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District Digest: Community Colleges: Beyond the Numbers

Author

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  • Stephanie Norris
  • Sonya Ravindranath Waddell

Abstract

There is enduring demand for postsecondary education that can provide the diverse range of skills, knowledge, and experience required for the jobs of today. For some postsecondary institutions, traditional metrics designed around the four-year degree model (i.e., graduation rates for first-time, full-time, degree-seeking students) are reasonable measures of how successfully they provide that training. For other institutions, such as community colleges, metrics like the Richmond Fed's Survey of Community College Outcomes are designed to more accurately measure what they do and who they serve. Yet despite their strengths, neither of these measures can capture students' ultimate labor market outcomes, and both also fail to capture other aspects of how colleges, and in particular community colleges, serve their regions and the broader labor market.

Suggested Citation

  • Stephanie Norris & Sonya Ravindranath Waddell, 2026. "District Digest: Community Colleges: Beyond the Numbers," Econ Focus, Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, vol. 26(Q3), pages 24-28, August.
    • Handle: RePEc:fip:fedrrf:103658
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    File URL: https://www.richmondfed.org/-/media/RichmondFedOrg/publications/research/econ_focus/2026/q3/district_digest.pdf
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