CEO Library

The report presents the findings from the America’s Promise Job-Driven Training Grants implementation study, which included virtual site visits, telephone interviews, a grantee survey, partner network survey, and Workforce Integrated Performance System (WIPS) data analysis, using data from 2017 to Q2 2021 and describes how the 23 America’s Promise partnerships used America’s Promise grants to provide sector-based employment and training services and form regional partnerships, including how the partnerships changed over time to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The evaluation of America’s Promise Job Driven Training (America’s Promise) provided a unique opportunity to hear directly from employers on their collaboration with the workforce development system. The brief draws on 31 interviews with employer representatives to describe why they chose to participate in regional workforce partnerships, how they helped shape partnership activities, what they perceived as successes and areas for improvement, whether they planned to sustain involvement, and what findings might provide insights for employer engagement more broadly.

The America’s Promise evaluation explored the strategies that regional partnerships used to engage with employers and the lessons they learned. The brief draws primarily on interviews with grantee and partner administrators and frontline staff collected through virtual site visits with 18 of the 23 America’s Promise partnerships in fall 2020. Across these 18 partnerships, advanced manufacturing was a target industry for 11 grant partnerships, health care for 9 grant partnerships, and information technology (IT) for 10 partnerships.

The report provides findings from the implementation study for the Evaluation of the Homeless Veterans’ Reintegration Program (HVRP), which relied on data from (1) a survey of all program year 2020 HVRP grantees, (2) semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders from eight deliberately selected grantees and their community partners, and (3) in-depth interviews with veterans who received services from one of those eight grantees.

The brief describes the experiences of 54 veterans in Homeless Veterans’ Reintegration Program (HVRP), the services they most appreciated, and gaps they perceived in the services. It describes veterans’ pathways to HVRP and their perceptions about the accessibility and responsiveness of HVRP grant staff, the helpfulness of the services, and how they were treated (such as whether they were treated respectfully). It concludes with their suggestions for improving HVRP.

Using data from the Homeless Veterans’ Reintegration Program (HVRP) grantee survey administered to grantees from program year 2020 and supplemented with interviews with staff from eight site visit grantees and their American Job Center (AJC) partners, the brief addresses three topics: (1) the AJC program in which a majority of HVRP participants were co-enrolled; (2) the percentage of participants receiving services at the AJC; and (3) the processes grantees used to co-enroll participants.

The brief describes the types of services Homeless Veterans’ Reintegration Program (HVRP) participants received at America's Job Centers and compares the service receipt of HVRP participants with other veterans experiencing homelessness who were not participating in HVRP. The data are from the Workforce Integrated Performance System (WIPS) and include all HVRP participants and other veterans experiencing homelessness across the United States who enrolled in the Wagner-Peyser Employment Service at AJCs during program year 2019 or 2020.

The brief uses implementation study data from the Homeless Veterans’ Reintegration Program (HVRP) Evaluation to discuss four main areas of HVRP with potential gaps and opportunities for improvement. The four areas, which emerged from an analysis of qualitative and grantee survey data, are (1) coordination with other public workforce development programs, (2) expansion of HVRP eligibility to other veterans, (3) emphasis on veterans’ skills and interests for employment opportunities, and (4) coordination with the homeless response system.

The report presents the findings from the implementation evaluation of the Veterans’ Employment and Training Service (VETS) Apprenticeship Pilot. The results of this descriptive study are intended to inform future efforts by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) and the U.S. Department of Defense to provide effective support to assist transitioning service members (TSMs) as they leave the military and move into civilian-sector jobs.

The toolkit represents successful practices in negotiating agreements to obtain and use administrative data in U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) program evaluations. It includes detailed instructions, recommendations, and lessons learned on how to obtain data from various data providers including state workforce agencies, community colleges, criminal justice agencies, and other DOL grantees, primarily by establishing data use agreements.

The technical appendix to Experiences of America’s Promise Participants During the “COVID-19 Recession”: Examining Gender Differences in Labor Market and Training Program Outcomes (Spitzer et al. 2022): Section A describes the data sources used for this study, Section B describes the approach taken to analyze employment and earnings, and Section C describes the approach taken to analyze program completion and enrollment.

The America’s Promise Job Driven Grant Program Evaluation Design Pre-Specification Plan follows the template that evaluators must use to meet the pre-specification practices articulated in OMB Memo M-20-12 Phase 4 Implementation of the Foundations for Evidence-Based Policymaking Act of 2018: Program Evaluation Standards and Practices.

The paper examines whether gender differences in outcomes emerged following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic among a group of people who recently enrolled in training aimed at preparing workers for careers in “middle- to high-skilled” industries and occupations. These people received training through programs funded by America’s Promise grants, with most programs focusing on advanced manufacturing, health care, or information technology.

The brief describes the challenges associated with helping low-income parents with children under the age of 13 pursuing training and employment to access affordable child care. It also proposes solutions that programs may undertake to increase their effectiveness in assisting parents with accessing and paying for appropriate child care. Further, it identifies barriers that remain to be addressed at the systems level.

The brief is based on lessons from an evaluation: a randomized controlled trial (RCT) of a small subset of the 53 TechHire and Strengthening Working Families Initiative (SWFI) programs—three TechHire programs and two SWFI programs—that explored the implementation and short-term impacts of TechHire and SWFI. In particular, this brief focuses on findings from the implementation analysis that was part of the RCT; data sources for the implementation analysis included observations of TechHire and SWFI programs, interviews with staff members, and a review of program participation data.

The report focuses on implementation of key changes to financial and management requirements for the American Job Center (AJC) system in order to seamlessly deliver services to all workforce customers across various partners. Data for this report are drawn primarily from site visit interviews, conducted in early 2019, with administrators, board chairs and members, employer and agency partners, and frontline staff in 14 states and 28 local areas. Other sources of information include administrative data and relevant state and local documents.

The report focuses on implementation of key changes to governance of the workforce system and how state and local workforce boards engage in planning across the core programs. Discussed here are the successes and challenges, promising practices, and possible areas for further technical assistance related to WIOA for workforce system governance and planning.

The report focuses on the implementation and short-term impacts of TechHire and Strengthening Working Families Initiative (SWFI) — capturing between 7 and 14 months of follow-up—in the five programs that participated in a randomized control trial. The implementation analysis explored broad research questions about how the programs were implemented and what factors facilitated or inhibited implementation.

The brief draws on data collected from virtual site visits with 18 of the 23 America’s Promise Job Driven Training (America’s Promise) grant programs as part of a comprehensive implementation study to explore the development of and services provided by regional grant partnerships involving workforce development agencies, institutions of higher education, economic development agencies, employers, and community based organizations.

The report presents findings from the Unemployment Insurance (UI) Deficit Financing Study. While the study is retrospective in nature, the report is designed to inform states’ decision making about UI-related borrowing activities in the future, discusses the rationale for the study, the research questions addressed and methods used, and a roadmap for the report.

The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) of 2014 included multiple provisions to strengthen service quality, access, accountability, and coordination across many programs. The report focuses on implementation of WIOA’s changes to various aspects of performance accountability and in other data-driven areas under the law, as related to the “core” workforce programs for Titles I and III.

The report provides the findings from the impact study of Youth CareerConnect (YCC). The YCC impact study assessed short-term student outcomes with two rigorous components—a quasi-experimental design (QED) study in 16 school districts and a randomized controlled trial (RCT) in four school districts that were also in the QED.

The report provides details on the data, samples, methods, and analyses for the Youth CareerConnect (YCC) impact study. Rigorously evaluating the effects of the YCC program on student outcomes required that multiple technical pieces be put in place, from selecting districts to participate in the evaluation to collecting and processing high-quality data and measuring impacts to conducting rigorous analysis to estimate impacts. This report provides details of these processes.

The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) of 2014 included multiple provisions to strengthen service quality, access, accountability, and coordination across many programs. The report focuses on implementation of key changes to the Title I Adult and Dislocated Worker programs under WIOA. Discussed are the successes and challenges, promising practices, and possible areas for further technical assistance related to WIOA for these two programs.

The Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) of 2014 included multiple provisions to strengthen service quality, access, accountability, and coordination across many programs. The report focuses on implementation of WIOA’s changes to various aspects of the WIOA Title I Youth program administered by the U.S. Department of Labor. The report covers changes regarding funding, service delivery approaches, performance accountability, and program elements.