Dr. Jessica Ordemann

This article gives an overview about current research on non-traditional students and alumni in Germany. Its aim is to highlight similarities and differences with their traditional counterparts. The paper concentrates on the motivation to study, study performance, and labor market success (status and income) of those who do not hold a traditional higher education entrance certificate but entered university via occupational qualifications. We show a widespread divergence in findings from no statistical difference at all to clear differences between non-traditional and traditional students and alumni. This holds true with regard to student motivation, study performance, and labor market success after graduation.

The following paper inquires if studying without an official university entrance certification decreases the relationship between social origin and status attainment for those non-traditionals. Using data of the starting cohort adults SC6 7.0.0 of the National Educational Panel Study (NEPS) I can show, that after five years in the labor market, the social origins of non-traditionals from the lower and middle classes have no effect on their status attainment, whereas it still effects – negatively - the status attainment of those non-traditionals from higher classes.

This paper analyzes how these worries developed over an extended period of 30 years. To do this, a longitudinal analysis of data from the German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP) between the years 1984 and 2014 was used. The descriptive trend analyses and random effects-ordered probit-regressions followed by a marginsplot reveal that from the beginning of the observation period up to the year 2005, the fear of job loss rose in all social classes, but was at its strongest for the for the middle middle class...

This article examines the extent to which the former occupation of an employee impacts the likelihood that one will decide to volunteer upon retirement. Following social production function theory, we assume that beginning with retirement, the status value attached to their former occupation fades. Because volunteering has the character of a collective good, it provides an opportunity to gain social status, offsetting the loss of occupational status. However, the extent of the incentive to volunteer will be distributed unequally across occupations: the higher the former occupational status value, the higher the perceived loss of status after retirement. Thus, a job with high status value increases the incentive to volunteer in retirement.