Holistic support services are critical to increasing skills training access, completion, and connection to quality jobs. This webinar video recording examined how intentional investments in supportive services help to address racial wealth gaps and the unprecedented rates of basic needs insecurity facing today’s students — adult learners who are balancing work, school, and family responsibilities. Speakers also discussed how community college, training provider, and community partner staff can help learners navigate education, public benefit, and resource options to ensure that resources go to those who need them the most.

This Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation brief is an overview of how HPOG 2.0 programs adapted during the COVID-19 pandemic and continued to provide services to participants. It examines changes programs adopted during the first 10 months of the COVID-19 pandemic (approximately March—December 2020). Local HPOG 2.0 staff described strategies that helped them continue operations despite unanticipated implementation hurdles. The brief also highlights promising practices that may be of interest to healthcare training providers and policymakers.

Breaking Barriers was a San Diego-based program that provided employment services to individuals with low incomes and disabilities who were looking for work. The program used the Individual Placement and Support model. This report summarizes findings from an earlier program evaluation report and presents new impact findings based on administrative records from the National Directory of New Hires. These records include information on study participants’ quarterly employment and earnings over an extended, two-year follow-up period.

This Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation compendium provides detailed summaries of each family self-sufficiency research project that was active or newly funded during FY 2021, along with brief overviews of past projects, and highlights select findings released in FY 2021. The studies in this report are organized into five sections:

• Temporary Assistance for Needy Families
• Employment and the Labor Market
• Education and Training
• Behavioral Science
• Cross-Cutting and Other Safety Net Research

In rural communities, widely dispersed populations face many access challenges. With a declining talent pool and lower educational attainment, coupled with rising poverty rates as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is an urgent need to prepare young people in rural areas for high-demand careers. The U.S. Department of Labor, Office of Apprenticeship hosted a webinar on April 28, 2022, which focused on best practices and creative solutions for increasing pre-apprenticeship and youth apprenticeship access, enrollment, retention, and program completion for young people in rural areas. Featured youth apprenticeship intermediaries and partners shared their accomplishments in developing youth apprenticeship opportunities in rural areas, establishing support networks, and best utilizing resources to ensure pre- and youth apprenticeship success.

As the economy struggles to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic and the ensuing volatility in labor markets, leaders in the field of young adult talent development are seeing a need to develop approaches that address the talent needs of employers and the training aspirations of young adults equally. This Jobs for the Future brief explores how personalized learning approaches can be used to support and balance the interests of the supply and demand sides in young adult talent development.

This is the first brief in the Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG) 2.0 Participant Perspectives series. HPOG 2.0 funded local career pathways programs to prepare participants for occupations in the healthcare field that paid well and were expected to either experience labor shortages or be in high demand. This brief presents insights from in-depth, in-person interviews with participants in career pathways programs funded under HPOG 2.0. It describes participant experiences navigating career pathways and suggests implications for career pathways program practice and for evaluations of career pathways programs.