Does Coursework Matter? Uncovering the Role of Skills in the Returns to College

• In Event: The Value of College Coursework

Abstract

While it's well-established that higher education enhances employability, the economic returns to college vary significantly across disciplines and institutions. Higher education investment includes four important dimensions: whether to attend college, which college to attend, what field to study, and which courses to take. Previous research often uses the first three dimensions to proxy skill specialization and measure success in the job market, but these metrics cannot capture the broad range of skills acquired through higher education. In this paper, I take the fourth dimension—coursework—into account and examine its relationship with majors, skills, and the impact on labor market outcomes. I create a novel dataset consisting of course descriptions extracted from online course catalogs. By employing natural language processing (NLP) techniques to analyze the content of courses, I identify the skills students gain from their coursework. I then link this with comprehensive K-20 Texas administrative data to examine labor market returns to skills acquired through coursework. I also leverage year-to-year variation in course availability as instrumental variables. This paper provides a new perspective on understanding whether college coursework matters for labor market outcomes, and to what extent coursework-based skills explain differences in returns across and within majors.

Author

• Yaling Xu, Cornell University
  Presenting Author