The Evaluation of Tribal Welfare-to-Work Programs

Issues Addressed
Key Evaluation Features
Participating Tribes
For More Information

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program it created, made moving people from welfare to work a primary goal of federal welfare policy. The legislation included special provisions so American Indians and Alaska Natives could pursue this goal themselves.

Under several programs—Indian and Native American Welfare-to-Work, Tribal TANF, Native Employment Works (NEW), Tribal Child Care, and Tribal Support Enforcement—tribal governments have new latitude in combining funds from different sources to pursue the overall goal of promoting employment. They can also establish for themselves the TANF time limits and work requirements that will apply to tribal nations. Yet with this new freedom comes new challenges. For example, most tribes have little experience running welfare programs, and important funding issues remain to be negotiated between tribal governments and states.

This component of Mathematica's national welfare-to-work evaluation addressed three broad issues:

What program models and unique WtW approaches do tribes develop? How do American Indian and Alaska Native organizations find and develop jobs? Can they develop sufficient employment opportunities? What roles do private industry and economic development initiatives play in these efforts? What positive outcomes are pursued in addition to placement in unsubsidized jobs? What special issues and challenges affect tribal WtW and related programs? How are they dealt with?

What activities and services do the tribal initiatives emphasize? What range of employment preparation, supportive services, and postemployment services do tribal programs provide? How do tribal programs respond to special challenges relating to transportation, child and elder dependent care, and noncustodial parents?

How do tribal initiatives integrate services? How are issues such as access to health, mental health, and substance abuse services taken into account in developing and implementing tribal WtW programs? How do tribal TANF, NEW, Child and Dependent Care, Child Support Enforcement, JTPA programs, and Bureau of Indian Affairs programs interact with the WtW program?

Key Features of the Tribal Evaluation

Focus on implementation experience. The 550 federally recognized American Indian tribes and Alaska Native villages are diverse in circumstances and culture. Furthermore, many have very small populations. As such, rigorous statistical evaluations of program impacts are infeasible. Instead, the evaluation emphasized developing a clear understanding of program designs, implementation experiences, promising approaches, and lessons learned. The research is based on two rounds of intensive site visits to about 10 sites. The first round was conducted from September 1999 to January 2000; the second was conducted in late 2000.

Input from a tribal working group. Mathematica assembled an advisory group of ten individuals from American Indian and Alaska Native groups with expertise in tribal employment and training programs, as well as welfare-to-work issues. The group assisted in selecting evaluation sites, and in ensuring that the evaluation addressed issues of interest to the U.S. government and tribal nations, and helped guide the dissemination of results.

Two-way involvement of tribal leaders at evaluation sites. The evaluation team obtained the approval of relevant tribal authorities to conduct site visits. The findings were circulated to the participating tribes for comment before being delivered in final form or published. Draft reports on lessons learned were also distributed to all federally recognized American Indian tribes and Alaska Native villages and to national and regional tribal organizations for their feedback. 

Click here for participating tribes.

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