Testing the Effectiveness of Integrating Relationship Education Into an Existing Workforce Readiness Program

Mathematica Policy Research

Status: Completed

Conditions: Marriage; Family Relations

Treatments: Behavioral: Workforce Readiness Program; Behavioral: Relationship education

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; Other U.S. Federal agency

Identifiers

NCT02829411

MPR-500098-FWCA

Details and patient eligibility

About

The project will test the strategy of integrating 25 hours of relationship education into an existing employment program for low-income individuals ages 18-30. It will use a 2-arm randomized controlled trial to test the effect of this full package of services on participants' employment outcomes and relationship outcomes.

Full description

The study will examine the programming by FWCA, which currently offers the Career Pathways Bridge program in three locations in St. Louis County in Missouri. The evaluation will test the strategy of integrating relationship education into an existing workforce readiness program. FWCA plans to add approximately 17 hours of content from the Within My Reach relationship education curriculum to the two-week job readiness workshop it offers as part of the Career Pathways Bridge program. Second, FWCA will add up to eight additional one-hour relationship skills education sessions that customers can attend in the five weeks after completing the initial two-week job readiness workshop.

The evaluation will use a 2-arm randomized controlled trial to test the effect of this full package of services on participants' employment outcomes and relationship outcomes. The target population will be low-income individuals ages 18-30 living in St. Louis County, Missouri. The study will aim to enroll 1000 individuals over 2 years. The Metropolitan Employment and Training (MET) Center will be the primary recruitment and service location.

Enrollment: 909 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18 to 30 years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• disconnected from workforce

Exclusion criteria

Trial design

Primary purpose: Treatment

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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909 participants in 2 patient groups

Employment Services only

Active Comparator group

Description:

'Workforce Readiness Program'. job readiness workshop, organized into ten daily sessions over two weeks. The main content of these sessions will be a program-developed workforce readiness training, developed with funding from a DOL Career Pathways Bridge grant.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Workforce Readiness Program

Employment Services with HMRE content

Experimental group

Description:

'Workforce Readiness Program supplemented with Relationship Education': job readiness workshop, organized into ten daily sessions over two weeks. Program will add approximately 17 hours of content from the Within My Reach relationship education curriculum to the two-week job readiness workshop - and add up to eight additional one-hour relationship skills education sessions that customers can attend in the five weeks after completing the initial two-week job readiness workshop

Treatment:

Behavioral: Relationship education

Behavioral: Workforce Readiness Program