Roberto Gonzales Helps Chart a Path for Education and Workforce Opportunity

Roberto Gonzales, the Richard Perry University Professor and a Penn Integrates Knowledge Professor, is among 30 national leaders who have spent the past two years developing a roadmap to help more people in the United States successfully navigate the transition from high school to college, careers, service, and other opportunities.

The American Academy of Arts and Sciences’ Commission on Opportunities After High School released its final report, Thriving After High School: Community, School, Service, and Work, on September 23. The report offers 10 recommendations for state and local policymakers, K–12 and higher education leaders, and employers aimed at expanding economic and social mobility and creating multiple high-quality pathways to success. 

“It was an honor serving on the Commission and I'm incredibly excited for the launch of Thriving After High School: Community, School, Service, and Work,” said Gonzales. “This report is a culmination of two years of sustained work, undertaken by 30 multidisciplinary leaders with the intention of building a consensus roadmap for transforming our education and workforce systems in a way that empowers all people in the United States with a sense of self-direction, possibility, and opportunity.”

The Commission was co-chaired by Hunter College President Nancy Cantor, President of the University of North Texas Harrison Keller, and Bridget Terry Long, Bridget Terry Long, Saris Professor of Education and Economics and former dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Its findings are the result of listening sessions and roundtables across the country with students, educators, college administrators, employers, philanthropists, and workforce development organizations. 

The recommendations emphasize the need to better connect education and workforce systems and give learners greater flexibility in charting their futures. Among them are calls to break down silos and create greater shared responsibility across education and workforce systems; make it easier for people to pursue nonlinear pathways and reengage with education; and ensure learners, alumni, and workers have access to effective advising and mentoring. 

The report is accompanied by an interactive resource highlighting more than 100 local and regional initiatives already putting related ideas into practice. Examples include programs combining degrees with guaranteed employment, state systems that connect education and workforce data to inform decision-making, and service programs that simultaneously address community needs and build workforce pipelines. 

Rather than advancing a single route after graduation, the Commission argues for a connected system encompassing college degrees, credentials, service opportunities, and earn-and-learn models, with pathways that can respond to learners’ changing goals and circumstances. 

For Gonzales, the report represents not simply a set of recommendations, but an effort to build common ground around how the country can better equip people to shape their own futures.

Read the American Academy of Arts and Sciences announcement and explore the Commission’s report and resources.