Opportunity Youth: Disenfranchised Young People

wage jobs with gaps in between, or start classes at a community college but then drop out, or a
combination of the two. A number of interventions may help this population advance along a
career path.
Evidence suggests that programs that take career pathways approaches and connect
training to identifiable opportunities in the local labor market are more likely to achieve strong
employment outcomes. As the success of Year Up shows, connecting with local employers to
understand their needs and interests can also greatly improve opportunities for young people to
obtain meaningful internships and employment. Youth programs should adopt strategies that
incorporate career pathway approaches and cultivate employers. Such strategies could include
engaging employers to shape services, so that young people leaving programs have the skills
that companies seek, or educating employers about supervision strategies to help improve performance
and retention.
Community college is another place where big impacts are possible. According to one
study, only 40 percent of community college students complete a degree within six years. 81
Young people who connect to community college need support to ensure that they stay engaged.
MDRC’s study of the Accelerated Study in Associate Programs at the City University of
New York found one promising model to improve graduation rates. 82 However, few interventions
or efforts target people who enrolled in community college but who later dropped out
without finishing their degrees. Most community colleges do not attempt to reconnect with students
who have dropped out. One opportunity to make a difference could be to work with
community colleges to design efforts similar to Reengagement Centers that would conduct active
outreach to college dropouts and offer one-on-one counseling to help address their barriers
to completing their education.
81 Shapiro et al. (2014).
82 Scrivener et al. (2015).
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