Educationally Disadvantaged Older Youth: Attendance at High School or College

School attendance was targeted by two programs but measured in studies of three programs (JC, LEAP, SADP).  Attendance is important because it improves the likelihood of attaining a high school diploma or GED.  The evidence regarding high school attendance and enrollment in an educational program is generally positive.  Programs aimed at having older youths stay or re-enroll in high school had positive impacts on high school attendance.  Participants in LEAP, for example, had higher rates of retention in school than youths in the control group (LEAP1).  Participants also attended school more days than those in the control group did.  In addition, participants completed slightly higher grade levels than youths in the control group (LEAP2, LEAP3)—specifically, an average grade level of 10.34, compared with an average grade level of 10.22 (LEAP2).  This small but statistically significant difference was apparent at the end of the program and at the follow-up three years later (LEAP3).  One program had long-term—but not short-term—effects on high school attendance.  Participants in the School Attendance Demonstration Project were more likely than youths in the control group to have attended school 80 percent or more of the time in the program’s second year, a difference that did not appear in the first year (SADP).  Most programs did not measure differences in college attendance.  The one program that did, Job Corps, found no significant differences in college attendance for participants (JC1, JC2).