#3 Most Adults Believe Their Short-Term Certificates Are Useful for Getting a Job—Even if the Job Is Unrelated to Their Credential

Although many students are dissatisfied with their wages,¹ the majority of adults believe their short-term certificate is either somewhat or very useful for getting a job (Figure 4). Many participants in the focus groups believe that their program helped them to earn the certificate they needed to get a job and improve their skills,² judging the quality of their short-term programs on their ability to readily obtain employment and develop their skills.³ However, almost half of adults with short-term certificates in the ATES survey believe their credential is not useful for increasing their pay, while the other half of adults believe it is either somewhat or very useful to help them earn more money.

About two in five adults with a short-term certificate believe their current job is not related to their credential. Relatively split down the middle, a similar percentage (37 percent) of adults believe their short-term certificate is either somewhat or very related to their current job. Figure 5 shows that about one in four students get a job that is very related to their short-term certificate (15 weeks or fewer). These findings reveal that the odds are not in students’ favor for finding a job in an industry very related to their short-term certificate.