• Provisions of the Family Support Act
• FSA Data
• Summary and Conclusions

INTRODUCTION

The Family Support Act of 1988 (FSA), P.L. 100-485, is the latest in a series of welfare reform efforts.[48] It is designed to replace welfare benefits with employment for those receiving support under the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program. The act aims to reduce barriers to employment including lack of child care, marketable skills, work experience, transportation, and educational credentials by providing states with federal funds to support special services to targeted groups. Because most AFDC recipients are or were teen parents, its provisions are of particular interest to those concerned with this group.

In this section, we first briefly review the FSA, then examine data collected from the teen parent programs that we had visited earlier about its current and future effect. (See the appendix for a more detailed discussion of the FSA.)

PROVISIONS OF THE FAMILY SUPPORT ACT

The FSA requires that each state set up a Job Opportunities and Basic Skills (JOBS) program. The state must include certain components in its JOBS program: high school education or high school equivalency education; basic literacy education; education in English as a second language; jobs-skills training; job-readiness activities; and job-development and job-placement activities. There is no requirement that any particular component be available to all JOBS participants, or to any specific percentage of participants.

Under FSA requirements, most 16- and 17-year-olds must be assigned to educational activities (high school or its equivalent).[49] This requirement has aroused concern among some teen parent advocates, who worry that dropouts will be referred back to the same school programs that could not meet their needs earlier, setting them up for failure. Critics argue that the FSA should specify ways to educate teen parents so that they have some hope of succeeding in the educational programs that they are required to attend.[50]

In many respects, the supportive services mandated by the FSA are the most important feature of the act for teen parents. States are required to "guarantee" child care and transportation for any JOBS participants who are making "satisfactory progress," whether their participation is voluntary or mandatory.[51] It cannot require an individual to participate in JOBS if necessary child care is not available. This child care requirement has the potential to vastly increase the availability of scarce child care resources for teen parents. But such expansion is far from guaranteed; because of the tremendous discretion granted the states under JOBS, states may simply exempt teen parents from JOBS by declaring that child care and transportation are unavailable to them.

The FSA provides states with an opportunity to use JOBS funds to make teen parents a real priority. These funds could increase the availability of teen parent programs and could increase the supply of scarce infant care and other services. The JOBS program could also serve as a catalyst for reforming school programs to make them more responsive to the needs of teen parents.

Alternatively, states could choose not to make teen parents a high priority under JOBS. State plans could require only that teen dropouts be referred back to regular schools; no examination of the appropriateness of available school programs or of the reasons why so many teen parents leave them would be expected. Or, states could simply exempt teen parents from JOBS by declaring that child care and transportation are unavailable to them. Finally, states could use JOBS to punish teen parents by effectively refusing to provide child care to any teen parent with another family member at home, e.g., the teen parent's own parent, and by issuing sanctions for all teen parent dropouts who do not return to the school programs that they had left earlier.

What states decide to do probably will be heavily influenced by each state's willingness to spend funds on education and training and its attitude toward AFDC recipients and toward teen parents in particular. Since we had access to a number of teen parent programs at a time when JOBS was beginning to be implemented, we decided to conduct telephone interviews with those programs to see if we could learn something about how JOBS was being implemented in the context of teen parent programs and what expectations program staff had for JOBS.

FSA DATA

To explore the reality and the potential of the FSA, we conducted telephone interviews to address the following questions:

¥	To what extent are additional programs or services for teen parents being created as a result of the FSA?
*	Is the priority status of teen parents under the FSA resulting in greater interest in them by JTPA or other service agencies?
*	To what extent are the new requirements imposing costs on existing programs, e.g., additional paperwork, changes in the relationship between participants and staff?
*	In what ways, if any, are the populations attending teen parent programs changing as a result of the FSA? To what extent are dropouts returning to school or other employment and training activities?
*	What positive effects has the FSA had to date on these programs?
*	To what extent are additional services (especially child care and transportation) being made available to teen parents under the FSA?
*	To what extent are teen parents losing their welfare benefits because of refusal to participate in JOBS programs?
*	What effects, if any, has the FSA had on the demand for or provision of vocational training in teen parent programs?

Methods

A total of 11 agencies, located in nine different counties and administering 13 programs, are described in this section.[52] Twelve of these programs were described in Secs. 2-4; the thirteenth, a private vocational college, was added here to compare JOBS' effect on it with its effect on agencies running teen parent programs in the same community.[53] For simplification, the 11 agencies administering teen parent programs are referred to in this section as "programs." Those described here are both school- and community-based and are located in areas ranging from very rural to inner city. One was located in a state that had not yet begun to implement its JOBS programs.

Project staff conducted telephone interviews during the spring of 1990 with teen parent program directors and with local welfare officials who worked with the selected programs. Welfare officials were asked about implementation of the JOBS program in the community. Teen parent program directors were questioned about the effects of the FSA and the state JOBS program on their participants and on program activities. Concurrently, information on the state-level administration of JOBS was gathered by project staff.[54]

We focused our interviews on the effects of the FSA on pregnant and parenting teens who are currently school-aged and on the programs that serve them. The FSA serves other teen parents as well, namely, older teens who are parents and older women who became parents while they were still teens. In some cases these two other groups of mothers are discussed as a means of drawing comparisons with younger teen parents.

Findings

State programs. Fifteen states were approved to begin JOBS programs in July 1989; of these, three were in our study sample. Ten more states and the Virgin Islands were approved for JOBS funds in October 1989, and of these, two were our sample states. The remaining states planned to have programs by the October 1990 deadline; two of these are also our sample states (Center on Social Welfare Policy and Law, 1989). About half the states in our sample use different names for their teen and adult versions of JOBS; some use the same name, and others do not have separate programs for teens and adults.

Consistent with the wide discretion accorded states under the FSA, the states in our sample chose to serve teens very differently. Two of our seven sample states had not begun their JOBS programs at the time of our interviews, and target groups for receiving benefits or being required to participate were not yet clearly defined. Of the remaining five sample states, three chose to serve only those teen parents under age 18 who had dropped out of school, as shown in Table 5.1. Two of these three states directed dropouts into alternative education programs for GEDs, bypassing the regular education system. The other state specified the conditions under which teens would go to alternative programs. In all three of these states, school-age parenting teens continuously enrolled in school programs receive no ancillary support from JOBS, although the FSA has provisions that permit volunteers to receive such services, as described above. In one community, JOBS funded ancillary services for older teen parents who enrolled themselves in college-level training programs. However, JOBS would not pay tuition for these self-starters, as they were not considered dropouts. In these three states, which use FSA money to serve dropouts only, it is economically smarter for a teen to drop out of school and wait to be referred to a special program; in this way, ancillary services and tuition appear to be paid.[55]

The two remaining states in our sample of seven require any teen parent age 16 or older with a child at least three months old to participate in JOBS, even though the federal statute exempts full-time students. If the teen does not have a high school diploma or equivalent, she is sent to the teen version of JOBS, which promotes educational programs. If the teen has a diploma (or GED), she is sent to the adult version for employment development.

The teen versions of JOBS that we saw in these states offered many program choices to participants. Teens could be referred to a variety of programs in the community--from regular high schools to adult schools to the special comprehensive programs for teen parents that we had studied. Of course, we were interviewing in communities that were considered exemplary for their services to teen parents; it is likely that in other communities teen JOBS participants have more constrained program choices. Our respondents told us that in many of these latter communities, the regular school system is the only option.

The FSA set teen parents apart from the general public by including more stringent requirements for this group. In particular, the legislation required teen parents to participate in JOBS regardless of the age of the teen's child.[56] In spite of this provision, two of our sample states specified that mandatory participation for teens would begin only after the baby was three months old. In the three states without a specified age for a teen's child, teen parents were expected to participate even if the child was younger than three months, as shown in Table 5.1. One provision in the FSA legislation allows both teens and adults not to participate if they must stay at home to care for an incapacitated child. Respondents reported that many teens have been excused from JOBS participation for this reason.

Of the 11 teen parent programs interviewed for this section, one was located in a state that had not yet implemented its JOBS program. Of the remaining ten programs, seven were officially working with the local version of JOBS by the spring of 1990, when we conducted our interviews (see Table 5.2). One of these programs was a private vocational college that served young women who were considered "voluntary" JOBS participants because they had enrolled on their own in the college. These voluntary participants were receiving child care and transportation benefits under JOBS.[57] This college has an official contract with the local welfare office and can accept mandatory JOBS participants (those who have been out of school and who have not enrolled themselves in an employment and training program), but at the time of our interviews, the college had received only one referral from the welfare office. Two teen parent programs located in other states had one or two JOBS participants enrolled in the program but served these teens informally without any official contract with the local welfare agency. Another program had no contact with the welfare office and served a different population--girls that were pregnant or only a few weeks postpartum.

In the communities investigated, no new programs for teen parents had been created by JOBS. This finding is consistent with results from other studies (see McDonnell and Grubb, 1991, for example) which find that, in general, welfare offices rely on preexisting community agencies to provide services to welfare program participants. In particular, we found heavy reliance on regular schools (without special supports) or adult basic education (through evening schools) for teen parent JOBS participants, even when an exemplary teen parent program existed in the community.

Part of the reason that exemplary or special programs are not used more heavily for referrals may have to do with welfare officials' sense of their task and goals. A number of the welfare staff we interviewed indicated that their responsibility was limited to ensuring that the participant was enrolled in a program and participating according to standard. Similar to findings of other researchers (such as Figueroa, 1990), they typically believed that the specifics of service provision were the domain of service providers. In their view, schools or other service providers, not welfare staff, should worry about whether teen parents' needs were being met and whether special programs were necessary.

Consistent with the above, we found that welfare staff typically refer teen parents to regular schools or teen parent programs without knowing or investigating how the teens are served. Typically, welfare officials had met with school officials early in the implementation of the JOBS program; in some communities these officials would continue to have some kind of relationship with the schools. Most often, these continuing relationships were limited to discussions of particular participants' attendance problems.[58] School officials in most of the communities we studied reported only attendance or achievements of participants to the welfare officials; nothing was reported on activities, program goals, or an individuals' unmet needs. This limited focus seems to support concerns of teen advocates (described above) that inadequate attention is given in JOBS to the increased risk of school dropout that teen parents face. Because JOBS requires regular attendance, some welfare departments are taking the position that a teen referred to these settings would be subject to sanctions for poor attendance. This limited focus on attendance may obscure the fact that inadequate program or support services (e.g., child care, transportation, flexible scheduling) are available.

Only three teen parent programs of the 11 interviewed receive regular funds from the local JOBS program. In two of these programs, JOBS money increased services, as shown in Table 5.2. The first receives these funds to pay for participants' child care; this funding has allowed the program to expand infant care services. The other two programs are located in a state that now funds all teen parent programs with JOBS money. Many programs in this state, including the two in our sample, continue to receive financial support and have relationships with other funding sources, such as New Chance, as well. Staff in one of these programs reported that the addition of JOBS funding had had no effect on program services. The other listed a number of new services implemented since the advent of JOBS funding and indicated that the program will be able to accept a larger client load in the coming year as a result of funding support through JOBS.

We also examined whether the FSA had increased community awareness of the problems facing teen parents and the special service needs that they might have. Directors of teen parent programs everywhere felt that JOBS had not had any impact on community attitudes toward teen parents and noted no changes in activity among agencies that serve them (e.g., JTPA). In one case, program staff complained that they were unable to get JTPA to pay any attention to teen parents; JOBS had not changed this. In other sites, the local JTPA and other community groups were described as already aware of teen parent concerns, so that the FSA had had little effect for that reason.

Effects on Programs

The number of teen parents served jointly by teen parent programs and JOBS ranged considerably. In two programs (one state) all teen parents had to be eligible for JOBS to be served by the program in which we interviewed. In three other programs (in two other states), JOBS participants constituted between 25 percent and 85 percent of program enrollments, as shown in Table 5.3. The remaining programs served few if any JOBS participants for several reasons: (1) there was no local JOBS program; (2) the teen parent program was designed for pregnant teens whereas JOBS is for parents; (3) the local JOBS program concentrated on dropouts, and teen parents in the program were considered "in school"; (4) the local JOBS administration had not yet executed a formal contract with the teen parent program in which we interviewed and had sent no referrals to the program; or (5) teen parents enrolled in the program were largely ineligible for JOBS because of family income levels.

Of the ten teen parent programs located in states that had implemented JOBS, five reported no effect of JOBS on their operations. These five, as noted above, served no or few young mothers enrolled in JOBS programs and had little contact with welfare officials. Staff in one of these programs believed that although JOBS had had no effect on their program, their program had had an effect on the local JOBS program for teens. Since the program served teen parents before they became JOBS participants, they enrolled in JOBS better prepared for job-skills acquisition and employment. Four other programs worked closely with the local JOBS program but still claimed few changes in their program as a result; these were located in two states with preexisting workfare/learnfare programs, which later incorporated JOBS requirements. Working relationships between welfare officials and the program had previously been established, programs were historically mutually supportive, and cross-referrals were common. The tenth program worked only occasionally with local JOBS officials; the program and JOBS served the same clientele, but staff rarely spoke with each other. Program staff anticipated few, if any, future changes to the program as a result of JOBS.

Some critics of the FSA have worried that JOBS' monitoring requirements would put an excessive burden on the staff of programs serving JOBS participants, or might force them to function as police, monitoring and reporting attendance and progress to welfare staff as a means of operating sanction systems. We did not find this to be the case among programs in our sample. Some program staff mentioned that they were now required to monitor attendance or activities of JOBS participants, but they all trivialized this task, making such comments as "it takes very little time and usually only one staff person" (for example, one hour of one person per week or month); and "we always did such monitoring for all participants anyway." Some felt, as one staff member described, that such monitoring was a "good handle on the girls." No program staff noted any change in staff relationships with program enrollees as a result of JOBS. One program did say that clients sent from JOBS to the program were often initially hostile and suspicious. Staff claimed these hostilities were erased, however, once participants saw what the program offered.

Enrollments had not increased in any of the programs as a result of JOBS, although one program given JOBS funds will be able to expand client populations from 36 to 50 participants in the coming year. Two other programs anticipate larger numbers in the coming year but not because of the FSA. They are located in a state where a new state law mandates that teen parent programs become entitlements to teens who are pregnant. A fourth program did anticipate long waiting lists as a result of JOBS education requirements and limited education staff.

Recruitment methods in the programs have remained largely the same as before JOBS funds became available; recruitment has changed in only one program because of JOBS. This program was able to eliminate a full-time recruiter position and rely only on referrals from the JOBS administrative office. One additional program reported that although recruitment methods have not changed under JOBS, many participants are now inconvenienced because they must go back and forth between the program and the JOBS office to make their joint participation official.

Only one program noted a change in the hours required for a program activity as a result of the FSA. In this program, a literacy course was required to expand instruction time from three hours to four hours daily so that students could receive the 20 hours of instruction per week required by JOBS. The literacy program had previously offered two three-hour sections per day, allowing teachers an hour break for lunch and an hour for preparation and grading. The new hours meant that teachers had to teach two courses per day, back-to-back, for a total of eight hours. Teachers now had to do preparation and grading on their own time, which the program director anticipated would soon cause problems.

A second program altered its goals in response to the FSA. Although this program had never offered long-term services, it had hoped to do so some day. However, the staff believed that such a long-term program now would be impossible with JOBS funding, which they described as emphasizing rapid job placement over longer-term training.

Few programs noted changes in the mix of clients they serve as a result of the FSA; this is mostly because few programs were actively working with JOBS programs and JOBS participants. In a few programs, however, there were some changes. Some now serve more minorities, dropouts, or older teens; some serve more teen parents who are less motivated and have lower skill levels. Staff in these programs believe that serving more dropouts and older, less-skilled participants was creating additional challenges. One director stressed that dropouts were more difficult to retain; another director mentioned that her older teens were less optimistic and needed more guidance and counseling in the program. The vocational college serving older teen parents noted that new participants were coming in less motivated; staff felt that JOBS participants were enrolling only to avoid going on job search. College staff believed that these were poor candidates for their services because the job training they provided required a desire to both learn and work that was not exhibited by these participants. Several respondents worried that working with "less-successful" enrollees might reduce staff morale over time.

Attitudes

Staff in all programs who were familiar with JOBS felt positively about the FSA, citing the benefits JOBS offered participants, especially the extra services, attention, and guidance. Most respondents claimed that their programs and JOBS were mutually reinforcing. Programs located where their clients were excluded from JOBS said they would like to see teen parents volunteer for the JOBS program so that they could receive the ancillary supports that JOBS makes available and which may not be available elsewhere. Most believed that JOBS could play a large role in keeping parenting teens in school and preventing dropout by providing these services. Another contribution, noted by several teen parent program directors, is found in the new role of JOBS staff; they can reinforce the message the programs try to convey--that education and training are important and that teen parents can become self-sufficient. A few program directors were less enthusiastic about JOBS; they believed that JOBS and all its benefits represented only an additional way to reach previously established program goals. Further, several noted that this new approach remains untested. Said one of these directors, "JOBS could be good, but it still must prove itself." Two program directors noted that JOBS' special contribution is in continuing to provide services to teen parents once they leave time-limited teen parent programs. Such long-term support, as noted above, is generally unavailable from school or community programs.

One program director said that the FSA provisions that allow the state to get money from absentee fathers were a more important part of the act for her teens than the JOBS programming itself. Interestingly, similar federal legislation has been in effect since 1975[59] and the local welfare office has been mandated since then to seek support from absent parents. The fact that many of the teen mothers in her program were now able to receive child support services probably reflects a change in local welfare office practice. In spite of criticisms that "JOBS just took old stuff and repackaged it," the new packaging may in fact be having an effect.

Overall, few JOBS-related complaints were reported by program respondents; most concerns were specific to the way JOBS was implemented in the state or in the local area. For example, one program director voiced support for sanctions, which are not allowed in her state. She believes that many teen parents need a push to do something about their lives, and sanctions are a great way to give that push. She feels sanctions are particularly important for teens because it is at this time that development is so crucial and remaining isolated at home is so detrimental.

Nevertheless, complaints were frequently voiced about JOBS' eligibility requirements. Many program staff were unhappy when their clients were unable to receive the benefits of JOBS because they were too young or had not yet delivered. Staff were particularly upset when enrollees were excluded for being self-initiators, or for never having dropped out of school.[60] With such a system, there is no reward for hanging in, overcoming obstacles, and taking care of oneself, they argued. One program director wanted her state AFDC program to provide separate grants to teen parents who are under age 18 and are not living with or supported by their parents. The local welfare office does not permit these young mothers to get independent AFDC grants, claiming parents' income is too high, despite the fact that these girls receive no help from them.[61] Without an AFDC grant, these teen mothers are not eligible for JOBS services. Other problems, encountered in a state serving only those teens who were dropouts, were found in the local welfare office's implementation of the state program. Older teen parents were sent to the local JTPA office for training programs; teen parents younger than age 16 were referred back into schools for their JOBS participation. The older teens took a GED test as part of the JTPA training program but received no classroom preparation for the test. One program staffer felt that this system set the older teens up for failure. With the younger teens, the JOBS staff was having difficulty finding placements in local schools; many principals refused to take these dropouts back. A special program for pregnant and parenting teens, which received some JOBS funding, also refused to take referrals, saying the program was full beyond capacity. JOBS had not created any other services locally so was forced to use the imperfect school and JTPA options. It is interesting that schools in this state receive money from JOBS through the Department of Education. These monies are apparently given without a mandate that schools receiving them participate in enrolling JOBS participants. The degree to which the school portion of JOBS money actually goes to JOBS participants may depend on the local commitment to integrate welfare, school, and job development efforts.

There were concerns expressed by a few respondents about the compatibility of JOBS and teen parent program goals. As discussed above, one director fears that JOBS will force her program to change its eventual emphasis from in-depth job preparation and training to the GED and rapid job placement. She worries that welfare officials will limit the time a teen parent can be served in the program, might specify performance goals promoting quick jobs rather than in-depth training, or limit the funds that can be spent per teen parent, thus forcing the less-expensive push for a quick job. Such coercion could be powerful in this teen parent program because it is funded mostly by JOBS; other programs that receive more limited JOBS funds would be less likely to have program goals and operations threatened by such regulations.

Vocational education and training may be compromised by JOBS in other ways as well. The same director noted one negative change with regard to work experience that has already occurred as a result of JOBS. Previously, teen parent enrollees were given a relatively high stipend (more than minimum wage) when they worked at jobs in her community. With JOBS, the stipend has been eliminated and minimum wage has been substituted. Additionally, teen parents on work experience lose the child care and transport subsidies they would receive by remaining on-site in the program. Consequently, enrollments in work experience through the
program have declined; the director feels that enrollees are losing a valuable part of their employment preparation training.

One final problem with JOBS reported by teen parent program staff was repeated difficulties in getting information from welfare offices about JOBS programs. Central information lines at the welfare offices were often not answered, or the receptionist/operator was unaware of JOBS and unable to transfer the call to an appropriate staff member.[62] These access problems made it clear that teens must be unusually tenacious or have outside help to get help from the system.

Respondents anticipate additional problems with information and data access down the line. Few data are being collected about JOBS program implementation; respondents were unable to answer a number of our questions because they had not been monitoring the effect of JOBS.

Effect on Enrollees

Because research staff did not conduct telephone interviews with teen participants about the effect of JOBS, we cannot discuss in detail the effects of the FSA and JOBS on this group. From the data that were gathered from teen parent program and welfare office staff, there are, however, some indications of effects; these are discussed below.

Virtually all school-aged parents involved with JOBS are pursuing diplomas or GEDs, usually exclusively, or in some instances, along with vocational training. The JOBS emphasis on basic education for teens was clearly evident in the universal response from teen parent program heads that JOBS had created no new interest in vocational education among participants. The primary goal of JOBS participants is to get diplomas or GEDs, not unlike other program enrollees. Two of the programs, serving dropouts only, always focused on vocational education and training and they found that there was no hoped-for additional interest among enrollees in vocational preparation because of JOBS--only the same level as before. If the goal of JOBS is to encourage vocational training among eligible school-aged mothers, more thought must be given to how to do this given its educational emphasis and the short-term teen parent programs in which it may operate.

In the eight communities operating JOBS programs, five welfare offices disbursed funds for child care and transport by giving the money directly to teen parents when they came into the JOBS office. One community used this contact as a check on participation; the teen had to bring proof of regular attendance in her education program to receive money for the ancillary support services. The three remaining JOBS programs made child care and transport money available to programs serving the teens, although in all of these communities, individual teens could receive the funds themselves by special arrangement. In some cases money was provided for local bus transportation; in other communities private car expenses or public transportation costs were covered. Child care was usually described as center-based care, although some welfare staff would not specify the kinds of care they covered, saying instead that coverage was based on need.[63] We were unable to ascertain the proportion of JOBS participants receiving ancillary services, since these data were not being recorded, nor could we get clear descriptions of what precisely was being provided. We are unable, therefore, to determine whether any of the states in our sample are holding back in providing benefits or whether they are skimping on costs by pushing less costly alternatives such as family member child care, as FSA critics fear. Our data do, however, suggest that coverage is less than 100 percent.

Teen parent program staff were generally uninformed about the operation and application of sanctions. Program staff were not likely to know whether a particular teen had been sanctioned or what the precise sanction was. In the absence of this knowledge, many claimed there were none. In actuality, one state in our sample mandated sanctions for its teen participants but was taken to court for doing so. Another state in our sample offers sanctions as the other side to its incentive program. When teens participate according to standard, they are rewarded with an additional sum in their AFDC check; when participation is inadequate, the same amount is subtracted from the usual AFDC grant. In spite of the provision of bonuses to participating teens, sanctions are being applied to a large number of teens at any one time in this state. For example, welfare officials in one community told us that 500 teens were registered for the JOBS program, but of these 500, only 150 were participating in school programs at any point in time, leaving 350 teens at risk of being sanctioned.

Nor were welfare officials working with JOBS able to provide us data on the numbers of teens who had been sanctioned. In the case of welfare staff, the sanctions that they may have recommended are often applied to the teens' checks through a different branch of the welfare system--the AFDC caseworkers. Communication between the two branches was apparently not very good. Not all states have implemented sanctions in the same way, and many have not completely decided how to handle teens who demonstrate inadequate participation.

Two other programs in our sample were located in a state with vague rules regarding teen sanctions; de facto sanctions developed so that when teens failed to participate in the teen parent programs, they were moved to another program within JOBS, usually to community work experience. Four other programs were located in two states where JOBS focused only on teen dropouts; teens who had been dropouts and now participated in JOBS alongside adults were subject to the maximum sanction allowable--loss of their portion of the family's AFDC grant.

These difficulties in tracking sanctions among teen JOBS participants will probably persist. HHS is not requiring states to collect or report data on the number of cases in which sanctions have been applied, and as we found, few teen parent or local JOBS programs are stepping in to fill the gap.

We attempted to determine whether the FSA was creating service opportunities for teen parent dropouts--a group that is often ignored. Dropouts are not served by school programs for parenting teens, as discussed above, and there are often no other programs within a community. In two of the sampled teen parent programs, staff indicated that dropouts were more likely to request services than in the past as a result of JOBS referrals. Three other programs serve dropouts exclusively, before and since JOBS, and as a result noted no change in the percentage of dropouts as a result of the FSA. One other program served dropouts, but they were excluded from JOBS because they were enrolled in the teen parent program, which was considered part of the school system. In a catch-22 situation, any dropouts who returned to school via the teen parent program were considered to have re-enrolled in school and were therefore exempt from mandatory participation. The remaining programs in our sample reported no change in the proportion of dropouts coming in to be served, as they either served none or did not record dropout status. Where dropouts are not served by teen parent programs, those required by JOBS to enter programs are entering adult GED classes or skipping to employment development. The effect of JOBS on dropouts depends, then, on the local availability of services for them. We did not see that new services were being created and, as a result, suspect that in many places referrals may be to inappropriate or inadequate programs.

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

The implementation of JOBS, even in our small sample, is highly variable. Some of the JOBS programs we examined appear to really help teen parents by providing child care and transportation. There were some disturbing indications in other communities, however, that the FSA has done little or nothing to increase service options for teen parents. In these communities, the FSA merely imposes sanctions and sets up a system where enrolling in or remaining in school is unrewarded.

The uneven impact of FSA is particularly striking because the communities in which we interviewed were selected because of the existence of a teen parent program generally considered to be very good. Consequently, welfare officials in these communities had at least one fairly well-known program to which teen parents could be referred. JOBS funds could be used to increase the level of services available and the number of young mothers who could be served. But these programs did not always receive JOBS resources or JOBS referrals. In some communities in which exemplary teen parent programs were operating, this resource was not exploited at all by JOBS.

The likelihood that JOBS will use and support programs specifically designed to meet teen parent needs in communities with less exemplary or no teen parent program is clearly not high. In these communities, JOBS may well impose demands without providing benefits to its teen participants. In a survey of state implementation of JOBS, Figueroa (1990) found that JOBS money was being used to establish services where they were lacking, but that this service development focused on adult literacy and employment training. The special needs of teen parents were not targeted. Our data suggest that even when special programs are available, JOBS referrals are often made to regular school programs, which typically lack the supportive services that teen parents need. To meet the needs of teen parents, some service development targeted to teen mothers' needs and more use of existing special services are essential.

Finally, we need to examine the assumptions implicit in FSA that teen mothers should move quickly into JOBS, and that consequently, unique regulations pertaining to school-age mothers, e.g., mandatory participation without regard to baby's age, must exist. These implicit assumptions incorporate the idea popular in school-based programs that the period immediately following pregnancy is the golden or last opportunity to serve teen parents to prevent them from
becoming mired in long-term poverty. This assumption argues for the provision of intensive services to teen mothers over a short period of time. The problem here, as elsewhere, is that the short period of services might be inadequate--especially when services are not well articulated, are not comprehensive, or are provided too briefly.

There is no explicit reason given in the FSA legislation for requiring teen parents to participate in JOBS regardless of the age of their children--a regulation not applied to adult participants. We can only surmise that first, teen parents are seen as a group in crisis requiring immediate remediation, and second, teen parents are seen as a problem that must be contained forcefully and immediately. If a teen is forced to participate in JOBS shortly after giving birth to her baby, and parenting education is provided along with supports for her new parenting role, the end result can be beneficial for the teen and her baby. The irony is that at least some JOBS programs refer teens to regular school programs that do not provide parenting education and that provide no ancillary supports.

Teen parent program staff argued in interviews in all phases of our study that intensive short-term programs are not enough--that teens must be provided the resources they need to develop skills and self-assurance over time--the same time often accorded to middle class youth who attend college or to the noncollege-bound who defer parenting. The FSA could be a positive force in supporting this approach by insisting that its teen funds be directed to settings in which support is currently available, and by reexamining how it defines a teen mother's "success."

[48]The prior programs included the Community Work Experience Program and the Work Incentives Program. These programs, and the history leading up to the FSA, are described in Handler (1987).

[49]Teen parents under age 18 may be assigned to another activity if the parent is beyond the state's compulsory attendance age, if the decision is made on the basis of an individualized assessment not solely on grade completion, and if the state JOBS plan provides for participation in another educational activity or in skills training combined with education. Eighteen- and 19-year-olds can be assigned to an educational program or to work or other training if they fail to make good progress in school or if their participation in education is otherwise inappropriate.

[50]Greenberg and Levin-Epstein (1989), in a preliminary analysis of state plans for JOBS, found that states were not describing what kinds of education will be used for teens or decision rules about which programs to use when. These decisions, with a few exceptions, were left by states to local discretion.

[51]See the appendix, footnote 5, for a discussion of "satisfactory progress."

[52]When a single community agency operated separate programs for teen parents (differing in goals and clientele), these programs were described separately in previous sections. In this section, we are interested in relationships between agencies that run teen parent programs and the welfare staff who administer JOBS. For this reason, separate programs run by one agency are considered together.

[53]Two of the programs described above were not interviewed about the FSA. In one case, the program was the second part of a sequential program and served few school-aged teen mothers. In the second, the program had not yet had any dealings with JOBS because it was committed to filling scarce program slots from an existing waiting list.

[54]These data were supplemented with unpublished state-level data collected by the National Center for Research on Vocational Education.

[55]There was no evidence that such deliberate dropping out was occurring in our sample communities from these three states. However, tracking dropouts is very inexact, leaving this issue largely unexplored.

[56]Parents 20 and older receiving AFDC benefits are required to participate in JOBS if they have a child over the age of three (or over the age of one, at the state's option). In contrast, teen parents age 16-19 receiving AFDC benefits who do not have a high school diploma must participate in educational training activities regardless of their child's age. (See the appendix for further discussion of this requirement.)

[57]This is consistent with federal regulations, which provide that persons who are in "self-initiated education or training" in an institution of higher education are eligible for child care, transportation, and other supportive services, but the cost of the tuition is not federally reimbursible. The state is permitted to limit the use of post-secondary education but must do so in its state JOBS plan.

[58]In a few of the communities in which we interviewed, JOBS staff were more involved with community agency staff, and their efforts were praised by local teen parent program directors.

[59]Title IV-D of the Social Security Act, 42 U.S.C. 651 et seq., requires that each state operate a Child Support Enforcement Program and establish paternity and enforce child support obligations for all AFDC recipients and for any nonwelfare families who request assistance. Although the FSA strengthened those provisions, the state has been required to take these actions since 1975. All AFDC recipients are required to cooperate with child support enforcement actions unless they have "good cause" (which is narrowly defined). As long as the child is receiving AFDC, the support payments go to the state to reimburse it for the welfare benefits; the family receives a maximum of $50 each month as a "pass-through" if timely support payments are made. The "pass-through" is intended as an incentive for cooperation.

[60]Teen parents who remain in school and do not drop out, in spite of being young parents, are handicapped in states where the JOBS program has chosen to serve only teens who do not remain in school.

[61]This is probably illegal. The FSA permits states, as an option, to deny AFDC benefits to pregnant and parenting teens under 18 who have never married, and who are not living with their parents, unless they are living in another adult-supervised situation. However, there are a series of exceptions for teens, e.g., whose parents are not living or whose whereabouts are unknown; whose parents do not permit them to live at home; whose physical or emotional health or safety would be jeopardized by living with their parents; who lived apart from their parents for one year before the birth of the child or before their application for AFDC benefits; or who otherwise have "good cause."

The federal implementing regulations are not yet in place, and it is likely that states are not properly implementing this option in their absence. The most likely explanation for the denial of benefits to these teens is that the local welfare office is misapplying the "grandparent deeming" provision, which requires states to count the income of teen parents' parents, if the teen parent is under age 18, and if she and her child are living with her parents now (42 U.S.C. 602(a) 39).

[62]RAND research staff experience was consistent with these complaints; in response to requests to speak with JOBS staff they were on occasion given referrals to outside agencies completely unconnected to welfare and JOBS.

[63]The states have a wide variety of choices about how to provide child care under the FSA. HHS expressly rejected proposals that would have required states to provide on-site day care for the children of teen parents, choosing instead to allow states more discretion in providing child care. (See the appendix for additional discussion of this point.)