Postgraduation outcomes for community college students are complex. In addition to traditional job placement and earnings information, transferring to a 4‐year institution is a positive first‐destination outcome. Furthermore, community college students may have education and career goals that do not include earning a degree. Community college measures of success, two case studies, and how community colleges use outcomes data will be discussed.

Over 4000 prospective secondary and elementary teachers were tested in a national study to determine their knowledge of fourteen consumer subject areas. In the area of consumer food and nutrition knowledge the prospective teachers achieved only 48%. This area of consumer food and nutrition was found to be a critical weakness of prospective teachers relative to their performance in the other consumer subject areas. Prospective home economics and agriculture teachers scored higher than other majors on the food and nutrition questions but still revealed a poor cognitive grasp of the subject. Because of their impact on children's attitudes toward food and their eating patterns, prospective teachers need to be knowledgeable about food concepts. This study has implications for educators and college curriculum committees concerning the need for college level courses which deal with food and nutrition concepts.

The purpose of this study was to examine the energy beliefs of western U.S. residents. Data from the Western Regional Project W‐159, ‘Consequences of Energy Conservation Policies for Western Region Households' were analysed. Using a sample of 5,471, respondents' beliefs about the energy efficiency of their current dwelling and actual energy saving features were compared. A significant Kendall correlation was found and these two measures were then used to divide the sample into two groups, respondents with energy efficient dwellings and respondents with energy inefficient dwellings. Chi‐square analyses yielded significant differences between the two subsamples' beliefs about the seriousness of the U.S. energy problem and whether to solve it by conserving energy or increasing production. The two sub‐samples' beliefs about a series of mandatory and incentive energy conservation policies were compared. For all policies except requiring home energy audits, significant differences were found between the two subsamples' beliefs. Overall, the incentive energy conservation policies were favoured over the mandatory policies. Sample respondents with energy efficient dwellings were more often opposed or strongly opposed to the incentive policies than were the respondents with energy inefficient dwellings.

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