Young people, particularly low-income youth and youth of color, have long experienced difficulty in the labor market because of economic conditions, educational inequality, persistent discrimination, structural racism, and other factors. Changes in the economy have exacerbated these challenges and today, the average monthly unemployment rate for youth ages 16 to 19 is 18.3 percent, compared with 5.4 percent for the US population overall. Black and Latino youth are even worse off, with unemployment rates of 34.0 percent and 22.4 percent, respectively. Many of these unemployed youth are not attending school. Approximately 6.7 million people ages 16 to 24 in the United States are neither enrolled in school nor working. Increasingly, governments, foundations, and nonprofits have made investments in alternative approaches to education and work experience that create pathways to college and career success for "disconnected" youth and other young people who are struggling in traditional educational environments or the workplace.
The Urban Institute is working to understand the programs and strategies that can help meet the needs of this population through rigorous evaluations and by bringing evidence from our work and the field to inform the development and implementation of effective strategies.
Publications
The Youth Workforce: A Detailed Picture
July 2019 Natalie Spievack, Nathan Sick
Hiring Well, Doing Good in Georgia
March 2018 Robert Lerman
Understanding Young-Parent Families
February 2018 Nathan Sick, Shayne Spaulding, Yuju Park
Opportunity Works Implementation Report
December 2017 Theresa Anderson, Breno Braga, Neil Damron, Teresa Derrick-Mills, Alan D. Dodkowitz, Micaela Lipman, Ananda Martin-Caughey, H. Elizabeth Peters, Eleanor Pratt, Mary K. Winkler
Dropping Out, Clocking In, and Falling Behind: What Happens to Youth Who Work and Drop Out?
August 2016 research report by Sierra Latham, Molly M. Scott and Heather Koball
Building Alaska’s Science and Engineering Pipeline
January 2015 research report by Hamutal Bernstein, Carlos Martín, Lauren Eyster, Theresa Anderson, Stephanie Owen, and Ananda Martin-Caughey
Expanding Economic Opportunity for Young Men and Boys of Color through Employment and Training
February 2015 research report by Shayne Spaulding, Robert I. Lerman, Harry Holzer, and Lauren Eyster
Supporting Youth Transitioning out of Foster Care, Issue Brief 3: Employment Programs
March 2015 brief by Sara Edelstein and Christopher Lowenstein
Embarking on College and Career: Interim Evaluation of Urban Alliance
May 2015 research report by Brett Theodos, Mike Pergamit, Devlin Hanson, Sara Edelstein, and Rebecca Daniels
Youth Apprenticeship: A Hopeful Approach for Improving Outcomes for Baltimore Youth
May 2015 research report by Robert I. Lerman and Arnold Packer
Solutions for Youth: An Evaluation of the Latin American Youth Center's Promotor Pathway Program
April 2016 research report by Brett Theodos, Mike Pergamit, Alexandra Derian, Sara Edelstein, and Allison Stolte
Realizing Employment Goals for Youth through Digital Badges: Lessons and Opportunities from Workforce Development
May 2016 research report by Shayne Spaulding and Martha C. Johnson
Pathways after High School: Evaluation of the Urban Alliance High School Internship Program
August 2017 Brett Theodos, Mike Pergamit, Devlin Hanson, Sara Edelstein, Rebecca Daniels, Tanaya Srini
Urban Wire blog posts
How Can We Better Connect Youth to Work and School? Five Lessons for Youth Employment Programs
September 2014 blog post by Sara Edelstein
Dropping out and clicking in
April 2015 blog post by Molly M. Scott
A DataCamp to help the 7 million young people who are out of work and out of school
June 2015 blog post by Jonathan Schwabish
Expanding economic opportunity for boys and young men of color through summer work experience opportunities
May 2016 blog post by Shayne Spaulding and Don Baylor
How cities are expanding access to college and careers in the digital age
May 2016 blog post by Don Baylor
Urban Alliance internship program improves job skills and college attendance for disadvantaged youth
May 2016 blog post by Sara Edelstein
School choice as an antipoverty strategy
June 2016 blog post by Matthew Chingos
Connecting learners to careers
July 2016 blog post by Hamutal Bernstein
Events
Badging the Future: Can Digital Credentials Create Pathways to Careers and College for Today's Youth?
May 2016 event
Using Data to Help Low-Income Youth Find Jobs
May 2015 event
Related Projects
Bridging the Gap | Accelerating Opportunity | Local Workforce System | Financing Public Higher Education | Cities of LRNG