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Prior research has shown that students from lower socio-economic backgrounds are less likely to graduate. We examine if this can be explained by background-specific pathways into higher education. Many students in Germany enter higher education with a vocational qualification and prior vocational qualifications occur more often among students from lower socio-economic backgrounds. We argue that vocational qualifications shift opportunity structures and opportunity costs of students who have to decide between continuing higher education and alternative options. We therefore examine if parental background and vocational qualifications are associated with the destinations after non-completion. We distinguish the destinations "re-entering higher education", "vocational training" and "skilled employment". Using the German Educational Panel Study (NEPS starting cohort 6), we apply competing risks models. Our results show that non-completers from higher socio-economic backgrounds are more likely to re-enter higher education than non-completers from lower socio-economic backgrounds. The higher rates of transfer to skilled employment among non-completers from lower backgrounds are mainly due to the fact that they more often hold a vocational qualification and have good chances to enter the skilled labour market without additional educational investments. Our results hence shed some new light on the question how vocational training "diverts" lower background students from higher education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Family practice is an important setting for health promotion and prevention in Germany. However, there is a research gap regarding the involvement of nonmedical practice staff in health promotion. Therefore, our aim is to gain an indepth understanding of the role health care assistants (HCAs) can play regarding health promotion in family practice. Methods: We conducted 21 qualitative semi-structured interviews via telephone with 14 physicians and 7 HCAs, inquiring both professional groups about the role of HCAs concerning health promotion in their practice. The interviews were evaluated separately for both professions using thematic analysis. Results: In addition to organizational tasks such as making an appointment and communicating with physicians, HCAsmainly take on a key function as the first contact person in all practices: They recognize preventive needs, select eligible patients early at the reception and actively address them about preventive services. In some practices, HCAs carry out health-promoting measures such as training courses. However, with regard to further delegation of tasks, physicians in particular expressed concerns as they did not want to overburden HCAs. Conclusions: HCAs often take on organizational activities with regard to health promotion in family practice, but due to their function in the practice structure, they can also shape the practice as a health-promoting setting for patients. In addition, HCAs navigate patients with regard to preventive and health-promoting services. In accordance with their key role as initial contact, it should be worked out together with HCAs how health promotion can be addressed in a structured way at first contact. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we investigate whether and if so why different pathways to higher education (HE) have an effect on the development of the intention to study and its motivational factors of pupils from different social backgrounds. In Germany as well as in many other countries, non-traditional pathways—mostly vocational oriented schools, but also comprehensive schools—lead to eligibility for HE. Drawing on the theory of planned behaviour (Ajzen in Organ Behav Human Decis Process 50:179–211, 1991); Fishbein and Ajzen (Belief, attitude, intention and behaviour. An introduction to theory and research, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Reading, MA, 1975) and empirical results, we assume that the intention to study and motivational factors (= attitudes towards HE, the perceptions of expectations of relevant others, control beliefs) of pupils in vocationally oriented pathways develop less favourably than those of pupils in comprehensive schools, and that for pupils in vocationally oriented pathways the effects of social backgrounds on intentions and motivational factors become stronger due to school-type specific college-going cultures. Our database consists of the responses of 7133 pupils in comprehensive schools and vocationally oriented two-year and three-year pathways to HE at the beginning (t1) and the end (t2) of upper secondary education. We use Propensity Score Matching to disentangle selection and socialization effects. Our results show that among vocationally oriented pathways, only two-year pathways divert pupils from HE, partly due to decreasing expectations of relevant others and attitudes towards HE. In contrast, the intention to study and the motivational factors among pupils in direct as well as in three-year vocationally oriented pathways remain stable during upper secondary education. No differential effects of the pathways on pupils from different social backgrounds could be observed. Thus, vocationally oriented pathways do not in general divert their pupils from HE, but if they do so, all pupils are affected regardless of social background. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Women's life courses underwent substantial changes in the family and work domains in the second half of the twentieth century. The associated fundamental changes in opportunity structures and values challenged the importance of families of origin for individual life courses, but two research strands suggest enduring within-family reproduction of women's family behavior and work outcomes. We revisit this issue by studying two complementary types of intergenerational associations in women's combined work-family trajectories. On the one hand, we examine similarities across mothers' and daughters' work-family trajectories to address the direct within-family reproduction of female life courses (intergenerational persistence). On the other hand, we examine systematic associations between work-family trajectories that are typical in each generation to address intergenerational interdependencies beyond direct reproduction that account for individual and societal constrains and opportunities that each generation faced (intergenerational correspondence). We use a within-dyad approach to sequence analysis and examine combined work-family trajectories between ages 18 and 35 of two generations of women, born in 1930-1949 and in 1958-1981, within the same family drawn from the German Socio-Economic Panel. Overall, we find evidence of small but nontrivial persistence in work-family trajectories across generations that is partly attributed to within-family mechanisms of reproduction. In addition, we find correspondence across typical trajectory patterns of each generation, without daughters necessarily resembling their mothers' trajectories. The strength of the intergenerational associations varies by social background. Our research improves and broadens our understanding of the reproduction of female life courses across generations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Digital skills are thought to be a key competence of the twenty-first century. With the rapid growth of internet and communication tool (ICT) usage among both students and teachers, cooperative (co-op) education programmes, like other educational institutions, face the challenge of integrating and supporting digital skill development. However, little is known about how these skills are developed prior to entering cooperative education programmes. Against this background, a sample of 893 freshers, ranging from vocational students to co-op students, were tested according to their digital skills. The analysis shows that co-op students have a higher level of competence than vocational students. In addition, we found that in our sample social background has no impact on digital competences. The results are discussed and classified in the context of the current state of research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes time to first degree at German universities. The database is the 'Absolventenpanel' 2001, a panel study conducted by the 'Hochschul-Informations-System.' The German university system is characterized by a long duration of study; the regular time is often exceeded. One potential reason might be the high proportion of students reporting part-time work during their studies. This paper focuses on the relationship between the working status of German students and their time to degree. Besides that, additional individual characteristics and parental background are included. Analysis is carried out for ten fields of study separately. The descriptive analysis reveals a positive correlation between the amount of part-time work and the duration of study. In the empirical analysis, the Cox proportional hazards model is applied. The results confirm that part-time work has an increasing effect on time to degree. These results and the aspect that mainly socially underprivileged students are engaged in part-time working during their studies should be considered in the political discussions of tertiary education financing and the Bologna process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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In this article, we evaluate the impact of social origin on the realisation of educational intentions at the time of becoming eligible for higher education in Germany. In general, we find high persistence of intentions and actual attendance of higher education. However, effects of parental education on the changes of educational intentions increase the existing social inequality with regard to higher education at the time of leaving secondary school. The group which is affected most are those young adults planning to study after vocational training-while the gap between different origin groups does not widen much during other stop-outs from education. This can be explained only partly by previous educational performance. The findings suggest that estimates of educational inequality are attenuated when entry into higher education is approximated by educational intentions of young adults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After publication of our article (Tobisch and Dresel 2017) it came to our attention that in the section "2.2 The case of Germany". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study analyses the selection of a sample of 203 young male asylum seekers from Middle Eastern and African countries that recently arrived in Germany. The findings suggest that, on average, asylum seekers in our sample have 22% more years of schooling—the indicator used for human capital—when compared to same-aged males from their country of origin. In addition, the analysis suggests that asylum seekers in the sample often accumulated rather low or relatively high levels of schooling compared to same-aged males in their countries of origin. This phenomenon is even more pronounced for parental education. It is demonstrated that individual human capital influences short-run integration outcomes in Germany. The paper discusses potential economic explanations for the findings on immigrant selection and integration outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]