Data from 192 employers and 10 high schools participating in the National Academy Foundation's (NAF) career academies program reveal the benefits of employer participation and incentives and disincentives to their involvement. Findings demonstrate factors that bolster sustained employer involvement, including industry-specific support and NAF's…

Discusses generally positive findings of research studies of the School-to-Work Opportunities Act of 1994 related to academic achievement, career preparation, youth development, teachers' views, and employers' views. (Contains 52 references.) (PKP)

To study employer motivations for participating in school-to-work (STW) programs, researchers sought programs with a strong work-based learning component, specifically those where employers took students as interns or apprentices for one or two school years. In 1995 and 1996, 1 or 2 site visits were made to each of 12 programs. Researchers toured…

Since the School-to-Work Opportunities Act was passed in 1994, there has been debate over whether sufficient numbers of employers can be recruited, in order to create a national school-to-work system with the substantial work-based learning component the legislation calls for. Recent research on the question has had mixed results. In order to…

A literature review of 132 studies of School-to-Work programs and consultations with the staff of the National School-to-Work Office, researchers, and practitioners in the field drew conclusions about the effectiveness of the School-to-Work initiative. Some of the study's conclusions were the following: (1) School-to-Work students maintain good…

To assess the impact of the National Academy Foundation (NAF) career academy (CA) model, a large-scale, multi-site evaluation was undertaken. Survey and interview data on program experiences and postsecondary outcomes were analyzed from nine CA programs. The study used pre-post evaluation of student data, field visits, and written and telephone…