Data Access Files for: Do Dual Enrollment Students Realize Better Long-Term Earnings? Variations in Financial Outcomes Among Key Student Groups in Texas

This study considers
whether dual enrollment is associated with students’ earnings outcomes over a longer,
ten-year time horizon after high school graduation than previously analyzed in
the existing literature. Using longitudinal administrative data that span K-12,
higher education, and the workforce, we conduct a propensity score analysis to
understand how dual credit participation among five cohorts in the state of
Texas—the 2008-2012 high school graduating classes—correlates with annual
earnings measured through the tenth year post high school graduation. We find
that dual credit participants realize lower earnings than non-participants
during the first four years after high school graduation, but achieve higher
earnings in years five through ten, netting a cumulative ten-year earnings
increase of 6%. We find similar results across many student subpopulations, though
smaller magnitudes of association for some, suggesting that dual enrollment
relates favorably to distal measures of students’ financial wellbeing.