Employment: High School Credential

Evidence that participation in employment programs leads young people to earn a high school diploma or GED is mixed.  It is important to note that some programs target youths who are in school, while others target out-of-school youths.  Participants in Job Corps, which targets disadvantaged youths, and JOBSTART, which targets economically disadvantaged dropouts age 17 to 21, passed the GED exam at significantly higher rates than youths in the control group.  Similarly, young women who participated in the JTPA evaluation, which is geared toward out-of-school youths, were more likely to obtain a high school diploma or GED than young women in the control group.  Job Corps is primarily a residential program, whereas JOBSTART and JTPA are not, yet all were successful at improving participants’ chances of obtaining a high school diploma or its equivalent.  Evidence also indicates that students in Career Academies,  a school within a school, had significantly higher rates of graduation from high school (CA4).