There is one powerful exception to our general observation about the independence of education providers from employers. In the health sector, occupations are subject to public regulation through state licensing requirements. These requirements specify the educational requirements for particular health occupations, including the duration of programs, the skills that must be taught, and the related academic content that must be included. Such requirements are binding on both employers and educational providers since employers must hire licensed health care workers and providers must meet licensing requirements if their students are ever to get jobs. The licensing requirements therefore structure a congruence between the expectations of employers and the programs in community colleges. In turn, this may explain why the economic benefits of certificates and associate degrees in health occupations are larger than in other occupational areas (Grubb, 1992b).
Furthermore, the process of establishing and implementing licensing requirements puts employers and providers in constant contact.[61] Typically, the committees and task forces in charge of establishing licensing requirements are composed of both employers and providers. The enforcement of licensing requirements is also carried out by accrediting committees, again with both employers and providers represented; the scrutiny of each educational program therefore takes place by a committee of both peers and employers. The amount of regular contact between providers and employers around issues that matter greatly is therefore substantial.
The contrast between these organized occupations in which required skills have been carefully codified by committees of employers and providers and markets in business occupations or computer-related occupations or many of the crafts where required skills vary substantially and are not codified at all is striking. In the unorganized labor markets more typical of sub-baccalaureate occupations, there is much more variation in the skills required among different types of jobs that are identically labeled and much less consistency in what employers expect from their employees and what educational institutions provide. The amount of sustained contact between providers and employers is much less--except perhaps in well-constructed co-op programs--and there is no necessity to reach agreement about something like licensing requirements that are binding on all parties. In contrast to health occupations, where the occupations and their requirements are well-known and the educational programs necessary to enter occupations are unambiguous, students are on their own with little guidance about job prospects and the best ways of qualifying for them.
There are not many examples of organized occupations in the sub-baccalaureate labor market aside from health occupations. A few other occupations are licensed--for example, cosmetologists--though such requirements now vary from state to state and some industry groups have tried to establish skill requirements and certificate programs, for example, in the areas of auto repair and inventory control. These are exceptions, however, and are still sporadic and voluntary; they have clearly not affected the majority of occupations in the sub-baccalaureate labor market nor the majority of community college programs. However, the current interest in establishing skill standards (Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce, 1990; Secretary's Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills [SCANS], 1991), following the model of Germany, is a potential harbinger of changes in this area.
We conclude, then, that while many mechanisms link community colleges and area vocational schools to employers in the sub-baccalaureate labor market, most of them work imperfectly.[62] To be sure, specific programs and individual instructors maintain strong ties to employers; the co-op programs in Cotooli link providers and employers quite well; and in health occupations, licensing requirements and the codification of skills establish close working relations between employers and providers. But institutionally, most educational providers are relatively distant from employers; they have little knowledge of specific employers, job opportunities, hiring requirements, promotion opportunities in various occupations and with various employers, and other aspects of local employment that are crucial to their students and to the content of their programs. They know almost nothing about where their students are placed and rely on hearsay and anecdote rather than direct evidence. Above all, the incentives for educational institutions to be responsive to employers are lacking since they are enrollment-driven and not outcome-oriented. The most distinct image we are left with is one in which two independent worlds coexist: the world of educational providers--enrollment-driven but relatively disconnected from employers--and the world of employers who (as we will see in the next section) are often unfamiliar with educational providers and indifferent to their activities.
[61] See especially Hudis et al. (1992), who describe health occupations in the San Francisco Bay area based on interviews with employers and education providers.
[62] For a similar conclusion about poor "alignment" between community colleges and high-tech employers based on research in the early 1980s in Silicon Valley and the Route 128 area near Boston, see Useem (1986).