Resource Library

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 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.

Building on an interim impact report at 18 months after program start, this final impact report describes each Ready to Work (RTW) Partnership Grant program’s impacts on participant earnings and employment through 3 years or more. For the report, the evaluation pre-specified average quarterly earnings for the period from 1 year to 2.5 years after random assignment as the evaluation’s main indicator of the extent to which a given RTW program had impact.

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 technical appendices to The Ready to Work Partnership Grant Evaluation: Findings from the Final Impact Study of Four Employment Services Programs for the Long-Term Unemployed (Klerman, Herr, and Martinson 2022): Appendix A: Additional RTW Impact Study Technical Information, Appendix B: Demographic Comparison of RTW Samples to U.S.

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 brief documents the impact of four Ready to Work (RTW) programs on participants’ service and credential receipt through 18 months after random assignment, and on participants' employment and earnings through three to four years after random assignment.

The brief reports results of an exploration of survey non-bias using data collected for the evaluation of the Ready to Work (RTW) Partnership Grant program. Additional detail on the RTW program and its evaluation are also provided.

In 2016, the Employment and Training Administration, in partnership with the Chief Evaluation Office, awarded a contract to Abt Associates, with the Urban Institute, MEF Associates, W.E. Upjohn Institute, Capital Research Corporation, George Washington University, and McBassi & Company to evaluate the American Apprenticeship Initiative (AAI) training programs across all 46 grantees, mostly community colleges. 

The AAI programs seek to: