Search

One strategic goal in the post-hurricane recovery plan for Puerto Rico is the development of a modern workforce with relevant skills to meet the demands of an evolving labor market. To begin, Puerto Rico must first overcome the acute workforce challenges and structural problems that have impeded economic growth for more than a decade. The authors set out a course of action that strengthens the K–12 and post-secondary education and training system, develops career pathways for individual workers that would improve their employment trajectories, and better aligns workers' skills with employment opportunities and the needs of local businesses. More specifically, the authors present four strategies to address short-term workforce shortages and needs.

Tools for Life® (TFL) is a program designed to improve school climate and safety through the proactive development of elementary and middle school students' social and emotional skills. The authors of this report describe the implementation of TFL in the Jackson (Mississippi) Public School District, calculate its costs, and evaluate the program's effectiveness.

RAND researchers assess the Appalachia Partnership Initiative (API)'s progress toward its vision and goals in improving science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education for grades K–12; energy and advanced manufacturing workforce development; and community building from 2014 through 2019. It is the final report in a multi-report series.

This brief describes the implementation of Tools for Life®, a social and emotional learning program, in elementary and middle schools in Jackson, Mississippi, and evaluates the program's effects on school climate and safety.

The authors examine indicators of education and labor markets in the Appalachia Partnership Initiative (API) region, with a focus on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, and on the extraction industry. The authors look at how the indicators have changed over time, tighten some of their analysis specifically to the API region, and introduce new measures, such as participation in career and technical education.

RAND Corporation researchers are conducting an assessment of the Appalachia Partnership Initiative's (API's) progress toward its vision and goals, with interim assessments conducted annually from 2016 to 2019. This report is the third assessment, and its authors consider the API's strategic alignment, beneficiaries, effectiveness, community catalyst, and sustainability.

Using data on a mid-sized community college in northeast Ohio as a case study, we examine patterns of enrollment in petroleum technology credential programs and labor market returns to those credentials. The enrollment analysis yields mixed results. Strong industry conditions represented by an increase in oil prices is associated with a decline in program enrollment; however, higher wages for petroleum workers is associated with increased program enrollment. Earning analyses were unambiguous: Obtaining a certificate or an associate’s degree was associated with outsized quarterly earnings returns of $2,900 and $5,500, respectively. This study suggests that partnerships that align subbaccalaureate postsecondary education to the needs of local labor markets may result in occupational credentials with substantially larger returns than those observed in the literature.

The growth in energy production in the tristate Appalachia region has spurred a demand for hiring workers who are proficient in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields. RAND Corporation researchers assessed the Appalachia Partnership Initiative's (API's) October 2014 to December 2017 investments in K–12 STEM education activities and initiatives related to catalyzing the community.

This Research Brief explores the alignment of oil and gas industry--related college courses with employer needs in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia, as well as ways in which employers and educators can collaborate to improve these courses.

Lower-skilled workers face a shrinking pool of employment opportunities. To combat this, the city of New Orleans developed a job training program that helped these individuals train for and find skilled jobs in particular industries. The authors of this report examine that program's implementation and effectiveness and perform a cost-benefit analysis. Findings include improved wage growth and a positive return on investment.

Employers struggle to find workers with science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) knowledge and skills; this struggle is particularly pertinent to the oil and gas companies of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia. This research explores the alignment of STEM education (at colleges with partnerships with oil and gas companies) with the needs of regional employers, as well as STEM areas in which students need more support.

The authors of this brief examine the implementation and effectiveness of a New Orleans job training program that helped lower-skilled, unemployed, and underemployed individuals train for and find skilled jobs in particular industries.

My Career Advancement Account Scholarships are intended to help military spouses with education and employment. The percentage of eligible spouses working declined over time, but users were more likely than nonusers to be working two years later.

This report presents findings from the initial phase of a study to examine whether and how rebuilding and renovating of Baltimore City Public Schools buildings affects students, school staff, school conditions, and the surrounding community. The report summarizes findings on three sets of exploratory analyses that examine associations between factors that may be influenced by the school building conditions prior to the renovations taking place.

Current extended military engagements in foreign nations have taken their toll on U.S. service members and their families. As a result, the services have made renewed commitments to support the needs of these families of military personnel. Quality-of-life and family programs across the services continue to grow. But no service has applied neighborhood theory and methods to better understand these military issues. Installations, and the communities where they are located, vary in terms of the quality of life they provide inhabitants. Similarly, the families who live in these communities and who are assigned to these installations vary in terms of their needs. A one-size-fits-all approach to base resource allocation and the provision of services may not be the most effective in fostering health and well-being among service members and their families. Thus, the services may want to use this approach as part of their efforts to identify gaps in support to service members and families so that they can make the necessary adjustments and better compensate where communities are lacking. This article explores the applicability of neighborhood theory and social indicators research to understanding the quality of life in and around military bases. It also highlights gaps in neighborhood study methodology that need to be addressed in future research. Finally, it outlines how a more in-depth neighborhood analysis of military installations could be conducted.

Over the last decade, U.S. military forces have been engaged in extended conflicts that are characterized by increased operational tempo, most notably in Iraq and Afghanistan. While most military personnel cope well across the deployment cycle, many will experience difficulties handling stress at some point; will face psychological health challenges, such as post-traumatic stress disorder or major depression; or will be affected by the short- and long-term psychological and cognitive consequences of a traumatic brain injury (TBI). Over the past several years, the Department of Defense (DoD) has implemented numerous programs that address various components of psychological health along the resilience, prevention, and treatment continuum and focus on a variety of clinical and nonclinical concerns. This article provides detail from an evaluation of 211 programs currently sponsored or funded by DoD to address psychological health and TBI, along with descriptions of how programs relate to other available resources and care settings. It also provides recommendations for clarifying the role of programs, examining gaps in routine service delivery that could be filled by programs, and reducing implementation barriers. Barriers include inadequate funding and resources, concerns about the stigma associated with receiving psychological health services, and inability to have servicemembers spend adequate time in programs. The authors found that there is significant duplication of effort, both within and across branches of service. As each program develops its methods independently, it is difficult to determine which approaches work and which are ineffective. Recommendations include strategic planning, centralized coordination, and information-sharing across branches of service, combined with rigorous evaluation. Programs should be evaluated and tracked in a database, and evidence-based interventions should be used to support program efforts.

The Appalachia Partnership Initiative (API) addresses STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) K-12 education and workforce development needs in the Greater Pittsburgh area's advanced manufacturing and energy sectors. The tool highlights the geographic reach of API programs and allows users to drill down and see specific information about each funded program.

This report assesses the Appalachia Partnership Initiative's progress toward its vision of fostering a sustainable STEM education and workforce development ecosystem in parts of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia during the first years of the API: October 2014 through July 2016. Interim assessments will be conducted annually from 2016 to 2019. A final summative evaluation in 2020, will analyze the effect of API efforts through time.

These technical appendixes provide more details on the methodology, data, and findings in the report, The Appalachia Partnership Initiative's Investments in Education, Workforce Development, and the Community: Analysis of the First Stage, 2014–2016.

This second of five annual reports focuses on employment and wages in energy and advanced manufacturing–related industries and on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education in the Ohio, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia region. These reports will capture trends about which localities might have greater demand for educating or employing local talent in STEM careers and guide investments and collaborative work.

A substantial and growing share of the population, immigrant children are more likely than children with native-born parents to face a variety of circumstances, such as low family income, low parental education, and language barriers that place them at risk of developmental delay and poor academic performance once they enter school. Lynn Karoly and Gabriella Gonzalez examine the current role of and future potential for early care and education (ECE) programs in promoting healthy development for immigrant children. Participation in center-based care and preschool programs has been shown to have substantial short-term benefits and may also lead to long-term gains as children go through school and enter adulthood. Yet, overall, immigrant children have lower rates of participation in nonparental care of any type, including center-based ECE programs, than their native counterparts. Much of the participation gap can be explained by just a few economic and sociodemographic factors, the authors find. To some extent, the factors that affect disadvantaged immigrant children resemble those of their similarly disadvantaged native counterparts. Affordability, availability, and access to ECE programs are structural barriers for many immigrant families, as they are for disadvantaged families more generally. Language barriers, bureaucratic complexity, and distrust of government programs, especially among undocumented immigrants, are unique challenges that may prevent some immigrant families from taking advantage of ECE programs, even when their children might qualify for subsidies. Cultural preferences for parental care at home can also be a barrier. Thus the authors suggest that policy makers follow a two-pronged approach for improving ECE participation rates among immigrant children. First, they note, federal and state ECE programs that target disadvantaged children in general are likely to benefit disadvantaged immigrant children as well. Making preschool attendance universal is one way to benefit all immigrant children. Second, participation gaps that stem from the unique obstacles facing immigrants, such as language barriers and informational gaps, can be addressed through the way publicly subsidized and private or nonprofit programs are structured.

In 2002, Qatar began establishing publicly funded, privately operated “independent schools” in parallel with the existing, centralized Ministry of Education system. The reform that drove the establishment of the independent schools included accountability provisions such as (a) measuring school and student performance and (b) distributing school performance information to parents. Because parental demand for the new schools exceeds supply, the effectiveness of parental choice in promoting accountability is limited. The independent schools showed higher student achievement (in elementary grades) and significant changes in classroom practices on the basis of 2005–2007 data. In 2009, the government announced that all ministry schools would convert to independent schools. In addition, over time, vouchers would become available to allow per-student funding to be used in some private schools.

This first of five annual reports focuses on employment and wages in energy and advanced manufacturing–related industries and on science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education indicators in the Appalachia Partnership Initiative (API) region. These reports will inform the regional stakeholder community about localities with greater demand for STEM careers and guide API investments and collaborative work.

For many community colleges, expanding enrollment demands coincide with shrinking resources, confronting policymakers with multiple competing constituencies of discouraged college-goers. At issue are whether community college enrollments are keeping pace with local growth among the subpopulations that typically attend community colleges; how enrollment levels might differ had participation rates remained unchanged; and which specific population groups, in which subareas of an overall region, are most affected by funding constraints. These issues focus attention on identifying and measuring the diverse populations such colleges serve. We present methods for tracking those populations (1) to gauge how completely (or incompletely) the local community college-going population is enrolling in various campuses, and (2) to delineate the functional service areas of individual campuses. Our methods have applicability to the needs of community college systems generally, especially where the size and geographic distribution of their populations are changing significantly through, for example, immigrant influx and regional expansion. These methods and measures add to the applied demographer’s repertoire of techniques for strengthening local decision-making.

Military service places distinct demands on service members and their families (U.S. Department of the Treasury and U.S. Department of Defense, 2012). In particular, frequent relocations can complicate military spouses career trajectories (Booth, 2003; Booth, Falk, Segal,and Segal, 2000; Harrell, Lim, Weber, and Golinelli, 2004; Lim, Golinelli, and Cho, 2007). It is well documented that these frequent moves can have negative effects on the spouses ability to find employment in occupations of their choosing, earn wages that match their skills, and maintain long-term careers (Cooke and Speirs, 2005; Harrell, Lim, Weber, and Golinelli, 2004; Lim and Schulker, 2010). Previous research has found that, compared with their civilian counterparts, military spouses are more likely to be unemployed (jobless, but actively seeking work) or underemployed (either working part-time involuntarily or having higher levels of education than required for their jobs) (Lim and Schulker, 2010; Maury and Stone, 2014).Recognizing the challenges facing military families (and military spouses in particular), the White House published a directive in 2011 ordering the Department of Defense to expand the Army Spouse Employment Partnership, which had recruited 52 employer partners since its inception in 2003 to assist military spouses seeking private-sector careers, to serve Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force spouses (White House, 2011, p. 17). The Military Spouse Employment Partnership was launched on June 29, 2011.(footnote)1 It is one of four initiatives under the Spouse Education and Career Opportunities (SECO) program.

RAND developed a set of four tools to assist with understanding, evaluating, and improving performance of programs that address psychological health and traumatic brain injuries among service members.

Provides overviews and detailed descriptions of 211 programs currently sponsored or funded by the Department of Defense to address psychological health and traumatic brain injury, along with recommendations to maximize program effectiveness.

To deal with the challenges of struggling public schools, declining populations, and diminishing quality in the local workforce, Pittsburgh instituted a new college scholarship program to encourage eligible students to continue their education.

Qatar's education reform, which included implementation of a new finance system, appears to be providing schools with adequate funding but is still struggling with issues of transparency and swift policy shifts that have been difficult to accommodate.

Describes RAND's evaluation of the progress made in the first years of Qatar's K-12 education reform.

Documents efforts to build cohesive systems of state and district policies to improve school leadership.

This research brief describes an analysis of the reform efforts of four Arab region nations (Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates) in response to human capital challenges they face in preparing their people to work in a global environment.

This research brief describes an analysis of the reform efforts of four Arab region nations (Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates) in response to human capital challenges they face in preparing their people to work in a global environment.