Federal Programs for Youth: More of the Same Won’t Work

This approach draws on the fact that there are examples of interventions that work. Rigorous randomized evaluations, for instance, the Carrera Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention program (shown to reduce pregnancies and births among teenage girls by 40 to 50 percent);

May 1, 2010

by Jon Baron, Isabel V. Sawhill

The federal government’s traditional approach to funding large social service programs – including programs for youth – is in need of reform. Since 1990, there have been 10 instances in which an entire federal social program has been evaluated using the scientific “gold standard” method of randomly assigning individuals to a program or control group.

Nine of these evaluations found weak or no positive effects, for programs such as the $1.5 billion Job Corps program (job training for disadvantaged youth); the $300 million Upward Bound program (academic preparation for at-risk high school students); the $1.2 billion 21st Century Community Learning Centers (after-school programs for disadvantaged youth); and, most recently, the $7 billion Head Start preschool program. Only one program – Early Head Start (a sister program to Head Start, for younger children) – was found to produce meaningful, though modest, positive effects.

 

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