Moving People from Welfare to Work. Lessons from the National Evaluation of Welfare-to-Work Strategies.. 3. Effects on Education Outcomes

The education-focused programs in NEWWS engaged large numbers of people in mandatory education or training classes -- more people than would have enrolled in such classes on their own. The next critical question iswhether higher participation in such classes enabled people in the education-focused programs to acquire the credentials or skills that might give them a better foothold in the labor market and better prospects of moving into good jobs than control group members had. On this topic, NEWWS offers a number of insights.

• GED and Other Credential Receipt: Do welfare-to-work programs' investments in education and training result in higher rates of credential attainment?

  • • Welfare-to-work programs can increase the proportion of people who obtain a GED or high school diploma -- particularly among recipients who enter the program with literacy skills at or close to the high school level -- but the overall proportion of people who earn such a credential is likely to be low. Increases in the proportion of people who obtain a training certificate or postsecondary degree are harder to achieve.

    Among nongraduates in the three sites that ran HCD programs, an average of 7 percent of those in the control group received a GED or high school diploma over the five-year follow-up period, whereas more than twice as many in the HCD group -- 17 percent -- did so (Figure 3). Overall, however, less than one-fifth of the nongraduate HCD program group members earned one of these credentials. The impact was mostly on GED (rather than high school diploma) receipt and was concentrated among people who entered the programs with high reading and math skills or at least an eighth-grade education. None of the LFA programs increased receipt of a GED or high school diploma. Examining both graduates and nongraduates, only three of the 11 NEWWS programs (one of them an HCD program) led to an increase in receipt of any other type of education or training credential, generally a trade license or certificate.

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    Figure 3.
    Receipt of a High School Diploma or GED over Five Years:
    Programs Can Increase the Proportion of Nongraduates Who Obtain a High School Diploma or GED, but the Overall Number Who Do So is Low

    

    SOURCE: Hamilton et al., 2001

    NOTE: The percentages shown are averages for sample members in the HCD and control groups in Atlanta, Grand Rapids, and Riverside who were nongraduates at study entry.

• Gains in Skills: Do welfare-to-work programs' investments in education and training result in higher skills?

  • • Welfare-to-work programs that rely on adult basic education programs for the general population are unlikely to improve welfare recipients' basic reading and math skills.

    In none of the NEWWS sites in which standardized reading and math literacy tests were administered two years after study entry did the programs raise test scores, even among people who at study entry wanted or planned to enroll in school. (Basic education programs are usually targeted at people whose skills are at or below the eighth-grade level.) Note, however, that most of the programs did not assess welfare recipients for learning disabilities, which could have diminished the programs' ability to improve literacy skills. Some studies have estimated that between one-quarter and one-half of welfare recipients have learning disabilities. ³

• Adult Education: What factors enhance or diminish its beneficial effects?

  • • The gains in credential receipt and literacy skills that welfare recipients can reap from adult education programs seem to be related to the length of participation in and the quality of such programs.

    How long welfare recipients participate in adult education programs can enhance or diminish such programs' beneficial impacts. Overall, the typical participant in an adult education program received the equivalent of about two-thirds of a year of high school instruction. A nonexperimental ⁴ examination of the association between credential receipt or skills improvement and length of stay suggested several patterns. Shorter stays were associated with GED receipt and gains in math skills: Enrollment in GED preparation classes for more than six months did not increase GED receipt, and most people's math skills no longer improved after six months of enrollment in basic education classes. Longer stays, in contrast, were associated with gains in reading skills: Enrollment in basic education classes for less than one year did not measurably improve reading skills.

    The size of education benefits also seemed to depend on the characteristics of education providers. For instance, nonexperimental comparisons revealed that the higher the average level of teachers' experience and education, the larger the improvements in recipients' reading and math skills. The size of education benefits did not, however, seem to be affected by the fact that welfare recipients in these adult education classes were required to be there: Among adult education enrollees who went to classes, those in the program groups (almost all of whom enrolled to meet a welfare requirement) experienced gains in GED receipt and math and reading skills comparable to those experienced by adult education participants in the control groups (all of whom attended classes voluntarily).

• Endnotes

  • ³  See, for example, CLASP Update (Center for Law and Social Policy). 1998. Center for Law and Social Policy.

    ⁴  Nonexperimental comparisons are analyses that do not take direct advantage of the random assignment design. Differences found in some comparisons are thus not necessarily indicative of a causal relationship.