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This report presents findings from two components of the National Implementation Evaluation of the Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG): the Descriptive Implementation Study and the Outcome Study. These two studies address the following two major research questions:

1. How are health profession training programs being implemented across the grantee sites?
2. What individual-level outputs and outcomes occur?

Overall, the two studies found that HPOG programs generally reached their target enrollment levels, and that the majority of participants completed their course(s) of study and found healthcare jobs. However, many of those first jobs after leaving the program were entry-level positions at relatively low-wages.

Visit OPRE’s website to learn about the design of the evaluation to assess implementation, systems change, and outcomes of the 27 non-tribal HPOG 1.0 Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG) programs awarded in 2010. You can also access all reports on the evaluation on this website.

This report describes how grantees of the Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG) program used the Performance Reporting System and other sources of performance information to manage their programs, identify areas in need of change, and make programmatic improvements.

The report is based on a review of documents such as grantee performance progress reports, a survey of HPOG program directors, and interviews with a subset of these directors that took place starting in December 2014.

The Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG) Impact Study will answer questions about the program’s overall effectiveness and explore how variations in services affect program impacts. This analysis plan provides detailed information on the study’s impact analyses, including data sources that will be used, how variables and measures will be operationalized, how missing data will be treated, the approach to hypothesis testing, and model specifications for each of the study’s research questions. This document supplements information outlined in the HPOG Impact Study Design Report released in November 2014.

This brief summarizes key findings from the Interim Outcome Study Report: National Implementation Evaluation of the Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG) to Serve TANF Recipients and Other Low-Income Individuals report, released in 2014. Findings come from administrative data collected through the HPOG Performance Reporting System one year after program enrollment. Information provided includes characteristics of the typical HPOG participant, types of training courses enrollees participated in, types of support services participants received, and participants’ outcomes.

The Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG) were first awarded in 2010 to 32 grantee organizations across 23 states.  The grantees, which include post-secondary education institutions, Workforce Investment Boards, state and local government agencies, community-based organizations, Indian tribes and tribal organizations, will receive funding through September 2015.  In June 2015, HPOG delivered the HPOG Program and Evaluation Portfolio Interim Report to Congress. The report provides a summary of the significant activities, outcomes and accomplishments of the HPOG program during its first three fiscal years, from 2010 to 2013. The information contained in the report was gathered from an analysis of participant performance, an outcome study of a sub-set of participants and an evaluation of the tribal grantees.  The report also outlines key aspects of the HPOG program, such as its career pathways framework, fundamental program components, employment outcomes and ongoing evaluation and research initiatives.

This report describes the research design of the HPOG Impact Study. The study is designed to answer questions about overall HPOG program effectiveness and explore how variations in program services affect program impacts, including identifying which elements of career pathways programs contribute most to advancing the labor market success of participants.

This report reviews the literature on the policy context of the Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG) program, and the challenges and opportunities related to developing healthcare occupational training and support programs. It discusses the structure of the healthcare industry and trends in healthcare employment, implications of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) for entry-level employment in healthcare, and resulting challenges and opportunities for training programs. The report was developed as part of the HPOG Implementation, Systems and Outcome Project, which is being led by Abt Associates in partnership with the Urban Institute.

The Health Profession Opportunity Grants (HPOG) Program funds training programs in high-demand healthcare professions, targeted to Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) recipients and other low-income individuals.

A substantial skills gap exists between the education and training of the labor force and the needs of employers in many high growth industries, including healthcare and manufacturing.