Final Report Monterey County Economic Development Department and WDB’s Youth Ambassadors for Peace

Over the course of 18 months, YAP participants received a range of services including assessments, work readiness and life skills training, case management, and work-based learning. YAP participants also received financial incentives for completion of program milestones. To further encourage current and future participants, in November 2017 the Monterey County WDB received approval from DOL to increase the total incentive amount that each participant could earn from $650 to $1,075. Out of the 167 youth enrolled in YAP, 120 youth were included in the evaluation study.

Evaluation of the innovative YAP program consisted of an implementation study, an outcomes study, and a cost study. Data for the evaluation came from site visits, pre- and post-program participant surveys, program documents, program data, and administrative data from the California Department of Justice.

The evaluation was conducted over the life of the YAP program to document program implementation as well as education, justice, and workforce outcomes of program participants. The goal of the evaluation was to document the program’s model, its implementation, and its evolution over time, as well as participant-level outcomes. Early implementation findings were shared with Monterey County WDB through annual progress reports. The final report discusses the program’s implementation and outcomes, details the costs of implementing program services, provides lessons learned that may be useful to policymakers and practitioners, and suggests areas for future research. The report also highlights the limitations of the evaluation associated with a delayed start to the project and high staff turnover resulting in lower-than-expected enrollment. The evaluation was also hampered by a lack of survey responses, specifically with the follow-up survey.

Findings from the YAP program evaluation included the following:

• Developing strong relationships with community stakeholders was crucial for successfully recruiting and enrolling youth in the program’s targeted population.
• Establishing connections with employers willing to serve as host sites for work-based learning experiences can be difficult.
• Using an individual-level service delivery strategy, rather than a cohort model, allowed the program to better meet the needs of the youth it served.
• Most of the youth in the study received a financial incentive for actively engaging in and completing program activities. There was a significant, positive association between completing any program activity and receiving an incentive for obtaining employment or enrolling in college.
• YAP served youth with characteristics significantly associated with incarceration. The odds of a youth with an incarcerated parent being arrested was about three times higher than the odds of a youth without incarcerated parents being arrested.
• The YAP program cost per participant was $7,329 in grant funds. Overall, the program utilized under half of the WIF grant funding to serve approximately 70 percent of the participant goal. When leveraged funds are included, the average cost per participant was $7,436.
• Staff salaries were the largest program cost. Unsurprisingly given the program’s intensive service model, approximately 78 percent of grant funds were expended for staff salaries.
• The program utilized a small amount of its leveraged funding. In September 2015, the Monterey County WDB received a $100,000 Workforce Accelerator Fund 2.0 grant from the California WDB to pay YAP participants’ wages while in subsidized employment opportunities. The program expended $14,486 of these funds on participant work experiences.

The evaluator offered several recommendations for implementing similar projects in the future.

1. Build relationships with key community organizations that can serve as referral partners prior to starting program enrollment;
2. Lay the groundwork for developing work-based learning placements in addition to securing the funding to subsidize it; and
3. Modifications to the program service model may be needed to meet the needs to the target youth population.

• Last Updated:
• Created:
• Resource Publication Date: 2019
• Author(s): Gutierrez, I., Levin, M., Mallett, J.
• Funding Source: U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration
• Resource Availability: Publicly available
• Posted by: Wesley Peterson
• Posted in: Workforce System Strategies