The Forgotten Half Revisited
American Youth and Young Families, 1988-2008
Washington, DC - The nearly ten million 18-to-24 year-old Americans who don't go on to college after high school aren't doing as well as the end of the 1990's as they were a decade ago. In 1988, these young Americans were the focus of two landmark reports, The Forgotten Half: Non-College Youth in America and The Forgotten Half: Pathway to Success for America's Youth and Young Families, both by the William T. Grant Foundation Commission on Work, Family and Citizenship, which called the nation's attention to their shaky prospects for successful passages to productive adult lives.
While some progress is visible, "These young people are still losing ground" on many fronts, according to Samuel Halperin, editor of The Forgotten Half Revisited: American Youth and Young Families, 1988-2008. Halperin, who also served as study director for the 1988 reports, writes: "There has been scant progress in a few areas and quite substantial regression elsewhere. Ten years ago, most young people who were not going to college were receiving little adult or public assistance and, only with great difficulty, making the transition to adulthood. Their situation has changed only marginally since then."
Most key indicators -- as examined in essays by 15 prominent experts and commentators on such topics as public schooling, postsecondary education, family life, preparation for employment, youth and community development, and national service, show either disturbing stagnation or, in some areas, marked retrogression. Nationally- respected trend-spotter Daniel Yankelovich notes in his essay, for example, that we are beset by negative public perceptions of youth in such critical areas as education, moral values, and governmental and popular responses to the needs of young people.
Some Key Findings of The Forgotten Half Revisited:
Employment and Wages: Down and Unpromising. The critical transition from school to the workplace has become more painful than a decade ago. Moving to permanent employment is taking longer. Young workers who do not go on to college or career training are experiencing longer periods of unemployment and are relying more than ever on part-time, dead end jobs. Moreover, their tenure in jobs is shorter and less stable.
Even in a booming economy, full- and part-time employment rates among "The Forgotten Half" were actually lower in 1997 than in 1989. And for minority youth, full-time employment is 20 to 30 percent lower than their white counterparts. Overall, inflation-adjusted earnings for 20-24 year-old male workers fell by one-third, while young women were earning 16.5 percent less. In March 1997, more than one-fourth of out-of-school young adults who were working full-time were earning less than the poverty line income standard of just over $16,000 annually for a family of four.
Critical Social Indicators: Persisten Negative Trends
- Home ownership for young families fell from 49 to 38 percent between 1980 and the 1990s.
- The number of incarcerated young men under age 25 doubled between 1986 and 1995. On any given day
in America, one in ten 20-29-year-old males is in jail, on probation, or on parole. - Of the four million births annually in America, one in eight is to a teenager, one in four to an unmarried
mother with less than a high school education, and one in three to a mother living in poverty. - The rate of teen deaths by homicide per 100,000 more than doubled between 1985 and 1994.
According to Carol Emig, in her report on "The Changing American Family," the homicide rate of 100 deaths per 100,000 15-19 year-old African American males in 1996 is "the single most horrifying statistic in the child and family field" -- eight times larger than for white males in the same age group.
Educational Attainment: Moderately Encouraging.
The data on educational attainment are uneven but slightly more positive than negative. From 1990 to 1997, the percentage of adult Americans who earned a high school diploma or GED rose from 28.3 to 31.4. And the percentage of those earning a bachelor's degree rose from 11.4 to 14.1 percent. This encouraging news was accompanied by high school dropout rates that fell from 9.5 percent in 1985 to 7.3 in 1996.
The most influential factor determining educational attainment, however, remains family income and there the news is not as good, as the gap widens along an income fault-line. Families with the lowest 25 percent of incomes have a high school graduation rate of 67 percent, compared to 94 percent among students from families in the top 25 percent of earners. The latter are also as much as ten times more likely to earn a college degree than are those in the bottom 25 percent. The report labels the proposition that "In America, everybody goes to college" a myth.
School Reform: A Mixed Bag. Assessing the impact of 15 years of school reform efforts, Jack Jennings and Diane Stark Rentner point out that "The Forgotten Half" of ten years ago may be more nearly a "Forgotten Third" today, as more high school graduates begnin (but not necessarily complete) postsecondary education. Although some reforms are taking hold -- increasingly rigourous course work, higher standards and tougher graduation requirements, for example -- the academic performance of America's students still lags behind that of their peers in many othe countries. "The curriculum may have to be altered to expose Americans to more difficult subjects earlier," they comment. While the initial news on reform is encouraging, the bad news is that those left behind face a bleaker economic future than did their counterparts in the 1980's. As education and skills have become increasingly vital to adult success, we are still losing a third or more of our young people to a limited economic future.
The Community Response: Promising Signs. Among the more heartening news is what is happening for young people in many communities, as reported by Martin J. Blank and Carol Steinbach. They see "a new breed of youth-focused initiatives," that are moving away from imposed, top-down solutions and toward community-generated responses to young adult problems. Communities across the country, report the authors, are focusing more intently on their roles as "keepers of values" and "human ecosystems."
Youth Service: Another Bright Spot. Evaluations of the many youth-service programs begun since publication of The Forgotten Half reports of 1988 reveal that young people responded positively to natonal and community service, and that such service has a positive effect on academic performance, building character and forming values. Author Shirley Sagawa notes that it is now possible "to make service a common experience of every child growning up in America."
Youth Development: A Call Heard. Ten years ago, The Forgotten Half was in the forefront of a call to shift the main emphasis of the nation's concern for it's youth from treatment and deterrence to positive youth development. That call has "generated a suprising energy and enthusiasm," according to Karen Pittman and Merita Irby. They view the most encouraging outcome as an "increased acceptance of youth development as a broad goal requiring intentional monitoring and intervention."
The Nation's Best Investment. In a concluding essay, educational statesman Harold "Doc" Howe II, former U.S. Commissioner of Education who headed the study group that issued the 1988 Forgotten Half reports, reminds that the most powerful and least expensive strategy for solving the problems facing America's young adults remains prevention, particularly throug a large-scale expansion of quality Head Start adn early childhood programs. Overall, says Howe, vigorous efforts to build "social capital" -- opportunities for youth to gain skills, knowledge and support services -- are required to complement the successes America has had in boosting educational attainment.
As part of such an effort, Howe believes the country needs to adopt a firm policy position on how, in a pluralistic society, we educate students whose first language is not English, and how we work to integrate them into an increasingly diverse culture. This, he believes, is the nation's greatest challenge. "Our country needs to be reminded that young people do grow up ... and their success in life is the best investment we could make."
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