College Students and Career Aspirations: Nudging Student Interest in Teaching

Last registered on June 24, 2024
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
College Students and Career Aspirations: Nudging Student Interest in Teaching
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0013764
Initial registration date
June 04, 2024

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
June 24, 2024, 9:25 AM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country
United States of America
Region
Michigan

Primary Investigator

Name
Alvin Christian
Affiliation
University of Michigan
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Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Basit Zafar
PI Affiliation
University of Michigan
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Matthew Ronfeldt
PI Affiliation
University of Michigan
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Additional Trial Information

Status
Completed
Start date
2022-04-21
End date
2022-06-07
Keywords
Behavior, Education
Additional Keywords
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Prior work
This trial does not extend or rely on any prior RCTs.
Abstract
We survey undergraduate students at a large public university to understand the pecuniary and non-pecuniary factors driving their college major and career decisions with a focus on K-12 teaching. While the average student reports there is a 6% chance they will pursue teaching, almost 27% report a nonzero chance of working as a teacher in the future. Students, relative to existing statistics, generally believe they would earn substantially more in a non-teaching job (relative to a teaching job). We run a randomized information experiment where we provide students with information on the pecuniary and non-pecuniary job characteristics of teachers and non-teachers. This low-cost informational intervention impacts students' beliefs about their job characteristics if they were to work as a teacher or non-teacher, and increases the reported likelihood they will major or minor in education by 35% and pursue a job as a teacher or in education by 14%. Linking the survey data with administrative transcript records, we find that the intervention had small (and weak) impacts on the decision to minor in education in the subsequent year. Overall, our results indicate that students hold biased beliefs about their career prospects, they update these beliefs when provided with information, and that this information has limited impacts on their choices regarding studying and having a career in teaching.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Christian, Alvin, Matthew Ronfeldt and Basit Zafar. 2024. "College Students and Career Aspirations: Nudging Student Interest in Teaching." AEA RCT Registry. June 24. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.13764-1.0
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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
We survey freshmen and sophomores at the University of Michigan about their future major/minor and career decisions, including their beliefs about the career characteristics of teachers and non-teachers, their likelihood of studying education, and their likelihood of working as a teacher or non-teacher. We run a randomized information experiment by embedding an informational intervention in our survey. After documenting students’ baseline beliefs, we randomize them into a control group that receives arguably irrelevant information and a treatment group that receives objective information on the pecuniary and non-pecuniary job characteristics for teachers and non-teachers from the National Survey of College Graduates (NSCG), a nationally representative sample of working-age college graduates. In a second treatment arm, students receive additional information on the importance of gender and racial diversity in the teaching profession. We then
re-elicit students’ beliefs to identify how providing information impacted students’ beliefs about the job characteristics of teachers and non-teachers, their beliefs about their job characteristics if they were to work as a teacher or non-teacher at age 30, and their beliefs about their intended major and career.
Intervention Start Date
2022-04-21
Intervention End Date
2022-06-07

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
Students' beliefs about how much they would earn or work as a teacher or non-teacher.

Students beliefs about their future career's characteristics including the likelihood they will have benefits and be satisfied in it.

Students' reported likelihood of majoring or minoring in education and working as a teacher or in education.

Number of education courses taken and actual major and minor declarations.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
Students' reported likelihood of majoring or minoring in education and working as a teacher or in education: these are reported as a percent chance (0-100).

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
We run a randomized information experiment by embedding an informational intervention in our survey. We randomize a subset of students into a control group that receives arguably irrelevant information and a treatment group that receives objective information on the pecuniary and non-pecuniary job characteristics for teachers and non-teachers from the National Survey of College Graduates (NSCG), a nationally representative sample of working-age college graduates. In a second treatment arm, students receive additional information on the importance of gender and racial diversity in the teaching profession.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
Randomization done via Qualtrics survey.
Randomization Unit
Individual
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
N/A
Sample size: planned number of observations
9,221 freshmen and sophomore (actual n = 1,269)
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
406 control, 450 treatment 1, and 413 treatment 1 + treatment 2
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Human Subjects Studies
IRB Approval Date
2022-03-01
IRB Approval Number
HUM00210997
Analysis Plan

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials