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Cover Image by Staff Sgt. Darron Salzer, National Guard Bureau iii
PrefaceThe National Guard Youth ChalleNGe program is a residential, quasi-military program for youth ages 16 to 18 who are experiencing difficulty in traditional high school. Participating states, through their state National Guard organizations with supporting federal funds and oversight, operate the program. The first ChalleNGe sites began in the mid-1990s; today, there are 40 ChalleNGe sites in 29 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. To date, about 155,000 young people have completed the ChalleNGe program. Congress requires the ChalleNGe program to deliver a report on its progress each year.The program includes a 5.5-month Residential Phase followed by a 12-month PostResidential Phase. Participants are supported by a mentor throughout both phases. The stated goal of ChalleNGe is "to intervene in and reclaim the lives of 16-18-year-old high school dropouts, producing program graduates with the values, life skills, education, and self-discipline necessary to succeed as productive citizens."The RAND team's analyses of ChalleNGe began in September 2016; ongoing efforts will continue through June 2020. This report is the second in a series of annual reports that RAND researchers will issue during the duration of this project. The first National Guard Youth ChalleNGe Annual Report covers program years 2015-2016 and can be found on the RAND Corporation's website (Wenger et al., 2017); the third report will cover program years [2017][2018] and is expected to be released in late 2018. RAND researchers will issue a fourth annual report covering 2018-2019 in late 2019. Given this time frame, the current report includes only a portion of our a...
