Search
American Youth Policy Forum: Bridging Youth Policy, Practice and Research
About Us What's New Program Areas Events Publications

Press Release

Preparing Youth for Employment

Principles and Characteristics of Five Leading United States Youth Development Programs

Preparing Youth for Employment, by Dr. Glenda L. Partee , provides an overview of five leading U.S. youth employment programs. The easy-to-ready report was designed for practitioners in both the public and non-governmental sectors who implement youth employment programs, the policymakers who support them, and youth leaders who wish to:

  • learn more about principles and characteristics of leading youth employment programs now operating in the United States; and

  • identify components or entire programs which may be transferable or applicable to their work or in the settings of other nations.

Youth employment program models discussed in this overview include:

  • Job Corps

  • National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Program

  • STRIVE

  • YouthBuild

  • Youth Service and Conservation Corps

Each of these program models has documented evidence of effectiveness in contributing to positive youth outcomes, including increased levels of employment, higher earnings, high school completion (or its equivalent), postsecondary attendance, reduced rates of reliance on public welfare assistance and involvement in criminal activities. Each of these models has been replicated widely in the United States .

Preparation for employment in the U.S.A. has a number of characteristics:

  1. The primary avenues for employment preparation for young people are through the formal secondary and postsecondary education system or through business-supported on-the-job training. These are not discussed in this brief paper.

  2. Federal government support for youth employment preparation is limited and primarily targeted to economically disadvantaged youth and those with significant challenges to successful employment (e.g., school dropouts with low-basic skills, youth with disabilities, young parents).

  3. Many youth employment programs that have recently been replicated and supported by the U.S. federal government were originally developed by privately-supported or local community efforts.

###

To learn more about the programs featured, please download the report from http://www.aypf.org/publications.

The report was made possible by the Ford Foundation.

The activities of the American Youth Policy Forum are made possible by the support of a consortium of philanthropic foundations: Carnegie Corporation of New York, Ford Foundation, Ford Motor Company Fund, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, General Electric Fund, William T. Grant Foundation, J & M Foundation, Walter S. Johnson Foundation, W. K. Kellogg Foundation, KnowledgeWorks Foundation, McKnight Foundation, Charles S. Mott Foundation, Surdna Foundation, Joseph and May Winston Foundation, and others.