The Employment Retention and Advancement Project: Final results from Hard-to-Employ 2012

What Strategies Work for the Hard-to-Employ? Final Results of the Hard-to-Employ Demonstration and Evaluation Project and Selected Sites from the Employment Retention and Advancement Project

OPRE Report 2012-08

March 2012

https://www.acf.hhs.gov/sites/default/files/opre/strategies_work.pdf

The Enhanced Services for the Hard-to-Employ (HtE) Demonstration and Evaluation Project seeks to answer a critical question about this population: how might we improve the prospects of the many Americans who grapple with serious barriers to finding and holding a steady job? The HtE evaluation was a 10-year study that used rigorous random assignment research designs to evaluate innovative strategies aimed at improving employment and other outcomes for groups who face serious barriers to employment. The strategies were tested in New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Kansas, and Missouri.

This report describes the HtE programs that were tested and summarizes the final results for each program. Similar information is presented for three of the programs in the ACF sponsored Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) project — programs that also targeted hard-to-employ populations, operated around the same time, and were evaluated with an identical methodology.

The inclusion of these ERA results permits an analysis of a wider variety of programs targeting those with serious barriers to finding and holding a steady job. The HtE and ERA programs had a variety of goals, but they all aimed, directly or indirectly, to increase employment and earnings, and most aimed to reduce reliance on public assistance.