market","","Over 18 million U.S. adults lack a high school credential, creating limited labor-market opportunities despite the availability of alternatives such as the GED. A network of tuition-free adult high schools supports graduation through tailored curricula, nonacademic coaching, onsite childcare, and transportation. After five years, enrolled graduates earn substantially more than nonenrolling applicants. The analysis addresses selection using preapplication earnings comparisons and sectoral switching, and it links completion gains to a human-capital mechanism.",{"@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/high-schools-tailored-to-adults-can-help-them-complete-a-traditional-diploma-and-excel-in-the-labor-market/264382/",{"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/high-schools-tailored-to-adults-can-help-them-complete-a-traditional-diploma-and-excel-in-the-labor-market/264382.png","ImageObject",300,407,{"name":92,"@type":93},"Adam","Person",{"url":74,"name":95,"@type":96},"DocShare","Organization","application/pdf","2026-11-06","2026-09-14",true,{"@type":102,"interactionType":103,"userInteractionCount":52},"InteractionCounter",{"@type":104},"ViewAction",{"@type":106,"mainEntity":107},"FAQPage",[108,114,118],{"name":109,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":111},"How does the paper address selection when estimating the labor-market return to adult high school graduation?","Question",{"text":112,"@type":113},"It conditions on preapplication earnings and compares graduates to applicants who enroll but exit early, as well as applicants who do not enroll. It also uses an identification strategy narrowing comparisons to exits positively related to earnings.","Answer",{"name":115,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":116},"What supports does the adult high school network provide to help adults complete a traditional diploma?",{"text":117,"@type":113},"It offers tailored curricula, nonacademic coaching, onsite childcare, transportation assistance, flexible class schedules, and integrates professional certificates and community college credits into the high school curriculum.",{"name":119,"@type":110,"acceptedAnswer":120},"What explains much of the wage gains found for program graduates?",{"text":121,"@type":113},"The paper reports that many wage gains are accounted for by sectoral switching and that evidence on credential completions is consistent with a human capital mechanism rather than signaling.","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},264382,1789380869,{"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":52,"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":129,"read_time":144,"preview_page_count":4},1374404737137,"https://ap-avatar.wpscdn.com/davatar_155a257f0dc6eb9ab79c44ca47cae57d","American Economic Journal: Economic Policy 2024, 16(4): 34–67  \n[https://doi.org/10.1257/pol.20230053](https://doi.org/10.1257/pol.20230053)  \nHigh Schools Tailored to Adults Can Help Them Complete a Traditional Diploma and Excel in the Labor Market†  \nBy Rebecca Brough, David C. Phillips, and Patrick S. Turner*  \nOver 18 million adults in the United States lack a high school credential. While some go on to attain the GED, diplomas are potentially more valuable. A network of high schools helps adults graduate by providing tailored curricula, nonacademic coaching, onsite childcare, and transportation. After five years, earnings increase by 38 percent more for graduates than nonenrolling applicants. We address selection by conditioning on preapplication earnings and comparing to students who exit after positive shocks. Much of the wage gains can be accounted for by sectoral switching and evidence on credential completions is consistent with a human capital mechanism.  \n(JEL I21, I26, J24, J31)  \nMore than 18 million adults in the United States lack a high school credential.  \nYoung adults with a high school diploma earn 77 percent more than peers without a high school credential, a gap that increases throughout adulthood.1 The GED2 serves as the primary credentialing option for adults who have no diploma, but the effect of the GED on earnings is either negligible (Jepsen, Mueser, and Troske 2016) or mixed (Tyler, Murnane, and Willett 2000), likely because the GED evaluates rather than creates human capital (Heckman, Humphries, and Mader 2011) . On the other hand, diplomas have large returns for traditional students (Angrist  \n* Brough: UC Davis, LEO (email: [rjbrough@ucdavis.edu](rjbrough@ucdavis.edu)); Phillips: University of Notre Dame, LEO (email: [dphill12@nd.edu](dphill12@nd.edu)); Turner: University of Notre Dame, LEO (email: [patrick.turner@nd.edu](patrick.turner@nd.edu)). C. Kirabo Jackson was coeditor for this article. We would like to acknowledge helpful comments from Mary Kate Batistich, Celeste Carruthers, Shaun Dougherty, Chloe Gibbs, Bill Evans, John Eric Humphries, Dan Hungerman, Richard Murnane, Jim Sullivan, three anonymous referees, and participants at SOLE, the Mid-Midwest Applied Micro Conference, the SEA annual meetings, and APPAM. We are indebted to Tessa Bonomo and Megan Allen for excellent research assistance. We would like to thank our project partners at Goodwill, including Betsy Delgado, Tabitha Manross, and Dan Scott, and the Indiana Management Performance Hub, including Owen Boberg, Tyler Brown, Brendan O’Connor, Sangeetha Saravanan, and Johrdan Vicstein. We are grateful for funding from the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO) . The opinions and conclusions expressed herein are solely those of the authors and should not be construed as representing the opinions or policies of Goodwill of Central and Southern Indiana or the State of Indiana. We received IRB approval for the full study, including the interventions and data collection, from the University of Notre Dame (IRB 17-11-4265) . An earlier draft of this paper was titled “The Labor Market Return to Reversing High School Dropout.”  \n†Go to [https://doi.org/10.1257/pol.20230053](https://doi.org/10.1257/pol.20230053) to visit the article page for additional materials and author disclosure statement(s) or to comment in the online discussion forum.  \n1 Based on authors’ calculations using the 2012–2016 ACS (Ruggles et al. 2020) . See Table 1.  \n2 The GED refers to the General Educational Development (GED) test. Different states use testing companies with differing names. Throughout the paper, we refer to these tests interchangeably as “GED.”  \nVOL. 16 NO. 4 BROUGH ET AL.: HIGH SCHOOLS TAILORED TO ADULTS 35  \nand Krueger 1991; Oreopoulos 2006) mostly due to human capital formation rather than signaling (Clark and Martorell 2014) . Few adults earn diplomas though, partly because of public policy—18 states provide no legal path for adult","cbCaimUqYrHcfN0y","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaimUqYrHcfN0y","pdf",888154,34,"English","# Introduction\n## Background: credential gaps and GED returns\n# Program design and supports\n## The Excel Center (TEC) framework\n# Data and identification strategy\n## Administrative data and fixed-effects approach\n# Results and mechanisms\n## Earnings impacts, sectoral switching, completion pathways\n# Evidence constraints and robustness","[{\"question\":\"How does the paper address selection when estimating the labor-market return to adult high school graduation?\",\"answer\":\"It conditions on preapplication earnings and compares graduates to applicants who enroll but exit early, as well as applicants who do not enroll. It also uses an identification strategy narrowing comparisons to exits positively related to earnings.\"},{\"question\":\"What supports does the adult high school network provide to help adults complete a traditional diploma?\",\"answer\":\"It offers tailored curricula, nonacademic coaching, onsite childcare, transportation assistance, flexible class schedules, and integrates professional certificates and community college credits into the high school curriculum.\"},{\"question\":\"What explains much of the wage gains found for program graduates?\",\"answer\":\"The paper reports that many wage gains are accounted for by sectoral switching and that evidence on credential completions is consistent with a human capital mechanism rather than signaling.\"}]","High Schools Tailored to Adults Can Help Them Complete a Traditional Diploma and Excel in the Labor Market | PDF",86]