Evaluating Transition Assistance Services

One of the many effects of the drawdown of the U.S. Military has been the premature separation of vast numbers of soldiers, sailors, marines, and airmen. In recognition of the hardship that this often presents, Congress enacted several pieces of legislation ultimately requiring that the Department of Defense permanently provide transition services to those leaving the military as a means of smoothing their move back into civilian life. The Departments of Labor and Veterans Affairs cooperated in this effort through what became known as the Transition Assistance Program (TAP). As the Service with the largest number of separating personnel, the Army supplements TAP with the Army Career and Alumni Program (ACAP), run by a team of government and contract personnel. While TAP provides a standard series of seminars on job search skills, ACAP includes more personalized and in-depth services, including Job Assistance Centers (JAC) offering one-on-one counseling and computerized job search services.

In order to assess the impact of JAC, HumRRO developed a telephone-based survey that asked respondents about transition and job-search assistance received and post-separation employment, along with other less tangible outcomes such as civilian job satisfaction and attitudes towards the military. A key problem faced in the design of the research methodology was finding a control group. The eventual solution involved including members of the other Services in the sample, individuals who may have participated in TAP but were unlikely to have had JAC programs available to them.

Some 3,000 Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force ex-servicemembers, Army civilians, and spouses of Army ex-servicemembers who made the transition back to civilian life between October 1992 and September 1993 participated in computer-assisted interviews in late 1994. The primary outcome measures were annual earnings, receipt of unemployment compensation, ratings of preparedness for the job market, and ratings of current financial condition relative to pre-separation. Multivariate analyses were conducted to assess the relative impact of various personal, military, and transition-related characteristics on these outcomes.

The results indicated that the more job search assistance services individuals received and the more satisfied they were with such services, the more they felt prepared for and achieved success in the civilian labor market. Further, 83 percent of those who received and were satisfied with job assistance said that such services made them more inclined to recommend the military as a career.

The effects of job search assistance were larger for a subsample of former enlisted servicemembers at or below the grade of E6 who had less than a bachelor's degree. Among this group, each of the 12 JAC services was predicted to increase annual earnings by $419, holding other factors constant. On average, ex-servicemembers felt that the most useful job search services included: resume/cover letter preparation; interviewing skills; salary/benefit negotiation; and individual job search. These were rated useful or very useful by 70 percent to 86 percent of ex-servicemembers.

Subsequent efforts are underway by HumRRO to assist in developing state-of-the-art quality assurance and performance measurement tools for the Army's transition assistance programs.

For more information, contact:
Dr. Peter Ramsberger or Research Notes