Publications

In a blog post originally published by New America, Meghan McCormick and Christina Weiland offer four lessons for states and localities interested in improving children’s access to high-quality public prekindergarten programs.

This document summarizes what was learned in SIRF (Strengthening the Implementation of Responsible Fatherhood Programs), which engaged 10 programs in using learning cycles—repeated periods of implementing ideas and reflecting on the results—to build evidence on practices to improve the enrollment, engagement, and retention of fathers in fatherhood programs.

The federal Family Self-Sufficiency program is a voluntary case-management and asset-building intervention that provides incentives to work for Housing Choice Voucher recipients. This report examines program implementation, participants’ engagement in services, and impacts on labor force participation and receipt of government benefits five years following random assignment.

Generation Work was launched in five cities to connect more young adults—especially those of color from low-income families—with meaningful employment by changing how workforce development systems prepare them for and support them in jobs. This publication previews findings from the first five years of the initiative.

In this blog post published by the National College Attainment Network, MDRC’s Colin Hill describes the findings from MDRC’s recent evaluation of the City University of New York’s ASAP student success program at three Ohio community colleges.

This brief compares models used to predict participants’ success in career pathways programs. While complex models may be more accurate, they may also come with increased costs and racial biases. The study team explores these trade-offs.

This report summarizes activities in a study designed to build evidence on promising strategies to improve enrollment and participation in fatherhood programs. Programs iteratively implemented and assessed such strategies in three areas: outreach, peer mentoring, and coaching.

In 2014, HUD expanded Jobs Plus, a rigorously tested model offering rent incentives and on-site work support to public housing residents. The first three groups to enroll show no evidence of higher employment or earnings during the early years, potentially due to low participation levels and implementation challenges.

Generation Work aims to help more young people—particularly those of color from low-income families—succeed in today’s job market. This Issue Focus highlights promising strategies that the five partnerships implementing the initiative have pursued to foster awareness of racial equity and inclusion among their staff and change organizational practices.

There is a lack of consistent evidence on the extent to which the pandemic affected preschool-age children. This brief summarizes the initial results from a study led by MDRC that is examining the post-pandemic language, literacy, math, and executive functioning skills of children enrolled in Acelero Learning programs.

MDRC is partnering with the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board to provide information about evidence-based programs backed by past research to the Student Success Program Inventory, an inventory of existing student success programs in Texas. This brief summarizes some of the information they will use in that effort.

In this commentary originally published in GovTech, Edith Yang explains how gathering and analyzing data are only two components of successful data projects. The right combination of people, perseverance, and project scoping are just as important.

In this essay, MDRC President Virginia Knox describes how MDRC and its partners are working with state welfare agencies to help them harness the power of their administrative data to better understand participants’ needs and to improve service delivery.

Some high schools are offering career and technical education pathways for students to develop skills needed for the “climate-ready” workforce. MDRC is learning from such schools and programs across the country, including the Green Tech Academy in Olathe, Kansas. This blog post describes the program.

In this commentary originally published in Inside Higher Ed, Sophia Sutcliffe, Dan Knox, and Marjorie Dorimé-Williams describe a new effort to understand the significant role faculty and staff play when students transfer between community colleges and four-year institutions.

U.S. community colleges—which disproportionately serve students from low-income backgrounds—have very low graduation rates. In response, three Ohio community colleges implemented programs based on the City University of New York’s successful Accelerated Study in Associate Programs. After six years, the programs had a positive impact on graduation and earnings.

The Procedural Justice-Informed Alternatives to Contempt (PJAC) project integrated procedural justice (the idea of fairness in processes) into enforcement at six child support agencies. This report finds that the PJAC intervention did not meet its primary goals of improving payment compliance and regularity.

The Procedural Justice-Informed Alternatives to Contempt project integrated procedural justice (the idea of fairness in processes) into enforcement at six child support agencies. After the study ended, the agencies could determine how they wished to continue to use procedural justice principles. This brief describes how they did so.

The Tools for Postsecondary Schools interactive toolkit is designed to help staff members and administrators at two- and four-year colleges use evidence-based practices to support students. It draws on over 20 years of MDRC research and technical assistance and can help practitioners at any stage in the program-development process.

Home visiting programs, which improve children’s development and strengthen caregivers’ and families’ well-being, faced many challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper examines a program that provided psychotherapeutic, parent-child services during the pandemic and the effects of delivering those services online or in a hybrid format at that time.