Examining Veterans' Use of Employment Programs and Program Mode of Delivery on Veterans' Employment Outcomes

Open Access
- Author:
- Davenport, Katie
- Graduate Program:
- Agricultural and Extension Education
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- October 02, 2019
- Committee Members:
- Daniel Francis Perkins, Dissertation Advisor/Co-Advisor
Daniel Francis Perkins, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
Mark A Brennan, Jr., Committee Member
John Ewing, Committee Member
Janet Agnes Welsh, Outside Member
Mark A Brennan, Jr., Program Head/Chair - Keywords:
- veterans
delivery mode
work satisfaction
work status;
programs - Abstract:
- Roughly 200,000 service members transition from the military each year (Ainspan, Penk, & Kearney, 2019) and there is a plethora of support available to veterans after they leave the service (Cohen, 2013). This dissertation uses data from The Veterans Metrics Initiative (TVM), a longitudinal prospective study of transitioning veterans to examine veteran work status and satisfaction outcomes based on work program use and subsequent characteristics of program delivery. Specifically, this dissertation is interested in parsing out differences in employment status and satisfaction for veterans participating in in-person, online and hybrid modes of employment program delivery as well as examining employment status and satisfaction as a result of participating in different types of online programs (i.e., online interactive programs in comparison to programs that only require passive user participation). This investigation involved examining the employment programs that unemployed veterans nominated using as part of their transition process and the characteristics of these programs at the first wave in comparison to veterans self-reported employment outcomes at the second wave or nine-months from transition. Significant differences were found in work status among unemployed veterans who participated in employment programs. There were no significant differences in work satisfaction among veterans who reported using employment programs. There were also no significant differences in work status or satisfaction between mode of delivery for online, in person, and hybrid programs or among online programs that had interactive or passive components. Future directions and implications for practice are discussed.