Letter: JAG Statistics Celebrated By Organization’s National President
The national office of Jobs for America’s Graduates (JAG) announced on June 8 some amazing statistics about the success of the program nationally.
Data gathered nationally from the class of 2020, which were tabulated on May 31, 2021, showed the class rate of graduation was 96.7%, up from 95.4% in 2019.
Employment nationally for the JAG class 2020 was 64.93%, up from 46.61% in the class of 2019. The “positive outcome rate” for the class of 2020 was 82%, up from 69.9% the year before. And the “unable to contact rate,” which was 17.02% in 2019, was down to 8.16% in 2020.
The numbers for the class of 2020 – a class affected by disrupted learning, closed schools, virtual learning, and strict COVID-19 precautions in school buildings – are an amazing reflection of the hard work done by JAG students and staff across the country to overcome those obstacles.
As Ken Smith states in the text below, incredibly, the results from the class of 2020 were the best in the history of JAG!
The preliminary results for JAG’s Class of 2020 were tabulated by our two data systems as of May 31. We could not be more inspired to report the results are the best ever in the 40‑year history of Jobs for America’s Graduates.
These results are, truly, simply outstanding. Information on the enormity of learning loss and student disengagement is just now becoming more public, and it will be publicized much more over the next 3–4 weeks. With the nation facing such disastrous educational impacts from the pandemic, the results achieved by JAG for the lowest‑performing segments of high school and middle school populations, in a word, stunning.
So too with regard to the results of JAG’s out‑of‑school program, with an employment rate of 68% and 51% earning a high school diploma or equivalent, which is dramatically higher than other out‑of‑school programs we are able to monitor.
The “Unable to contact” rate of 8.16% for the Class of 2020 is the lowest in JAG’s history. Congratulations!
In short, you and your team have, once again, delivered great results for our most vulnerable young people – and often their families. You have demonstrated that we can help young people overcome extraordinary learning challenges through intensive engagement, personal support and a commitment by our frontline team to meeting every challenge to ensure success in school, employment and post‑secondary education.
I am excited to share that the JAG program in Kansas has recorded its own remarkable statistics that demonstrate success during the pandemic!
JAG-K’s graduation rate for 2020, when COVID-19 was first sweeping across the U.S., was 97.05%.
Because JAG-K staff worked tirelessly to keep in touch with its students, to help them overcome whatever obstacles might prohibit them from succeeding at school during the pandemic, Kansas programs statewide reported an astoundingly low 2.55% “unable to contact” rate in March of 2021.
Despite all the obstacles, I am proud of our JAG-K team for demonstrating resilience and the effectiveness of evidence-based JAG model. The model has worked for 40 years, and despite the pandemic, JAG just recorded its best year in history!
Chuck Knapp, President/CEO
Jobs for America’s Graduates-Kansas