Follow-up analyses of the National JTPA Study sample (Orr et al. 1997)

Citation

Orr, L., Barnow, B., Lerman, R., & Beecroft, E. (1997). Follow-up analyses of the National JTPA Study sample. Cambridge, MA: Abt Associates, Inc.

This report presented and analyzed findings from a follow-up examination of the National Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) Study, an impact study whose final report was published in 1994. The JTPA program offered academic and occupational training, on-the-job training, job search assistance, and other support services to adults and out-of-school youth.
This report used the experimental data from the National JTPA Study to explore whether JTPA had positive effects on earnings of subgroups of youth, factors that had positive impacts on welfare recipients’ earnings, and implications of the National JTPA Study for improving the JTPA performance management system.
The report found that the JTPA program had a small impact on the earnings of out-of-school youth and positive impacts on the earnings of female welfare recipients. The impact was greater for females older than 25 years than for females ages 16 to 24. JTPA services adapted toward immediate employment were more effective than other services for welfare recipients, and access to JTPA increased earnings of welfare recipients without decreasing welfare receipts because earnings increased only after they left welfare.
The authors concluded that the correlation between measured impact and performance indicators was usually positive, but statistically weak, and that this suggested the performance management system did not work as intended.

National Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA)

August 2014