Founded in 1974, MDRC is committed to improving the lives of people with low incomes. We design promising new interventions, evaluate existing programs, and provide technical assistance to build better programs.
MDRC develops evidence about solutions to some of the nation’s most difficult problems. Explore our projects and variety of products, including publications, videos, podcast episodes, and resources for researchers and practitioners.
The Opening Doors Demonstration is designed to show how community colleges can help more low-income students remain in school and improve other outcomes, including degree attainment, labor market success, and personal and social well-being.
Early Results from the Opening Doors Demonstration at Kingsborough Community College
Opening Doors Learning Communities, a program serving mostly low-income freshmen at Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn, NY, improved course and test pass rates, particularly in English.
Evidence from the Talent Development High School Model
Talent Development, a high school reform initiative, produced substantial positive effects on attendance, academic course credits earned, tenth-grade promotion, and algebra pass rates for students in very low-performing schools in Philadelphia.
New Findings on Policy Experiments Conducted in the Early 1990s
In welfare and employment programs that provide earnings supplements, increased family income plays a key role in improving children’s school achievement.
In a study of over 3,500 women in welfare-to-work programs in three states, child care instability did not appear to be a major cause of employment instability.
Jobs-Plus, an ambitious employment program inside some of the nation’s poorest inner-city public housing developments, markedly increased the earnings of residents in the sites where it was implemented well.
A Study of Adult Student Persistence in Library Literacy Programs
Library-based literacy programs face serious challenges to improving adult students’ participation. This study suggests programs should be prepared to accommodate intermittent participation by adult students and to connect students to social services and other supports.
Evidence from Samples of Current and Former Welfare Recipients
This study suggests that child support can be an important income source and can help welfare recipients move toward self-sufficiency. More generous distribution rules increase payment rates, but many parents still do not understand the distribution rules.
Context, Components, and Initial Impacts on Students’ Performance and Attendance
During the first three years of implementation in six urban schools, The Talent Development Middle School model—an ongoing, whole-school reform initiative—had a positive impact on math achievement for eighth-graders but appeared to produce no systematic improvement in outcomes for seventh-graders.
Services That May Help Low-Income Students Succeed in Community College
Community colleges can pursue many strategies for enhancing student services, including offering “one-stop shopping,” which provides students with multiple services at the same time and place.
Seattle Jobs-Plus — part of an MDRC national research demonstration designed to promote employment among public housing residents — succeeded in engaging a majority of residents, many of whom were immigrants from diverse parts of the world, in work-related services or supports.
Basic Characteristics of Economically Disadvantaged Couples in the U.S.
Using recent surveys and published reports, this working paper assembles a portrait of the attitudes and behaviors of disadvantaged married couples. It gathers and assesses descriptive statistics on the formation and stability, characteristics, and quality of marriages in the low-income population in the U.S. We welcome discussion and comments on this working paper.
This report examines how public housing authorities in six cities implemented one of the most innovative features of the Jobs-Plus demonstration: using incentives plans to keep rents lower than they would have been under existing rules as a way to encourage and reward work among public housing residents.
Relying on 427 classroom observations conducted over a three-year period, this study traces changes in teachers’ instructional practices in the First Things First schools.
Implementation, Effects, and Experiences of Poor Families and Neighborhoods
Welfare caseloads fell, employment increased, and social conditions generally improved in Miami-Dade County after the 1996 federal welfare reform law was passed, but the county’s welfare-to-work program was poorly implemented and unusually harsh.
Implementing the Community Support for Work Component of Jobs-Plus
The “community support for work” component of Jobs-Plus relies on outreach workers from public housing developments to help extend Jobs-Plus’s reach in public housing communities.
Context, Components, and Initial Impacts on Ninth-Grade Students’ Engagement and Performance
An examination of the implementation and early impacts of Talent Development, a whole-school reform initiative, found that the model produced substantial gains in ninth-grade students’ course completion and promotion rates.
In MDRC’s study of over 160,000 single-parent welfare recipients, families who repeatedly return to welfare assistance—“cyclers”—were less disadvantaged in the labor market than long-term welfare recipients. At the same time, they were less able than short-term recipients to attain stable employment and to work without welfare.
