The two papers in this newsletter focus on youth employment and training programs in the United States and the government response to unemployment in Australia. In the first paper, "Looking at Other Countries, No. 1: United States. Youth Employment and Training Programs during the First Two Years of the Reagan Administration" by Ralph E.…

This policy update provides an overview of the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program as it applies to youth with disabilities at the time of their transition from high school. The paper defines "disabled individual" and "substantial gainful work," outlines how income and resources are identified for determining…

The Multi-District Outreach Projects for Services for Youths with Disabilities include 14 federally funded projects that assist in the adoption of proven models, components of models, or other exemplary practices. The projects are designed to improve secondary education and transition services in areas such as continuing education,…

Eight papers outline the nature of the present federally funded effort to improve the evaluation data gathered by programs for the transition of handicapped adolescents to higher education or work. Evaluation research, program evaluation flexibility, and professional standards are considered. Two other evaluation studies consider international…

The increasing use of job training or retraining and employment programs in response to high rates of unemployment in France has spurred interest in program evaluation to see what results have been achieved. The contribution of traditional standardized evaluations and of emerging methodologies is being examined. Traditional evaluation methods…

This policy update presents key aspects of the statutory language of the School-to-Work Opportunities Act of 1994 (Public Law 103-239), which provides states and localities with federal funds to be used as venture capital to underwrite the initial costs of planning and establishing statewide School-to-Work Opportunities systems. The paper focuses…

This document consists of four consecutive issues of a literary magazine written by adult workplace literacy students of the Casco Bay (Maine) Partnership for Workplace Education. The Partnership was a federally funded workplace literacy program that provided customized basic skills education at seven business sites in the Portland area, serving…

This publication is designed to help TANF [Temporary Assistance for Needy Families] agencies create specific program interventions to serve TANF recipients in place-based (in particular, housing-based) programs that help welfare recipients find and keep jobs. TANF programs increasingly serve welfare recipients with multiple barriers to steady…

High public expectations of the educational and workforce development systems are the force behind the shifting roles of education and training and efforts to create more coherent and effective systems of work force preparation. The result of pulling and tugging by citizens, policymakers, and educators is a system of widespread access,…

This publication, one of a series designed to help policymakers and TANF [Temporary Assistance for Needy Families] agency personnel, offers a baseline for understanding the challenge of serving persons who are being forced off welfare roles but who are hard to place in employment. The following topics are covered: (1) policy issues (who should be…

This publication, one of a series designed to help policymakers and TANF [Temporary Assistance for Needy Families] agency personnel, offers an overview of programs providing publicly funded paid jobs in the public or nonprofit sector to TANF recipients, as well as of work experience programs in which recipients receive welfare payment in return…

This "feature issue" reports on major shifts in attitudes, practices, and policies that have led to the growth of supported employment programs for people with disabilities, with special focus on the situation in Minnesota. It contains the following articles: "To the Year 2000 and Beyond: Jobs Won't Be the Problem" (David R.…

This Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) Update provides a quick primer of some of the key areas where states have flexibility to develop their own programs and processes in the new Job Opportunities and Basic Skills (JOBS) program. This guide is organized in seven sections that cover the following topics: (1) introduction; (2) why local areas…

This report looks at the concerns and issues about the growing involvement of the Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) in education, provides legislative information and primers about the programs in the three education areas with which JTPA links most often, and provides program models and resources. Specifically, the report looks at four areas:…

These three volumes contain articles related to (1) improving educational productivity (lessons from economics); (2) school-to-work (STW); and (3) reduced class size, offering recommendations from national invitational conferences. Topics include making schools work; tax revolts and school performance; market pressure and the impact on…