As more learners juggle work, caregiving, and college, stronger connections between higher education and the workforce can help improve career outcomes.
Today’s learners are balancing courses, work, family life, and caregiving while earning a degree. An estimated 64% of college students are working while enrolled in higher education programs, 37% are over the age of 25, and 24% are parents. Reflecting these changing demographics, one-third of the respondents to the 2025 Student Financial Wellness Survey conducted by Trellis Strategies identified themselves as “a worker who goes to school” rather than “a student who works.” These realities are reshaping what learners need from the higher education system.
Our latest fact sheet, Building Postsecondary Program Pathways into the Workforce for Today’s Learners, takes a closer look at the challenges facing today’s learners and outlines practical strategies for strengthening connections between higher education and the workforce.
With learners managing many other responsibilities outside of school, it has become increasingly important for higher education institutions to strengthen connections between curriculum and career experiences. Creating clearer pathways from education to employment can lead to learners being more prepared as they advance in, or enter, the workforce. In our report, Online by Design: Improving Career Connection for Today’s Learners, we dive into how career experience can be embedded throughout higher education programs to help set learners up for success in the workforce.
Aligning Education with Workforce Needs
Workforce-aligned college programs that feature career advising, stackable credentials, employer partnerships, and work-based learning opportunities, can help learners build essential skills while earning their degree. Programs like SNHU’s competency-based education (CBE) partnerships with nonprofit organizations, including Rivet School, Gateway U, and Duet demonstrate how flexible degree pathways paired with personalized coaching and other supports can accelerate the path to degree completion for working learners. Among Rivet School’s educator pathway learners, 83% complete at least 8 credits per term of enrollment, and 74% of graduates have secured a job within 9 months of graduation, demonstrating how career-connected learning and support can accelerate both degree completion and career advancement.
As the largest provider of allied health graduates in Texas, The College of Health Care Professions (CHCP) works with employer advisory committees for every program to continuously update curricula based on industry feedback. By embedding short-term credentials into degree programs and externships, CHCP learners gain career-ready skills while improving their employment and earnings potential before graduation.
The new Short-Term Pell Program provides an opportunity to expand access to high-quality, short-term education while strengthening pathways to continued learning and economic mobility. Success will depend on how effectively higher education institutions, employers, and states work together to create programs that meet both learner and workforce needs. You can read more in CHEPP’s recent blog, Ensuring Short-Term Credentials Work for Learners.
Policy Solutions for Strengthening Career Pathways
Strengthening connections between higher education programs and careers requires action from both higher education institutions, employers, and policymakers. Expanding career advising, offering work-based learning programs, recognizing work experience through credit for prior learning, improving transfer credit transfer systems, and expanding access to flexible education pathways can help students finish their degree while developing in-demand skills all while balancing work and family life.
Actions policymakers and higher education institutions can take to help today’s learners include:
- Increase funding for career advising and navigation services.
- Expand work-based learning options, such as apprenticeships, that allow students to earn an income while receiving training.
- Support flexible higher education pathways, such as online, hybrid, and competency-based education (CBE) that allow working students to access higher education opportunities.
As employer expectations evolve and today’s learners continue to balance work, family and education, strengthening connections between higher education and career can help more students complete their credentials, advance in the workforce, and meet the needs of a changing economy.
More details can be found in CHEPP’s recent fact sheet, Building Postsecondary Program Pathways into the Workforce for Today’s Learners.