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A class of University students sit together at long desks, each with notebooks and laptops out in front of them as they take notes during the lecture. They are all dressed casually and are listening attentively as they look to the front of the class and soak in all the information.

Community college students who earn an associate degree in the humanities don’t have better career outcomes compared to their peers with a high school diploma. A new pilot program led by Jobs for the Future helps embed career readiness into curriculum.

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Humanities degrees have come under attack in recent years as programs that do not provide a significant return on investment for graduates entering the workforce, and while data shows bachelor’s degrees do pay off, associate degrees in the liberal arts are less likely to provide significant outcomes.

To better support students who study the humanities in community colleges, Jobs for the Future (JFF), with support from the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Foundation, launched a pilot program at three community colleges that embeds career development into curriculum.

The Humanities to Career Program is designed to promote students’ lasting skills, such as communication, leadership and critical thinking, in a quickly evolving technology landscape as well as to provide certification and on-the-job training to make graduates more competitive. JFF researchers outlined the start of this work and how partner institutions are implementing programs in a recently published report.

What’s the need: In the 2022–23 academic year, the largest share of learners who completed an associate degree majored in liberal arts and sciences, general studies or humanities (around 313,600 students), according to data from the National Student Clearinghouse.

Students who receive bachelor’s degrees in a humanities field are more likely to be employed compared to those with just a high school degree, but those who earn an associate degree in the humanities don’t see the same labor market benefits versus their peers with just a high school diploma.

Many community colleges assume the average student who completes a two-year degree in the humanities or liberal arts (HLA) is planning to transfer to a four-year program, and this assumption leaves students underprepared if they leave higher education. Around 40 percent of associate degree earners who don’t complete a bachelor’s are HLA majors and a large share are students of color or from low-income backgrounds.

How it works: JFF announced the initiative in fall 2023 and the pilot launched in early 2024. The Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Foundation allocated $2.7 million to the program in total, distributed in three $900,000 grants to each of the participating institutions: Bunker Hill Community College in Massachusetts, Lorain County Community College in Ohio and Northern Virginia Community College.

One of the primary goals of the pilot is to define and outline what professional skills are and how the degree program introduces students to and builds their capabilities in each skill.

Each college is responsible for embedding business and professional credentials into HLA courses, incorporating lessons and activities to introduce students to the world of work, establishing internships or other work-based learning experiences, providing professional development opportunities for faculty and staff and partnering with employers to demonstrate the value of HLA competencies. But how that looks in practice depends on each campus and its context.

Bunker Hill Community College has an existing framework for career development in first-year courses but will now include a micro-credentialing program that helps students articulate their career competencies to employers.

Lorain County Community College is focused on preparing students to transfer to a four-year institution and created a cohort of 30 students in an HLA co-curricular learning community this past spring which exposes students to career exploration, industry credentials and internship preparation. Faculty members have also received professional training on understanding the local labor market and its needs.

Northern Virginia Community College established an advisory council to identify specific career skills to emphasize in the project and then created the HLA Career and Learning Readiness Institute, which provides workshops and lectures based on industry-needed skills. HLA students will also complete a micro-internship with Parker Dewey as their capstone activity.

Internships in Focus

One of the challenges of career preparation for humanities students is a lack of internships specifically targeted toward these learners. A Student Voice survey by Inside Higher Ed published in winter 2023 found 50 percent of arts and humanities students are required to complete an internship, but one-quarter had never completed any experiential learning.

Staff at Old Dominion University in Virginia created the Monarch Humanities Internship Academy to help humanities students land paid internships through partnering with employers and providing stipends for individuals in underpaid or unpaid roles.

What’s next: JFF is evaluating the implementation and outcomes of each pilot to determine effectiveness, paying special attention to if students built professional skills, gained work experience or earned industry credentials. Each campus has unique characteristics that will add complexity to analyzing and evaluating data, but researchers believe this will enrich findings overall.

In the report, authors wrote, “We’re optimistic that the three pilot projects … will identify new approaches to postsecondary education and career preparation that will not only put community college liberal arts and humanities students in better positions to land quality jobs and enter careers offering opportunities for economic advancement, but also help employers to better understand and value the skills and expertise students gain in two-year programs.”

Do you have a career prep tip that might help others encourage student success? Tell us about it.

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