Mindanao Youth for 
Development (MYDev)
Project
FY16Impact Evaluation Report
Measuring Youth’s Employment, Perceptions and 
Engagement, and Skills
August 2017
Prepared by: 
Education Development Center, Inc. (EDC)
1025 Thomas Jefferson St.
Suite 700W
Washington, DC 2000
i
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Table of Figures............................................................................................................................................ iii
Table of Tables............................................................................................................................................. iv
Executive Summary....................................................................................................................................... v
Introduction .............................................................................................................................................. v
Methodology............................................................................................................................................. v
Impact Findings........................................................................................................................................ vi
Employment......................................................................................................................................... vi
Youth’s Perceptions and Engagement................................................................................................. vi
Soft Skills............................................................................................................................................. vii
Gender Gap......................................................................................................................................... vii
Emerging Findings.................................................................................................................................. viii
The Relationship Between Soft Skills and Other Outcomes.............................................................. viii
Urban Rural Gap................................................................................................................................. viii
Recommendations................................................................................................................................... ix
Impact Finding Recommendations...................................................................................................... ix
Emerging Findings Recommendations................................................................................................. ix
Conclusion................................................................................................................................................ ix
Introduction ..................................................................................................................................................1
Project Background...................................................................................................................................1
Evaluation Questions................................................................................................................................2
Methodology.................................................................................................................................................3
Study Design .............................................................................................................................................3
Sample Design...........................................................................................................................................3
Data Collection..........................................................................................................................................4
Tools..........................................................................................................................................................4
Limitations ................................................................................................................................................5
Demographics...............................................................................................................................................6
The Sample................................................................................................................................................6
Comparability of Weighted Sample..........................................................................................................7
Findings and Discussion ................................................................................................................................8
Employment..............................................................................................................................................8
New Employment..................................................................................................................................9
ii
Better Employment.............................................................................................................................12
Unemployed Youth .............................................................................................................................14
Youth’s Perceptions and Engagement ...................................................................................................17
Youth’s Perceptions of Community ....................................................................................................17
Youth’s Perceptions of Government...................................................................................................19
Youth’s Satisfaction with Community and Government ....................................................................21
Youth’s Involvement in Organizations and Institutions......................................................................23
Soft Skills.................................................................................................................................................27
Soft Skills and the MYDev Intervention ..............................................................................................27
Emerging Soft Skills Findings...............................................................................................................29
Gender ....................................................................................................................................................30
Conclusions and Recommendations...........................................................................................................31
Key Findings ............................................................................................................................................32
Employment........................................................................................................................................32
Youth’s Perceptions and Engagement................................................................................................32
Soft Skills.............................................................................................................................................33
The Gender Gap..................................................................................................................................33
Emerging Findings...................................................................................................................................33
The Relationship between Soft Skills and Other Outcomes...............................................................33
The Urban/Rural Gap..........................................................................................................................34
Annex 1: Regression Output .......................................................................................................................35
1.1.Work Readiness and Leadership Skills Gains and New/Better Employment...................................35
Work Readiness Output......................................................................................................................35
Work Readiness Calculations..............................................................................................................35
Leadership Output ..............................................................................................................................35
Leadership Calculations......................................................................................................................36
1.2 Work Readiness and Leadership Skills Endline Scores and New/Better Employment.....................36
Work Readiness Output......................................................................................................................36
Work Readiness Calculations..............................................................................................................36
Leadership Output ..............................................................................................................................37
Leadership Calculations......................................................................................................................37
1.3 Civic Engagement and Skills Relationships .......................................................................................37
Annex 2: Sample Weights...........................................................................................................................39
iii
Weights for Youth Who Took Both the Youth Perceptions and the Youth Employment Surveys .....39
Weights for Youth Who Took the Youth Employment Survey ...........................................................39
Weights for Youth Who Took the Youth Perceptions Survey.............................................................40
Annex 3: Tools.............................................................................................................................................41
YOUTH EMPLOYMENT SURVEY...............................................................................................................41
Youth Perceptions Survey.......................................................................................................................46
TABLE OF FIGURES
Figure i: MYDev encourages out-of-school youth to become actively engaged in their communities........ v
Figure ii: New or Better Employment Amongst MYDev Youth.................................................................... vi
Figure iii: MYDev and Non-MYDev Youth's Skills Changes Over Time........................................................ vii
Figure 1: MYDev's Theory of Change ............................................................................................................2
Figure 2: MYDev Evaluation Study Design ....................................................................................................3
Figure 3: Location Type by Group (Unweighted)..........................................................................................7
Figure 4: Age by Group, Unweighted & Weighted .......................................................................................7
Figure 5: Incidence of New or Better Employment Amongst MYDev youth ................................................9
Figure 6: Employment at Baseline and Endline Amongst MYDev Youth......................................................9
Figure 7: Profile of a Newly Employed MYDev Youth.................................................................................10
Figure 8: Baseline and Endline Employment by MYDev and Non-MYDev Youth .......................................11
Figure 9: New Employment Amongst MYDev and Non-MYDev Youth, By Sex ..........................................11
Figure 10: Better Employment for MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth .............................................................12
Figure 11: Distribution of Improving Ability to Save to Meet One's Needs, by Group...............................13
Figure 12: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth's Increase in Number of Meals Eaten per Day ..........................13
Figure 13: Percent of Continuously Employed Males and Females with Better Employment, by Group..14
Figure 14: Ways of Finding Work at Baseline and Endline, Amongst MYDev and Non-MYDev Youth.......15
Figure 15: Reasons for Not Looking for Work at Baseline: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth ........................15
Figure 16: Reasons for Not Looking for Work at Endline: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth..........................16
Figure 17: Answer options for Community and Government Perceptions questions................................17
Figure 18: Youth's Perceptions of Community at Endline, by location type ..............................................18
Figure 19: Community & Government Perceptions Gain Scores for MYDev youth, by location................20
Figure 20: Average Community Satisfaction Gain Scores, by group...........................................................21
Figure 21: Average Change in Government Satisfaction, by group............................................................22
Figure 22: Gain Scores for Frequency of Performing Organizational Duties, by group..............................25
Figure 23: Average Number of Institutions Recognized at Endline, by group............................................25
Figure 24: Skills Self-Assessed by Youth......................................................................................................27
Figure 25: MYDev Youth's Skill Gains Relative To Non-MYDev Youth's Skill Gains ....................................28
Figure 26: MYDev Youth's Skill Gain Scores, by Sex....................................................................................28
Figure 28: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Females' Gain Scores...........................................................................29
Figure 27: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Males' Gain Scores...............................................................................29
iv
TABLE OF TABLES
Table 1: Reliability Statistics for the YES and YPS .........................................................................................5
Table 2: Components of Better Employment for Intervention and Comparison Youth.............................13
v
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
INTRODUCTION
The Mindanao Youth for Development (MYDev) project supports USAID-Philippines’ overall Country 
Development Cooperative Strategy (CDCS) goal through Development Objective 2: Peace and Stability in 
Conflict-Affected Areas in Mindanao Improved. To contribute to peace and stability in Mindanao, MYDev
applies a positive youth development approach to implementing activities targeted at two key 
populations:
 Out-of-School Youth: MYDev implements basic education and experiential life and leadership 
skills as well as technical skills training for 19,000 youth in eight areas in Mindanao. In addition, 
MYDev engages youth in community service activities through youth networks in order to 
improve youth’s employability and civic engagement.
 Local Government and Community 
Leaders: MYDev supports the creation 
and development of local Out-of￾School Youth Development Alliances 
(OSYDA), which actively promote 
education and work opportunities for 
out-of-school youth in their 
communities.
Together, out-of-school youth and OSYDA
activities are designed to create an 
environment in which out-of-school youth feel 
engaged through their contributions of 
productive work and civic engagement (see 
Figure i).
METHODOLOGY
The outcomes of MYDev’s programming are measured by examining the changes from baseline to endline 
of a randomly selected, weighted sample of MYDev youth and a weighted sample of comparison group 
youth1
. Two tools—the Youth Employment Survey (YES) and the Youth Perceptions Survey (YPS)—are 
used to answer three evaluation questions that correspond to key indicators:
Q1. Do youth participants demonstrate improved livelihoods as a result of project activities? 
Q2. Do youth participants demonstrate improved perceptions of government and community as a 
result of project activities?
Q3. Do youth participants demonstrate improved life, work readiness, and leadership skills as a result 
of project activities?
 
1 A non-equivalent groups, pre/post, quasi-experimental evaluation, with samples weighted by sex and highly urban/partially 
urban/rural location to reflect the MYDev population.
Figure i: MYDev encourages out-of-school youth to become 
actively engaged in their communities. 
vi
The collection of data on employment, skills, and perceptions and engagement from the same youth 
allowed MYDev to explore the possible influences of the project beyond these three questions alone.
While this impact evaluation was implemented with attention to rigor and detail, some key limitations 
persist, including: 1) the quasi-experimental evaluation design limits the claims to causality this report can 
make, and 2) the possible contamination of the comparison group may negatively bias estimates of 
MYDev youth’s improvements relative to non-MYDev youth.
IMPACT FINDINGS
Employment
Employment data suggest that MYDev’s programming may positively affect not only unemployed youth 
in finding a job, but employed youth in better managing what they earn from a job.
25.7% of MYDev youth find new or better 
employment between baseline and endline 
(see Figure ii)
2
. Further, compared to non￾MYDev youth, MYDev youth achieve a 
greater incidence of new employment
(significant at p<0.001).
While MYDev youth do not obtain better
employment at greater rates than non￾MYDev youth, they are better able to 
productively manage their money. More 
MYDev youth than comparison group 
youth are better able to use their savings to 
meet their needs (p=0.024), and more
MYDev youth report eating more meals per 
day by endline (p<0.001). 
Indicator 12: Number of out-of-school youth receiving new or better employment
25.7% of the MYDev Population
Youth’s Perceptions and Engagement
Nearly 70% of MYDev youth improve their perceptions of the community or government. Upon
comparison with non-MYDev youth, data suggest that MYDev activities seem to positively affect MYDev 
youth’s perceptions of their communities, their satisfaction with their communities, and their satisfaction 
with the government. Activities do not, however, seem to positively affect youth’s perceptions of the 
government.
 
2 Note that all visuals depicting MYDev youth only are colored in green, while visuals depicting a comparison between intervention 
and comparison group youth are colored in shades of blue.
Figure ii: New or Better Employment Amongst MYDev Youth
new 
employment
20.0%
better 
employment
5.7%
no change
74.3%
Incidence of New or Better Employment 
vii
Still, MYDev activities seem to positively affect the level of engagement of MYDev youth in their 
communities. While MYDev youth reduce the number of organizations in which they are involved 
compared to comparison group youth (p=0.009), they increase the frequency with which they perform 
their organizational duties in those organizations more than do comparison group youth (p=0.002). 
Indicator 10: Percentage of targeted out-of-school youth with improved perceptions of community or 
government
69.1% of the MYDev Population
Soft Skills
MYDev youth improve their life skills, work readiness skills, and leadership skills to a greater extent 
than non-MYDev youth.
74.9% of MYDev youth improve either their life skills, work readiness skills, or leadership skills between 
baseline and endline. While a statistically similar percent (72.1%) of comparison group youth improve 
their skills as well (p=0.220), MYDev youth improve their skills in life, work readiness, and in leadership to 
a greater extent than comparison group youth do (statistically significant at p<0.001) (see Figure iii3
). 
Indicator 14: Percentage of targeted out-of-school youth with improved life skills, work readiness, or 
leadership skills
74.9% of the MYDev Population
Gender Gap
MYDev seems to be able to reduce gender gaps across employment, skills, and some aspects of civic 
engagement: where gender gaps exist in baseline data, MYDev youth consistently experience smaller 
or disappeared gender gaps by endline compared to non-MYDev youth.
 
3 Confidence intervals (blue whiskers on each bar in the graph) represent the area in which we are 95% confident the 
population value lies. If confidence intervals on two bars overlap, it is likely that there is no statistical difference between the
average values represented by the bars.
0.21 0.20
0.34
0.05 0.01
0.08
Work Readiness Life Skills Leadership Skills
MYDev Youth Improve Skills More than Non￾MYDev Youth
Intervention
Comparison
Figure iii: MYDev and Non-MYDev Youth's Skills Changes Over Time
viii
While non-MYDev males find employment almost twice as much as females, amongst MYDev youth this 
gap is much smaller. Further, gaps in better employment between non-MYDev males and females at 
endline cannot be found amongst MYDev males and females (p=0.502).
MYDev males and females improve their skills at a statistically similar rate for all skill areas (all p>0.10), 
while non-MYDev males improve their skills more than non-MYDev females (p<0.10 for all skills).
At baseline, female intervention group youth recognize more institutions on average than male 
intervention group youth, but by endline, this gap disappears (p=0.28). However, in other areas of civic 
engagement, MYDev seems to reduce the gaps for females more than males.
EMERGING FINDINGS
The Relationship Between Soft Skills and Other Outcomes
Skill gains alone do not meaningfully influence employment or perceptions and engagement.
MYDev’s model is built upon a positive youth development approach characterized by a bundling of 
activities that together are expected to improve outcomes for MYDev youth. By design, soft skill training 
alone is not intended to yield the peace-building outcomes MYDev embraces; perhaps as evidence of this,
regression models that examine the relationship between skills and other outcomes only partially explain 
those outcomes. Still, the finding that comparison group youth who improve their work readiness and 
leadership skills at the same rate as MYDev youth are more likely to find new or better employment or 
have better perceptions of the community or government begs for further research. Is this finding the 
beginnings of evidence that the holistic, positive youth development model MYDev employs is key to the 
positive outcomes observed? Is it a manifestation of the complexities of the context in which MYDev 
works? More research is necessary to understand this phenomenon, observed by MYDev for the first time 
in this study, better.
Urban Rural Gap
Gaps in achievement for youth from highly urban, partially urban, or rural areas persist for employment, 
perceptions and engagement, and leadership skills. 
MYDev targets youth in highly urban, partially urban, and rural areas alike. While all programming 
originates from the same base, recent observations by staff have influenced suggestions of revisions of 
project programming to better target the different contexts geographic regions provide. Indeed, MYDev’s 
first investigation of the urban rural gap corroborates the importance of such a revised approach:
 While youth from highly urban, partially urban, and rural areas seem to find better employment 
at similar rates, the majority of MYDev (72.2%) and non-MYDev (54.7%) youth who find new 
employment are from urban areas.
 Rural youth improve their community and government perceptions and satisfaction, though this 
finding is not consistent when applied to highly urban and partially urban youth. However, highly 
urban youth recognize more institutions and meet more leaders by endline, which is not true of 
partially urban or rural youth.
 While MYDev may have reduced the urban rural gap across most skill areas, this is not true for 
rural youth when it comes to leadership skills.
ix
RECOMMENDATIONS
Impact Finding Recommendations
Findings on MYDev’s three evaluation questions yield the following recommendations:
1. With the understanding that better employment is observable in MYDev youth mostly through 
financial management indicators, the project should further examine what “better” employment 
can look like for MYDev youth as well as potential paths through which a working youth can 
achieve better employment. MYDev should harness these findings into supplemental project 
activities and employment evaluation tools. 
2. Given findings that show small changes in youth’s perceptions, but meaningful changes in their 
engagement, the project should review project evaluation tools to ensure they appropriately 
measure project activities.
3. MYDev’s value-add is in the level of soft skills MYDev youth obtain. The project should continue 
to implement soft skill development activities, while harnessing this information for the benefit 
of external stakeholders and the youth themselves.
4. MYDev’s ability to reduce gender gaps seems to be corroborated consistently in the data. The 
project should continue in its gender work, focusing additional efforts on civic engagement￾oriented activities to ensure that male MYDev youth benefit as much as females. 
Emerging Findings Recommendations
The quality of the data and design allow MYDev to explore and learn more about the project:
1. The initial—and as yet un-replicated—finding that soft skills on their own do not explain youth’s 
positive outcomes requires further investigation by the project team and should be explored 
through further qualitative and quantitative study.
2. An emerging understanding of the influence of geographic area on youth’s outcomes suggests 
that the project should systematically target programming to meet the different needs of youth 
in those areas while further investigating how area affects programming. 
CONCLUSION
Overall, this evaluation suggests that MYDev’s activities seem to have positively influenced the 
employment, perceptions and engagement, and skills outcomes of MYDev youth. MYDev’s deep 
expertise in work readiness, its engagement with government and communities in the region, and its 
efforts regarding gender are highlighted by the positive outcomes found across employment, civic 
engagement, and a closing gender gap found in this evaluation. While some areas remain for continued 
thought and focus—including how the project measures youth’s government and community perceptions 
and how it targets youth from different geographic locations—this evaluation suggests that the activities 
implemented by the Mindanao Youth for Development project are effective.
1
INTRODUCTION
PROJECT BACKGROUND 
The MYDev project supports USAID-Philippines’ overall Country Development Cooperative Strategy
(CDCS) goal through Development Objective 2: Peace and Stability in Conflict-Affected Areas in Mindanao 
Improved. Using a positive development approach, MYDev is designed to contribute to peace and stability 
in Mindanao by providing experiential training and other activities to improve life skills, improve youth’s 
engagement with and perceptions of their communities and government, and increase employability for 
19,000 out-of-school youth in eight conflict-affected areas: Cotabato City, Marawi City, Isabela City, 
Lamitan City, Zamboanga City, and the municipalities of Parang in Maguindanao, and Jolo and Indanan in 
Sulu. In addition, MYDev organizes and mobilizes local government officials, businesses, and other 
stakeholders in Out-of-School Youth Development Alliances (OSYDA) in order to strengthen local 
governance and its effect on out-of-school youth.
Specifically, MYDev activities focus on three key components:
 Strengthening life skills, leadership, and civic engagement for vulnerable out-of-school youth 
through capacity building of local government units, communities, and stakeholders (through the 
OSYDA) to improve education and training services for out-of-school youth
 Increasing out-of-school youth’s access to education through the Department of Education’s 
Alternative Learning System (ALS)
 Improving out-of-school youth’s employability by providing equitable access to relevant 
education and skills training
Within the specific context of the eight conflict-affected areas where MYDev works, external factors, 
combined with local socio-economic circumstances, bear acutely on vulnerable out-of-school youth 
populations. MYDev therefore aims to strengthen positive factors for pro-social engagement of out-of￾school youth by supporting reaffirmation of the social contract between and among different local 
government and other stakeholder groups, including out-of-school youth. Thus, MYDev’s implementation 
is informed by a positive youth development approach, USAID’s youth policy, USG’s 3D approach and 
MYDev’s development hypothesis: If the social contract between local government and communities—
vulnerable out-of-school youth in particular—is strengthened through incremental gains in mutual trust, 
conflict affected communities will begin to benefit from the accretion of social capital that underpins local 
area stability, security and prosperity. 
Taken together, out-of-school youth and OSYDA programming is designed to produce an environment in 
which out-of-school youth cease to feel alienated from their communities and instead are able to 
contribute through work and community service. Such integration into the community—as produced by 
both out-of-school youth training programs and OSYDA activity—would be evidenced by improved 
leadership, life, and work readiness skills accompanied by improved perceptions of and engagement with 
the community and government. The improvement of skills and perceptions in the context of an 
environment that is conducive to out-of-school youth’s development and growth would lead to improved 
work outcomes for out-of-school youth (see Figure 1).
2
EVALUATION QUESTIONS
Yet can such a theory—in which a holistic approach to creating an enabling environment for out-of-school 
youth is combined with skills-focused training—be proven in the context of MYDev? This impact 
evaluation seeks to determine whether links can be found between youth participation in MYDev’s 
programming and their outcomes in three key areas: 
 Employment, including self-employment
 Perceptions of and engagement with the community and government
 Life, leadership, and work-readiness skills
These three outcome areas align with three of MYDev’s key indicators and present the basis of the three 
evaluation questions that this impact evaluation seeks to answer:
Q1. Do youth participants demonstrate improved livelihoods as a result of project activities? 
 Indicator 12: Number of out-of-school youth receiving new or better employment (FAFI 4.6.3-2: 
Number of persons receiving new or better employment (including better self-employment) as a result 
of participation in a USG-funded workforce development project) 
Q2. Do youth participants demonstrate improved perceptions of government and community as a 
result of project activities?
 Indicator 10: Percentage of targeted out-of-school youth with improved perceptions of community or
government
Q3. Do youth participants demonstrate improved life, work readiness, and leadership skills as a result 
of project activities?
 Indicator 14: Percentage of out-of-school youth with improved life skills, work readiness, or leadership 
skills for civic engagement
Figure 1: MYDev's Theory of Change 
3
Beyond answering these three evaluation questions, the richness of data collected from the same youth 
over time allows for further exploration into how MYDev’s model functions. These findings—which 
require further study and reflection—are also presented in this report. 
METHODOLOGY
STUDY DESIGN 
In order to understand MYDev’s contribution to improving out-of-school youth’s community and 
government perceptions, skills, and employment outcomes, MYDev has designed and implemented a 
quasi-experimental evaluation study with each cohort of youth. After piloting evaluation tools in fiscal 
year 2014 (FY14), the project implemented the first full evaluation in FY15. For each cohort, a randomly 
selected sample of intervention group youth is surveyed during the first day of participation in MYDev 
(baseline) and four to six months after graduation from MYDev (endline). Intervention group results are 
then compared to a comparison group’s results at both baseline and endline to shed light on the possible
influence of project activities on intervention group youth (see Figure 2).
SAMPLE DESIGN
The selection of the sample of intervention and comparison group youth is key to ensuring the most 
comparable groups possible given a quasi-experimental approach in which the equivalence of comparison 
and intervention groups cannot be assumed. Thus, care was taken to choose comparison group youth 
who were very similar to intervention group youth in key characteristics:
 Sex
 Age
 Education Status
 Employment Status
 Place of Residence
Intervention group youth who participated in the impact evaluation were randomly selected from the 
population of out-of-school youth who began MYDev training between October of 2015 and September 
of 2016 (FY16). To account for a high expected rate of attrition from the sample, a sample of 1,200 youth, 
Figure 2: MYDev Evaluation Study Design
Intervention 
Group
Comparison
Group
Baseline data 
collection (pre)
Endline data 
collection (post)
Study Design for Each Cohort
4
stratified by sex and local government unit (LGU), was randomly selected from the FY16 participants, 
yielding a final sample of 1063 intervention group youth who took all surveys at both baseline and endline. 
A much smaller sample of 600 comparison group youth was drawn as well, also stratified by sex and LGU, 
yielding a final sample of 401 comparison group youth who took all surveys at both baseline and endline. 
These sample sizes were chosen to allow for the detection of even small changes over time or small 
differences between groups, sometimes referred to as a small effect size. While this sample size allows 
for comparisons between males and females, it does not allow for comparisons between males and 
females by LGU.
In order to allow for findings of this evaluation—which is based on sample data—to be generalized to the 
population of MYDev youth who participated in trainings beginning in FY16, the sample data was weighted 
to the population of youth who participated in MYDev in FY16. Weighting allows for the sample—which 
did not reflect key characteristics of the population such as the percent of males and females or the 
percent from rural/partially urban/highly urban settings—to be readjusted so that the composition of the 
sample reflects the composition of the population in key ways. In the MYDev context, where a
disproportionate stratified sampling strategy meant that an equal number of males and females were 
sampled from each LGU, the composition of the sample in terms of sex and being from a rural/partially 
urban/highly urban setting did not reflect the population. Thus, weights were applied to the sample based 
on the sex and rural/partially urban/highly urban setting composition of the population. This allows the 
MYDev team to argue that findings represent the entire population and to generalize findings to this entire 
population of FY16 MYDev youth. Both the intervention and comparison groups were weighted to the 
population of FY16 MYDev youth who participated in MYDev trainings during the time period in which we 
implemented our data collection surveys (see Annex 1 for sample weights).
DATA COLLECTION
Data were collected from intervention group youth both on the first day of their participation in MYDev
training and 4-6 months after they graduated from their training programs. Since MYDev youth begin and 
graduate from their trainings at different points throughout the fiscal year, which runs from October 1 
through September 30, baseline data were collected quarterly throughout the entire year. The 4-6 month 
lag between graduation and endline data collection is intentional: it allows youth the time necessary to 
realize the expected outcomes that we intend to measure. 
Comparison group youth are assessed at the beginning of the fiscal year, October and November 2016
with an endline survey implemented 4-6 months later in March and April 2017. 
TOOLS
Data were collected from youth using two tools: the Youth Employment Survey (YES) and the Youth 
Perceptions Survey (YPS). These two tools were first piloted with MYDev youth in FY14, after which they 
were revised, adapted, and implemented as part of MYDev’s FY15 impact evaluation before being used 
again for the FY16 impact evaluation.
The YES was developed and validated in previous EDC projects, and then adapted for use in MYDev. This 
process of adaptation included translation, back translation, piloting, and revision to the tool to ensure its 
usefulness for the MYDev context. In addition, a new section was added to measure youth’s life, work-
5
readiness, and leadership skills. To establish the reliability of this new section, principal component 
analysis was implemented, revealing the tool to be relatively reliable with a Cronbach’s alpha of .83 for 
work readiness, .72 for leadership, and .76 for life skills4
(see Table 1).
The YPS was developed specifically for the MYDev context with the goal of measuring youth’s perceptions 
of their government and their communities. Principal component analysis using FY16 data revealed that 
both dimensions measured—perceptions of community and of government—were reliable, with α=0.91
and α=0.90, respectively (see Table 1). 
Tool Dimension Cronbach’s Alpha How Reliable is 
it?
Youth Employment 
Survey
Work Readiness 0.83 Good
Leadership 0.72 Acceptable
Life Skill 0.76 Acceptable
Youth Perceptions 
Survey
Perceptions of 
Community
0.91 Excellent
Perceptions of 
Government
0.90 Excellent
Table 1: Reliability Statistics for the YES and YPS
The reliability of these two tools—as revealed in principal component analysis using baseline data—
suggests that these tools are measuring consistently each time they are implemented in this context.
LIMITATIONS
While this impact evaluation was implemented with rigor and detail, some limitations persist:
 Claims to Causality. While quasi-experimental impact evaluations are relatively rigorous, one cannot 
assume that they produce intervention and comparison groups that are equivalent in both observable 
and unobservable characteristics. While the sampling and data analysis approaches used in this 
evaluation try to mitigate the effects of this limitation, the influence of unobservable difference 
remains unknown. Thus, factors other than the presence or absence of the MYDev program may 
influence youth’s outcomes such that the findings in this evaluation cannot be claimed to be caused
by MYDev’s programming. Instead, throughout the report, we point to findings that suggest the 
influence of MYDev’s programming on MYDev youth, even though we cannot claim causality.
 Comparison Group Weighting. As data on the sex and geographic area composition of all out-of￾school youth in Mindanao were not available, comparison group youth were weighted to the 
population of MYDev Cohort 3 (FY16) youth. This means that, regardless of the reality, comparison 
and intervention groups will seem statistically comparable in terms of sex and location.
 Contamination of the Comparison Group. Comparison group youth—selected from barangays not 
served by MYDev but within the same LGUs as intervention group youth—may have experienced 
positive spillover effects from any encounters with MYDev youth within their LGUs or from the work 
of OSYDAs in improving the environment for out-of-school youth. Further, other projects—such as 
USAID’s ENGAGE project, which specifically targets civil society organizations with civic engagement 
 
4 A level of .70 or higher is viewed as acceptable for Cronbach’s alphas, though researchers prefer to see alphas of .85 or higher.
6
strengthening activities that include out-of-school youth—are operating in the same areas as MYDev. 
While MYDev youth are not likely participating in ENGAGE activities since the two projects require 
participation at many of the same times, comparison group youth may be participating in these 
projects. Since ENGAGE is focused on improving civic engagement, measures of civic engagement with 
comparison group youth may be biased upward if comparison group youth are ENGAGE participants. 
This would bias downward the estimate of MYDev youth’s gains relative to the comparison group.
 Different Timing of Data Collection for Intervention and Comparison Groups. MYDev’s trainings 
have rolling admission, which means that baseline surveys are implemented on a rolling basis as well, 
whereas comparison group baselines are implemented at one point in time. If time of year has a 
differential effect on skills, perceptions, or employment outcomes, observed differences between 
intervention and comparison group youth may be artificial. For example, perhaps comparison group 
youth were surveyed during an election cycle that made them feel unheard, while intervention group 
youth were surveyed at all points in the year, including the election cycle. In this case, intervention 
group youth as a whole would appear to have a better perception of the government at baseline, 
even if this were not true. Indeed, the presidential and local elections of 2016 may have provided just 
such a differential effect on findings depending on when during the election cycle a youth participated 
in MYDev’s evaluation.
DEMOGRAPHICS
THE SAMPLE
The unweighted sample of intervention group youth is 49.5% male and 50.5% female. Most intervention 
group youth come from rural areas (38.1%), followed by partially urban (35.4%) and highly urban (26.5%) 
areas. The largest group comes from Cotabato (13.4%), closely followed by Marawi (13.3%) and Parang 
(13.2%). The fewest youth come from Lamitan (9.5%). The average age of intervention group youth is 
around 19.5 years, with a minimum age of 14 and a maximum of 25. Nearly all of the intervention group 
youth (95.7%) participated in MYDev’s skills training program, with only 4.3% participating in ALS training. 
The unweighted sample of comparison group youth is 51.1% male and 48.9% female. Unlike the 
intervention group, the comparison group youth are most heavily concentrated in partially urban areas 
(38.4%), followed by rural areas (34.4%) and then highly urban areas (27.1%) (see Figure 3)5, 6
. The largest 
number of comparison group youth come from Indanan (19.8%), followed by Parang (14.6%) and 
Cotabato (14.2%). There are also the fewest amount of comparison group youth (12.3%) in Lamitan. The 
 
5 All graphs comparing MYDev youth to other MYDev youth or non-MYDev youth to other non-MYDev youth only are colored in 
green, while visuals depicting a comparison between intervention and comparison group youth are colored in shades of blue.
6 Confidence intervals (black whiskers on each bar in the graph) represent the area in which we are 95% confident the 
population value lies. If confidence intervals overlap, it is likely that there is no statistical difference between those values.
7
average age for comparison group youth is about the same as for intervention group youth, with a 
minimum of 14 and a maximum of 27 years. 
COMPARABILITY OF WEIGHTED SAMPLE
After weighting the sample, the comparison and intervention groups are statistically similar except for 
the regions they come from. The weighted sample of intervention group youth that this study examines 
is more heavily male (54.7%) than 45.3% female, reflecting the MYDev Cohort 3 population. These youth 
mostly come from highly urban areas (38.9%), followed by partially urban (33.2%) and rural (27.9%) areas. 
The most intervention group youth still come from Cotabato (20.1%), followed by Zamboanga (18.8%) and 
Isabela (14.5%). The least amount of weighted intervention group youth come from Lamitan (5.6%). The 
average age of intervention group youth is also around 19.4 years, with a minimum of 14 and a maximum 
of 25 years. Even more (99.7%) of the weighted intervention group youth participated in MYDev’s skills 
training, while only 0.3% participated in ALS training. 
Weighted for sex and highly urban/partially urban/rural based on the population of the intervention 
group, the weighted comparison group youth exactly reflect the composition of males and females and 
highly urban/partially urban/rural youth of intervention group youth. There is no statistical difference 
between weighted intervention and weighted comparison groups’ average ages (p=0.55) (see Figure 4). 
They are an average age of 19.3 with a minimum of 14 and a maximum of 27 years. There is, however, a 
significant difference between the regions in which weighted intervention and comparison group youth 
are concentrated (p<0.001). Comparison group youth are most heavily concentrated in the Cotabato 
region (24%), followed by Marawi (15.7%) and Zamboanga (15%). The smallest amount of weighted 
comparison group youth come from Isabela. 
27%
35% 38%
27%
38%
34%
Highly Urban Partially Urban Rural
Location Type by Group (unweighted) Intervention
Comparison
19.31 19.44 19.32 19.42
Unweighted Weighted
Age by group, unweighted & weighted Comparison
Intervention
Figure 4: Age by Group, Unweighted & Weighted
Figure 3: Location Type by Group (Unweighted)
8
As expected, the comparison group youth and intervention group youth show more demographic 
equivalencies when the data is weighted. 
FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION
EMPLOYMENT
MYDev’s training activities focus largely on helping youth to achieve positive education and employment 
outcomes—including obtaining work for the first time since starting MYDev or improving the quality of 
one’s work. While youth have the option to become involved in either technical skills training programs 
or alternative basic education (ALS), all youth participate in MYDev’s Life Skills training, which is based on
EDC’s Work Ready Now! (WRN!) Curriculum. Life Skills training includes focused study and the practical 
application of skills across several areas important for one’s work readiness. The curriculum also includes 
entrepreneurship and civic engagement modules:
 Personal Development
 Interpersonal Communications
 Work Habits and Conduct
 Leadership and Teamwork
 Safety and Health at Work
 Workers’ and Employers’ Rights and Responsibilities
 Managing Personal Finances
 Exploring Entrepreneurship 
 Civic Engagement
While the life skills training provided prepares youth for success on the job, it also seeks to prepare them 
for managing that success in the handling of their personal lives even as they embrace technical training 
or basic education training to prepare them for their next steps. This set of interventions that targets 
individual youth’s needs and goals intends to allow youth flexibility in finding work that suits them while 
providing a common level of soft skills amongst all MYDev youth. 
9
In this section, we examine the incidence of 
new and better employment amongst 
MYDev youth, comparing these youth to 
non-MYDev youth to provide a window into 
the potential effect of the MYDev program. 
The findings below suggest that 25.7% of 
MYDev youth find new or better 
employment between baseline and 
endline (see Figure 5). When compared to 
non-MYDev youth, MYDev youth achieve a 
greater incidence of new employment (a 
small to moderate effect size of 0.26). 
While MYDev youth do not achieve a 
greater incidence of better employment by 
endline relative to non-MYDev youth, a 
deeper look at several quality employment 
indicators provides some meaningful 
insights: while MYDev youth do not seem to improve the quality of their employment more than non￾MYDev youth over time—they do not experience a greater increase in income or savings, for example—
they do find themselves better able to use their savings to meet their needs, and they increase the number 
of meals they eat per day more than MYDev youth. These findings, explored more thoroughly below, 
suggest that MYDev’s programming may positively affect not only unemployed youth in finding a job, 
but employed youth in better managing what they earn from a job.
New Employment 
New Employment for MYDev Youth
Out of the possible employment outcomes, MYDev youth are most successful, in absolute terms, in 
finding new employment. Out of the 79.9% of MYDev youth who do not have employment at baseline 
(and thus are eligible for new employment by endline), 25% gain employment by endline, representing 
20% of all MYDev youth. This increase in new employment by endline raises the number of MYDev youth 
who are working from just 20.1% at baseline to 30% by endline (a significant difference at p<0.001) (see 
Figure 6).
20.10%
30.00%
Employment at Baseline and 
Endline
Baseline Endline
Figure 6: Employment at Baseline and Endline Amongst MYDev Youth
Figure 5: Incidence of New or Better Employment Amongst 
MYDev youth
new 
employment
20.0%
better 
employment
5.7%
no change
74.3%
Incidence of New or Better Employment 
10
The group of MYDev youth who are newly 
employed by endline tend to be male (63%), live 
in highly urban areas (54.9%), and are, on 
average, 19.7 years old (see Figure 7). Their work 
lives are mostly consumed with temporary work 
(38.7% of the youth) or permanent work (31.7%), 
both of which are much more popular types of 
employment amongst newly employed MYDev 
youth compared to internships and running one’s 
own business. Most of these youth (71.3%) work 
one job each. Almost all (93.8%) are paid in 
monetary wages, and not in kind, for their work. 
The most popular sector for newly employed 
youth is business, with 29.2% of newly employed 
youth involved in this sector, followed by 
food/restaurant services (15.7%), and 
construction (11.5%). Most of these youth feel
either safe (59.6%) or very safe on the job 
(10.2%).
Financially, newly employed MYDev youth seem to be managing their earnings. While just over half 
(54.2%) say their earnings have increased a little since graduation from MYDev, the majority (78.5%) say
that these earnings meet their needs either sometimes or always. A slight majority (55.5%) of youth who 
are newly employed report being able to save their money sometimes, and the majority of youth (64.5%) 
who responded say that these savings meet their needs, though half (50.5%) of them say their savings 
have not increased since they graduated from MYDev. Corroborating this point is the fact that 83.7% of 
responding youth report eating three or more meals per day at endline. 
Impact Findings: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
While findings on MYDev youth’s incidence of new employment are encouraging, even more 
meaningfully, every indicator suggests that MYDev youth far outpaced non-MYDev youth in finding new 
employment by endline. While 19.9% of MYDev youth find new employment by endline, just 10.5% of 
comparison group youth find new employment by endline (statistically different at p<0.001). This 
difference has a small to moderate effect size of 0.26. Even when we zoom out to look not just at new 
employment by endline, but at any employment by endline (so now including those who have
employment at baseline and also at endline), MYDev youth perform much better than non-MYDev youth. 
In fact, as the negative slope of the comparison group line and the positive slope of the intervention group 
line in Figure 8 display, while fewer intervention group youth have any employment at baseline (20.1% 
compared to 24.7% of comparison group youth; significantly different at p=0.03), by endline, more 
intervention group youth have employment than do comparison group youth (30% compared to 21.1% of 
the comparison group; significantly different at p<0.001). 
Figure 7: Profile of a Newly Employed MYDev Youth
11
New Employment and Gender
A comparison of MYDev males and females to non-MYDev males and females suggests that MYDev may 
reduce the gender gap for females in obtaining new employment. While 16.3% of all MYDev females find
new employment compared to 23.1% of all MYDev males (statistically different at p=.024), this difference 
between males and females in MYDev is not as extreme as the difference between males and females in 
the comparison group. As Figure 9 shows, the percent of male non-MYDev youth who find new 
employment almost doubles the percent of non-MYDev females who find employment, for a 92% 
difference. Amongst MYDev males and females, this difference is much smaller, at just 42%. These 
differences between intervention and comparison group males and females are statistically different 
(baseline at p=0.03 and endline at p<0.001).
Figure 8: Baseline and Endline Employment by MYDev and Non-MYDev Youth
23.00%
13.50% 16.30%
7.00%
Male Female
New Employment for MYDev 
and Non-MYDev Youth By Sex
Intervention
Comparison
Figure 9: New Employment Amongst MYDev and Non-MYDev Youth, By Sex
15.0%
20.0%
25.0%
30.0%
35.0%
40.0%
Baseline Endline
Intervention Group
Comparison Group
Positive (13.5 percentage points) 
and Significant (p=0.03)
Gain for the 
Intervention Group 
Relative to the
Comparison Group
Employment Gains
(% Working at Baseline and Endline)
Intervention Group
12
New Employment and Urban/Rural Location
There seems to be a highly urban/partially urban/rural gap for youth in finding new employment. 
Amongst both MYDev and non-MYDev youth, the majority of youth who find new employment are from 
urban areas (72.2% of newly employed non-MYDev youth are urban and 54.7% of newly employed MYDev 
youth are urban). For both the intervention and comparison groups, the distribution of newly employed 
youth from highly urban/partially urban/rural areas is significantly different (at p<0.001). Even when the 
full sample of all youth working at baseline and all youth working at endline is examined, the same pattern 
is found: working youth are mostly from highly urban areas.
Better Employment 
Better Employment for MYDev Youth
MYDev does not seem to influence the incidence of finding better employment in the way it seems to 
influence the incidence of finding new employment. While just 5.7% of all MYDev youth have better 
quality employment by endline, when we examine only the group of 76 MYDev youth who have
employment at both baseline and endline (and are therefore ‘eligible’ for improved employment), more 
than half (56.5%) of these youth obtain improved employment by endline. 
Impact Findings: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
While an initial glance at the data suggests no statistically significant differences in quality of 
employment between MYDev and non-MYDev youth, a deeper dive shows that MYDev youth outpace 
non-MYDev youth in terms of productively managing their income or savings from their work, 
improving their quality of life if not their quality of employment. First, while over half of MYDev youth 
with continuous employment improve their employment by endline, a statistically similar percent of non￾MYDev youth achieve the same (see Figure 10, where overlapping error bars (blue whiskers) show that 
there is no statistically significant difference between outcomes for the intervention and comparison 
groups) (p=0.559).
Yet a deeper dive into the components that construct “better employment” suggests that MYDev youth 
may be better off than non-MYDev youth. Table 2 below depicts these components as well as whether or 
not MYDev youth are statistically better off than comparison group youth for that component. While 
56.50% 51.70%
Better Employment for MYDev and 
Non-MYDev Youth
Intervention
Comparison
Figure 10: Better Employment for MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
13
MYDev youth experience the majority 
of the components similarly to non￾MYDev youth, they are worse off in one 
area and better off in two telling areas. 
While more research needs to be 
implemented to understand why 
MYDev youth feel increasingly less safe 
at work compared to non-MYDev 
youth, the areas where MYDev youth 
surpass non-MYDev youth suggest that 
the financial management training 
component of MYDev’s curriculum 
may be working well. Even though 
MYDev youth do not report saving 
more or more frequently, earning more 
or more frequently, or even that their earnings better meet their needs, they do seem to be able to 
manage money better over time than non-MYDev youth. MYDev youth report that their savings—which 
have not increased more than non-MYDev youth’s savings—better meet their needs. Figure 11 shows that 
the distribution of responses for MYDev youth are skewed more positively to the right (statistically 
different from the comparison group at p=0.024). 
Further, MYDev youth report that the number of meals they eat per day, on average, has increased more 
than for non-MYDev youth. Figure 12 shows that while 22.3% of MYDev youth report eating more meals 
on average by endline, just 2.3% of non-MYDev youth do (statistically different at p<0.001). While such 
findings highlight the limitations of training programs to change economic environment or the jobs a 
youth can obtain, they also highlight the importance of training programs in influencing what can 
become long term financial stability for a youth. Youth who can more efficiently use their resources to 
ensure that they can meet their needs, including eating meals, may be better able to sustain themselves 
in the long run.
Variable Difference? Who is better off?
Total Hours Worked/Week No
Job Satisfaction No
Savings Increasing No
Saving Frequency No
Earnings Increasing No
Earnings Meet One’s Needs No
Job Type No
Satisfaction No
Safety in Performing One’s Job Yes Comparison
Savings Meet One’s Needs Yes Intervention
Meals Eaten Per Day Yes Intervention
Figure 11: Distribution of Improving Ability to Save to Meet One's 
Needs, MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
Figure 12: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth's 
Increase in Number of Meals Eaten per Day
22.30%
2.10%
Increase in Average 
Meals/Day
5.30%
76.10%
18.50%
30.90%
58.70%
10.30%
worse no change better
Intervention
Comparison
Improvement in Savings Meeting 
One's Needs
Table 2: Components of Better Employment for Intervention and 
Comparison Youth
14
Better Employment and Gender
According to the data, no gender gap for better employment exists for MYDev, but one may exist for non￾MYDev youth. This may suggest that the MYDev project has reduced the gender gap for better 
employment. Specifically, while a statistically similar percent of MYDev males (59.6% of males with 
continuous employment) and females (51.5% of females with continuous employment) find better 
employment by endline (p=0.502), fewer non-MYDev males (42.6%) find better employment by endline 
compared to non-MYDev females (63.5%) (p=0.067). While this is statistically significant at only a 90% 
confidence level when 95% confidence is usually preferred (see Figure 13, where error bars representing 
the 95% confidence interval overlap), it may suggest that MYDev levels the playing field for males to find 
better employment. More research with a larger sample size is necessary to determine this for sure.
Better Employment and Urban/Rural Location
No urban/rural gap seems to exist for either MYDev or non-MYDev youth in terms of better 
employment. Comparison group youth from highly urban, partially urban, and rural areas seem to obtain 
better employment at similar rates (p=0.736). The same can be said of MYDev youth (p=0.968). 
Unemployed Youth
Unemployment for MYDev Youth
The almost 70% of MYDev youth who are not employed by endline seem to have benefitted from 
MYDev’s activities: they less often cite a lack of skills as a reason for not looking for work, and they
more often cite attending job fairs—a key OSYDA activity—as a way of looking for work. First, 
significantly more non-MYDev youth (78.9) are jobless at endline (p<0.001). While significantly more 
(78.3%) non-MYDev youth are looking for work at endline compared to 68.4% of MYDev youth (p<0.001)
and significantly more non-MYDev youth (23.7%) have started looking for work since baseline compared 
to just 16.9% of MYDev youth (p=0.04), their job search tactics vary. 
MYDev youth increase their incidence of attending job fairs—a key OSYDA activity—more than do non￾MYDev youth, suggesting that this OSYDA activity may increase youth’s use of this job-finding tactic.
MYDev activities do not seem to increase MYDev youth’s use of other tactics relative to non-MYDev youth: 
59.60%
42.20%
51.50%
62.90%
Intervention Comparison
Percent of Males and Females with Better 
Employment Males Females
Figure 13: Percent of Continuously Employed Males and Females with Better Employment, by Group
15
a statistically similar percentage of MYDev and non-MYDev youth cite applying for jobs, interviewing, and 
developing a business plan as ways of finding work at baseline and at endline, and MYDev youth more 
often develop CVs at both baseline and endline (see Figure 14). Regarding job fairs, however, while a 
statistically similar percent of MYDev and non-MYDev youth attend job fairs at baseline, by endline, more 
MYDev youth attend job fairs (p=0.020).
While both MYDev and non-MYDev youth indicate that they are not looking for work, by endline, 
MYDev youth’s reasons for not looking for work have shifted away from not having skills and towards 
being focused on education, unlike non-MYDev youth. At baseline, non-MYDev youth cited more often 
that a lack of jobs kept them from looking for work and more MYDev youth said that a lack of skills kept 
them away from work (see Figure 15). 
9.0
21.5
15.0
20.0
10.5
14.8
2.6
8.8
47.1
5.8
12.6 13.4
10.0
0.0
Don't need
work
There are no
jobs
Don't have
time
Do not have
necessary
skills
Don't have
the
resources
I am in
school
Caring for a
child
Reasons for Not Looking for Work at 
Baseline Intervention
Comparison
Figure 15: Reasons for Not Looking for Work at Baseline: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
53.1%
19.0%
25.8%
9.7%
30.3%
Comparison
71.1%
26.1%
30.3%
9.1%
24.3%
Intervention
52.7%
19.7%
23.5%
8.5%
30.1%
Comparison
65.1%
21.9%
28.6%
9.3%
25.1%
CV or Job Application
Attended a Job
Fair/Event
Applied for a Job
Interviewed for a Job
Develop a Businessplan
Intervention
Ways of Finding Work at Baseline Ways of Finding Work at Endline
Figure 14: Ways of Finding Work at Baseline and Endline, Amongst MYDev and Non-MYDev Youth
16
By endline, while MYDev and non-MYDev youth still cite different reasons for not looking for work, these 
reasons have shifted (see Figure 16): while fewer non-MYDev youth cite the unavailability of jobs as a 
reason, more MYDev youth cite a return to school as a reason for not looking for work. Further, whereas 
non-MYDev youth feel increasingly like they do not have the necessary skills to look for work, fewer 
MYDev youth cite not having the necessary skills as a reason for not looking for work by endline.
Unemployment and Gender
Examining the data through a gender lens again suggests that the MYDev program may reduce gender 
gaps for unemployed youth looking for work. While at baseline, non-MYDev males and females are 
looking for work at the same rates (no statistical difference, with p=0.187), by endline, a greater share of 
men (83.8%) are looking for work than women (72.4%), a statistically significant difference (p=0.001). In 
contrast, while MYDev youth begin MYDev with a gender gap—a higher percentage of men (79.3%) are 
looking for work than women (70.1%) (statistically different at p=0.011)—by endline, this gender gap 
starts to fade, with 72.1% of men looking and 64.5% of women looking, significant only at the 90% 
confidence level (p=0.064).
While no systematic gender gaps are found for comparison or intervention group youth in approaches to 
looking for work, amongst non-MYDev youth, a significant (p=0.009) gender gap emerges between males 
and females in using CVs to find work, with a greater share of women (60.2%) than men (47.4%) using this 
method. This gender gap does not appear amongst MYDev youth, where a statistically similar (p=0.311) 
share of males and females use CVs to look for work.
Amongst youth who are unemployed, but not looking for work, there are no systematic gender gaps in 
why youth are not looking for work amongst either MYDev or non-MYDev youth at endline. 
Unemployment and Urban/Rural Location
While there is no urban/rural gap in looking or not looking for work amongst MYDev youth at baseline, 
there is amongst non-MYDev youth. By endline, both MYDev and non-MYDev youth experience an urban
rural gap, though this gap is not consistent across groups: the largest group of MYDev youth looking for 
work is highly urban, while the largest group of non-MYDev youth looking for work is rural. 
MYDev may have closed the highly urban/partially urban/rural gap in one job search method: designing 
a CV. While differences in other approaches to looking for work—such as developing a business plan, 
4.9
21.3
10.8 12.8 10.1
37.6
2.2
12.3 21.3
9.8 20.3 20.4
12.6
1.7
Don't need
work
There are
no jobs
Don't have
time
Do not have
necessary
skills
Don't have
the
resources
I am in
school
Caring for a
child
Reasons for Not Looking for Work at 
Endline Intervention
Comparison
Figure 16: Reasons for Not Looking for Work at Endline: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
17
attending a job fair, and applying for jobs—exist between youth from different areas, these differences 
are not systematic. However, while highly urban youth are more likely to develop a CV at baseline for both 
the comparison and intervention groups (p<0.001), by endline this difference between urban and rural 
youth disappears for MYDev youth only (p=0.141). This suggests that MYDev may reduce the highly 
urban/urban/rural gap in this one method of looking for work. 
YOUTH’S PERCEPTIONS AND ENGAGEMENT
MYDev’s program seeks to improve youth’s engagement with and perceptions of their communities and 
government. This section presents findings regarding youth’s perceptions of both their communities and 
the government, their involvement in organizations, and their familiarity with government institutions 
and leaders before and by the end of the MYDev program. Findings suggest that 69.1% of MYDev youth 
improved their perceptions of their communities or the government between baseline and endline, 
statistically more than 62.6% of comparison group youth who improved their perceptions (p=0.009).
Youth’s Perceptions of Community 
The Community Perceptions component of this study consists of twelve questions measuring youth’s 
attitudes toward their communities and their role in it as out-of-school youth. These attitudes are 
measured over time as a gain score, indicating the change in youth’s perceptions of their communities
from baseline to endline. The answer options are on a 
Likert scale and are ultimately scored on a range of 1 to 5 
(see Figure 17).
Intervention group youth have significantly higher 
perceptions of the community at endline compared to 
non-MYDev youth, particularly among the male 
population. These findings, explored further below, 
suggest that, by exposing youth to community leaders 
and encouraging them to become involved in local 
organizations, the MYDev program may help in improving 
youth’s perceptions of their communities. 
MYDev Youth’s Perceptions 
MYDev youth improve their perceptions of their communities over time, without any signs of gender 
disparities in this improvement. The average MYDev youth has a 4.25 gain score in community 
perceptions, starting at an average of 36.37 on the index at baseline and reaching 40.69 at endline out 
of a total possible score of 60. There is no statistically significant difference in the average gain score in 
community perceptions between male and female intervention group youth (p=0.65). 
Impact Findings: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
There is some evidence that MYDev positively influences youth’s perceptions of their communities. 
While at baseline, there is no significant difference between comparison and intervention group youth 
(p=0.26), by endline, there is a statistically significant difference between comparison and intervention 
group youth (p=0.002), with comparison group youth at an average community perceptions level of 
Figure 17: Answer options for Community and 
Government Perceptions questions
ANSWER OPTIONS
1. I DON’T KNOW
2. STRONGLY DISAGREE
3. DISAGREE
4. AGREE
5. STRONGLY AGREE
18
39.19 and intervention group youth at 40.69. Thus, intervention group youth—whose baseline scores 
are similar to comparison group youth—do achieve higher than comparison group youth.
Findings regarding changes in community perceptions differ across the type of location in which youth 
live. MYDev’s civic engagement programming appears to be able to improve youth’s community 
perceptions in partially urban and rural areas, but does not seem to effect much change in the 
perceptions of youth from highly urban areas (see Figure 18).
 Comparison group youth in highly urban areas have higher community perceptions gain scores
(8.59) than their intervention group youth counterparts (1.31) (p<0.001). This may be partially 
explained by baseline scores, at which point highly urban intervention group youth already had a 
higher level of community perceptions (38.81) than their comparison group youth counterparts 
(33.36) (p<0.001). At endline, however, highly urban comparison group youth have better 
community perceptions (42.19) than their intervention group youth counterparts (40.05) 
(p=0.001). 
 Intervention group youth in partially urban areas improve their perceptions of their communities
with an average gain score of 4.57, while comparison group youth in partially urban areas actually 
decrease their community perceptions by -1.23 (p<0.001). At baseline, there is a significant 
difference in partially urban comparison and intervention group youth’s community perceptions, 
with intervention youth scoring lower than comparison group youth (p=0.052). At endline, 
partially urban intervention group youth have better community perceptions (41.9) than their 
comparison group youth counterparts (37.7) (p<0.001).
 Intervention group youth in rural areas increase their community perceptions between baseline 
with an average gain score of 8.06, while rural comparison group youth only increase theirs by
1.78 points (p<0.001). At baseline, rural comparison group youth had better community 
perceptions (35.02) than rural intervention group youth (32.1) (p=0.01). At endline, though, rural 
intervention group youth had better community perceptions (40.17) than rural comparison group 
youth (36.59) (p=0.001). 
Figure 18: Youth's Perceptions of Community at Endline, by location type
40.05
41.90
40.17
42.19
37.70
36.59
Highly
Urban
Partially
Urban
Rural
Intervention
Comparison
19
Youth’s Perceptions of Government
The Government Perceptions component of this study consists of twelve questions measuring youth’s 
attitudes toward their government and civic participation. These attitudes are measured over time as a 
gain score, indicating the change in youth’s perceptions of their government from baseline to endline. The 
answer options are on a Likert scale and are ultimately scored on a range of 1 to 5 (as in Figure 17 above). 
While the presence of a comparison group helps to isolate the effects of the larger political scene from 
the effects of MYDev’s programming, the absence of a randomly assigned control group opens the 
possibility for comparison and intervention group youth to be differently effected by the political 
environment. The findings presented below suggest that while MYDev youth show an improvement in 
their perceptions of their government over time, this improvement only exceeds the comparison group 
for females and partially urban and rural youth. These findings, which are explored in further detail in 
the following section, suggest that the MYDev program may have helped improve only more 
marginalized MYDev youth’s perceptions of their government.
MYDev Youth’s Perceptions
The average MYDev youth improved his or her perceptions of the government with an average gain of
3.95 between baseline and endline. There is no significant difference in average gain scores between male 
and female intervention group youth (p=0.84). There is also no significant difference between the male 
and female intervention group youth’s average level of government perception at baseline (p=0.6) or at 
endline (p=0.2). 
Impact Findings: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
MYDev’s programming does not appear to have a significant effect on intervention group youth’s 
perceptions of the government relative to comparison group youth. There is no significant difference 
between intervention group youth and comparison group youth government perceptions gain scores 
(p=0.97). Intervention group youth do, however, start at a higher level of government perceptions (34.56) 
than comparison group youth (33.36) (p=0.03). At endline, MYDev youth also have a higher level of 
government perceptions (38.63) than comparison group youth (37.23) (p=0.005). 
MYDev’s programming appears to have had a stronger effect on female intervention group youth’s 
government perceptions than those of male youth. Though female intervention and comparison group 
youth have no significant difference in their perceptions at baseline, female MYDev youth have better 
perceptions of the government than their comparison group youth counterparts at endline. There is no 
significant difference in average gain scores between male comparison and intervention group youth 
(p=0.32), nor between female comparison and intervention group youth (p=0.21). However, female 
MYDev youth have a higher endline level of government perception (38.12) than their comparison group 
counterparts (36.64) (p=0.048) though 
their baseline scores are statistically 
similar (p=0.86). Amongst males, 
however, MYDev youth sustain 
statistically higher scores at both baseline 
and endline (baseline p=0.009; endline 
p=0.04), which produce gains no higher 
than comparison group males’. 
MYDev’s programming appears to have had a 
stronger effect on female intervention group youth’s 
government perceptions than those of male 
intervention group youth.
20
Highly urban comparison group youth improve their government perceptions more than MYDev youth 
from these areas. Conversely, partially urban and rural MYDev youth improve their government 
perceptions more than comparison group youth from the same areas. This differentiation may be 
attributed to the fact that highly urban MYDev youth have better perceptions of the government than 
comparison group youth at baseline, whereas partially urban and rural MYDev youth have lower 
government perceptions at baseline than comparison group youth. While each group improves their 
perceptions, their starting points make a difference. 
 Highly urban comparison group youth improve their government perceptions (8.34) more than 
highly urban MYDev youth (1.52) (p<0.001). At baseline, intervention group youth in highly urban 
areas have a higher level of government perceptions (36.74) than their comparison group 
counterparts (31.59) (p<0.001). By endline, highly urban comparison group youth have a higher 
level of government perception (39.91) than highly urban MYDev youth (38.43) (p=0.04). 
 MYDev youth in partially urban areas improve their government perceptions at a level of 4.38, 
while comparison group youth in partially urban areas actually decrease their government 
perceptions at a level of -1.08 (p<0.001). At baseline, there is no significant difference between 
the levels of government perception of comparison and intervention group youth in partially 
urban areas (p=0.20). Intervention group youth in partially urban areas do, however, have higher 
government perception (39.6) than their comparison group counterparts (35.35) (p<0.001) at 
endline. 
 MYDev youth in rural areas have an average government perceptions gain score of 6.87, 
compared to rural comparison youth whose average is only 3.45 (p=0.008). At baseline, there is 
no significant difference between the two rural groups’ average levels of government perception 
(p=0.16). At endline, however, rural intervention group youth’s average level of government 
perception is 37.78, compared with their comparison group counterpart’s 35.55 (p=0.02). 
MYDev programming appears to have had larger effects on youth’s community and government 
perceptions in rural and partially urban areas, but seems to have not made significant changes in highly 
urban areas. The community and government perceptions gain scores of MYDev youth split between 
these three location types can be seen in Figure 19. 
Figure 19: Community & Government Perceptions Gain Scores for MYDev youth, by location
8.06
4.57
1.31
6.87
4.38
1.52
Rural
Partially
Urban
Highly
Urban
Community Perceptions Gain
Score
Government Perceptions Gain
Score
21
Youth’s Satisfaction with Community and Government
This component presents findings on youth’s satisfaction with their communities and the government. 
Their level of satisfaction is based off whether they feel government and community leaders effectively 
solve the problems of the people in their communities. These levels of satisfaction are measured over 
time as a gain score, indicating the change in youth’s satisfaction with their communities and government 
from baseline to endline. The answer options are based on a Likert scale and are scored on a range of 1 
to 4. The measurement for satisfaction is not an index, meaning that it may be slightly unreliable given 
that the level of satisfaction is entirely self-reported in a single question. 
MYDev Youth’s Satisfaction
MYDev intervention group youth improve their satisfaction with both their communities and the 
government, though the improvement is small. MYDev youth have an average community satisfaction
gain score of 0.07. There is no significant difference in the change in community satisfaction between 
male and female MYDev youth (p=0.32). There is also no significant difference in average community 
satisfaction between male and female MYDev youth at baseline (p=0.83) or at endline (p=0.72). 
MYDev youth have an average government satisfaction gain score of 0.21. There is no significant 
difference between male and female MYDev youth’s gain scores (p=0.89), nor is there a significant 
difference between their levels of government satisfaction at baseline (p=0.699) or at endline (p=0.34).
Impact Findings: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
Satisfaction with Community
MYDev activities may improve youth’s satisfaction with their communities. Intervention group youth 
improve their community satisfaction from baseline to endline (0.07) more than comparison group youth 
(-0.16) (p=0.04) (Figure 20). There is no significant difference between intervention and comparison group 
youth’s community satisfaction at baseline (p=0.60). At endline, however, intervention group youth are
significantly more satisfied with their communities (2.08) than comparison group youth (1.98) (p=0.04). 
While female MYDev youth appear to be more satisfied with their communities by endline than 
comparison group youth, it appears that male MYDev and comparison group youth improve their 
community satisfaction relatively evenly. Female 
MYDev youth significantly improve their community 
satisfaction (0.13) relative to female comparison group 
youth (-0.25) (p=0.004). At baseline, female 
intervention group youth are actually less satisfied with 
their communities (2.00) than their comparison group 
counterparts (2.21) (p=0.014). By endline, however, 
female MYDev youth catch up to their comparison 
group counterparts (p=0.19). For males, there is no 
significant difference in male comparison and male 
intervention group youth’s improvements in
satisfaction with their communities (p=0.90). Further, 
there is no significant difference between male 
comparison and intervention group community 
satisfaction at baseline (p=0.26) or at endline (p=0.11).
Figure 20: Average Community Satisfaction Gain 
Scores, by group
0.07
-0.16
Community Satisfaction Gain 
Scores
Intervention
Comparison
22
MYDev’s programming does not seem to have improved the community satisfaction of youth in 
partially urban or highly urban areas, though it may have been more effective amongst rural youth. 
Given that intervention group youth’s satisfaction improves overall, this finding may be due to the smaller 
sample size produced by disaggregation into highly urban, partially urban, and rural youth.
 There is no significant difference in the change of community satisfaction between comparison 
and intervention group youth in highly urban areas (p=0.15). Intervention and comparison group 
youth show no significant difference in satisfaction with their communities in highly urban areas
at baseline (p=0.09) or at endline (p=0.61). 
 Intervention group youth from partially urban areas do not improve their community satisfaction 
more relative to comparison group youth (p=0.85). Intervention youth are more satisfied with 
their communities at baseline (2.18) than are their comparison group counterparts (1.95) 
(p=0.04). The same can be said at endline, with intervention group youth from partially urban 
areas showing an average satisfaction of 2.10 and comparison group youth showing an average 
satisfaction of 1.89 (p=0.02). 
 Rural intervention group youth may improve their community perception compared to 
comparison group youth, but we are only 90% certain—instead of 95% as we prefer—that this 
finding would also be found in the wider population (p=0.07). Intervention youth are less satisfied 
with their communities at baseline (1.93) than their comparison group counterparts (2.28) 
(p=0.04). At endline, however, there is no difference between rural intervention and rural 
comparison group youth’s satisfaction with their communities (p=0.13). 
Satisfaction with Government
MYDev’s programming seems to have improved youth’s satisfaction with the government. While 
MYDev youth improve their government satisfaction from baseline to endline, comparison group youth 
become less satisfied with the government (p<0.001) (see Figure 21). Specifically, while comparison group 
youth are significantly more satisfied than MYDev youth with the government at baseline (p=0.02), by 
endline, there is no significant difference between the two groups’ satisfaction (p=0.26). 
MYDev programming seems to have positively altered female 
intervention group youth’s satisfaction relative to female 
comparison group youth, though not male intervention group 
youth’s satisfaction relative to male comparison group youth. 
Female intervention group youth become significantly more 
satisfied with the government than their comparison group 
counterparts do, with higher gain scores (p=0.001). Whereas
female comparison group youth are significantly more satisfied 
(2.14) than female MYDev youth (1.9) at baseline (p=0.005),
female MYDev youth are still significantly more satisfied (2.09) 
than comparison group youth (1.96) at endline (p=0.04). At 
baseline, there is no significant difference between male 
intervention and comparison group youth’s satisfaction with 
the government (p=0.39). The same can be said for male 
intervention and comparison group youth at endline (p=0.76).
Figure 21: Average Change in Government 
Satisfaction, by group
0.21
-0.26
Government Satisfaction 
Gain Scores
Intervention
Comparison
23
MYDev’s effects on youth’s satisfaction with the government greatly differ across location type. Its 
programming appears to have a positive effect in rural areas, whereas in highly and partially urban 
areas youth’s satisfaction with the government does not differ much from that of the comparison group 
youth. 
 Comparison group youth in highly urban areas become significantly less satisfied (-0.29) with the 
government between baseline and endline compared to their MYDev youth counterparts (0.25) 
(p=0.001). At baseline and endline, however, neither intervention nor comparison groups are
significantly more satisfied with the government than the other (p=0.46 and 0.26, respectively). 
 In partially urban areas, there is no significant difference in the change in government satisfaction 
between comparison and MYDev youth (p=0.28). There is also no significant difference between 
the two groups at baseline (p=0.85) or at endline (p=0.052) in partially urban areas. 
 MYDev youth in rural areas significantly improve their satisfaction with the government between 
baseline and endline (0.47) relative to their comparison group counterparts (-0.45) (p=0.02). At 
baseline, rural comparison group youth are more satisfied with the government (2.39) than rural 
MYDev youth (1.70) (p<0.001). However, at endline there is no significant difference between the 
two groups (p=0.30). 
Youth’s Involvement in Organizations and Institutions
The following component involves information on youth’s level of interaction with key persons in their 
communities. Youth are asked if they are involved in any organizations and, if so, how many. If youth are
involved in organizations, they are asked to indicate the role they hold and whether they are fulfilling their 
organizational duties. Youth are also asked which government institutions they recognize, as well as if 
they have met any leaders of such institutions.
The findings below indicate that, while MYDev youth reduce the number of organizations in which 
they are involved, they increase the frequency with which they perform their organizational duties in 
those organizations. This finding suggests that MYDev may help youth become more deeply engaged 
in fewer, select organizations. 
MYDev Youth’s Involvement
The average gain score of MYDev youth’s involvement in organizations is -0.57, indicating that they 
become involved in fewer organizations between baseline and endline. There is no significant difference 
in these gain scores between male and female MYDev youth (p=0.19). There is also no significant 
difference between the number of organizations male and female intervention group youth are involved 
in at baseline (p=0.91) or at endline (p=0.93), suggesting no gender gap in involvement in organizations.
MYDev youth perform organizational duties more frequently over time, with an average gain score of 
0.07. There is no statistical difference between males’ and females’ gain scores for the frequency of 
performing organizational duties (p=0.81). Neither is there a statistical difference between male and 
female intervention group youth’s frequencies of performing organizational duties at baseline (p=0.13) or 
at endline (p=0.52), suggesting no gender gap for the performance of organizational duties. 
24
MYDev youth recognize fewer institutions at baseline than at endline, with an average gain score of -0.07. 
There is no statistical difference in the change in institutions recognized between male and female 
intervention group youth (p=0.63). At baseline, female intervention group youth recognize more 
institutions on average (2.95) than male intervention group youth (2.74) (p=0.03). At endline, however, 
this difference disappears (p=0.28), suggesting that MYDev may have eliminated the gap between male 
and female MYDev youth. These results may be slightly unreliable due to the nature of the question, to 
which youth’s answers were entirely self-reported. 
Intervention group youth meet more leaders at endline than at baseline, with an average gain score of 
0.25, with no significant difference in these gain scores between males and females (p=0.56). There is also 
no statistical difference between the number of leaders male and female MYDev youth meet at baseline 
(0.83) or at endline (0.39), suggesting no gender gap for the number of leaders a youth meets.
Impact Findings: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Youth
Comparison group youth become more involved in organizations over time, with an average gain score 
of 0.34, compared to intervention group youth who became involved in fewer organizations between 
baseline and endline (p=0.03). Though at baseline there is no significant difference between the two 
groups’ involvement in organizations (p=0.89), comparison group youth are involved in more 
organizations (2.20) than intervention group youth (1.84) by endline (p=0.009). 
Examining this phenomenon by sex suggests that females drive this change more than males. Female 
comparison group youth become more involved in organizations over time than female MYDev youth, 
who actually become involved in fewer organizations over time (p=0.03). While female intervention and 
comparison groups do not differ at baseline (p=0.46), female comparison group youth are involved in 
more organizations at endline than are female MYDev youth (p=0.02). There is no significant difference 
in the number of organizations male comparison and male intervention group youth become involved in 
over time (p=0.20). There is also no significant difference in the number of organizations male 
comparison and intervention group youth are involved in at baseline (p=0.21) or at endline (p=0.16). 
Comparison group youth perform their organizational duties over time significantly less frequently than 
do intervention group youth (p=0.002) (see Figure 22). These youth actually decrease their frequency of
performing their duties with a negative gain score of -0.32. In contrast, while there is no statistical 
difference between comparison and intervention group youth at baseline (p=0.22), MYDev youth perform 
their organizational duties more frequently on average (2.31) than comparison group youth (2.10) 
(p<0.001) at endline.
MYDev programming may eliminate the gap 
between how many institutions male intervention 
and female intervention group youth recognized by 
endline.
25
This pattern of increased intervention group engagement 
relative to comparison group engagement holds when the 
data are disaggregated by sex. Male intervention group youth 
increase their frequency of engagement over time more than 
male comparison group youth (p=0.04), as do female MYDev 
youth compared to female comparison group youth (p=0.02). 
At baseline, male comparison group youth perform their 
organizational duties more frequently (2.39) than male 
intervention group youth (2.17) (p=0.01), but there is no 
statistical difference between female comparison and female 
intervention group youth here (p=.33). At endline, however, 
female intervention group youth performed their duties more 
frequently than female comparison group youth (p=0.02), and 
male intervention group youth also outperformed their comparison group counterparts (p=0.01). 
Although the intervention group gain scores in number of institutions recognized decreases over time, 
MYDev youth still recognize more institutions at endline than comparison group youth do (see Figure 
23). The different gain scores between intervention group youth (-0.07) and comparison group youth 
(0.20) regarding the number of institutions recognized from baseline to endline are statistically significant 
(p=0.01). At baseline, intervention group youth recognize more institutions (2.84) than comparison group 
youth (2.19) (p<0.001). At endline, intervention group youth still recognize more institutions than 
comparison group youth (p<0.001), but the number of institutions they recognize decreases (2.82) while 
the number for comparison group youth increases (2.39).
While there is no statistical difference in the gain scores 
between male comparison and male MYDev youth 
(p=0.09), female comparison group youth have a higher 
gain score (0.20) than female MYDev youth (-0.11) 
(p=0.03). Female intervention group youth recognize 
more institutions (2.95) than their comparison group 
counterparts (2.43) at baseline (p<0.001), and male 
intervention group youth also recognize more institutions 
(1.98) than male comparison group youth (2.74) 
(p<0.001). Female MYDev youth also recognize more 
institutions (2.87) than their comparison group 
counterparts (2.58) at endline, even though the number 
itself decreased (p=0.002). Likewise, male MYDev youth 
recognized more institutions (2.78) than male 
comparison group youth at endline (2.22) (p<0.001). 
When the data is disaggregated by highly urban/partially urban/rural, it appears that rural and partially 
urban youth drive most of the decrease in MYDev youth’s recognition of institutions. MYDev’s 
programming appears to positively influence the number of institutions that highly urban youth 
recognize.
Figure 23: Average Number of Institutions 
Recognized at Endline, by group
Figure 22: Gain Scores for Frequency of 
Performing Organizational Duties, by group
2.39
2.82
Number of Institutions 
Recognized at Endline
Comparison
Intervention
0.07
-0.32
Frequency of Performing 
Organizational Duties Gain 
Scores
Intervention
Comparison
26
 There is no statistical difference in gain scores for highly urban MYDev and non-MYDev youth 
(p=0.07). However, while there is no statistical difference between highly urban intervention and 
comparison group youth at baseline (p=0.09), at endline, highly urban MYDev youth recognize 
more institutions (2.67) than comparison group youth from that area (2.02) (p<0.001), suggesting 
that MYDev may positively influence the number of institutions recognized by highly urban youth.
 Partially urban comparison group youth improve their institution recognition more (0.60) than 
MYDev youth from these areas (0.11) (p=0.001). Intervention group youth in partially urban areas
recognize more institutions (3.02) at baseline than their comparison group youth counterparts 
(2.02) (p<0.001). At endline, partially urban MYDev youth continue to recognize more institutions 
(3.13) than comparison group youth from those areas (2.71) (p<0.001). 
 Comparison group youth from rural areas have higher gain scores (0.49) than rural MYDev youth 
(-0.37) (p=0.02). Rural MYDev youth recognize more institutions (2.98) at baseline than rural 
comparison group youth (1.97) (p<0.001), and there is no statistical difference between rural 
MYDev and comparison group youth at endline (p=0.33).
MYDev’s programming appears to have a significant effect on the number of leaders that youth meet, 
with no disparities in gender. Intervention group youth meet more leaders over time than comparison 
group youth (-0.14) (p<0.001). While comparison group youth had met more leaders at baseline (1.53) 
than intervention group youth (1.42) (p=0.01), at endline intervention group youth (1.62) had met more 
than comparison group youth (1.41) (p<0.001). 
Female MYDev youth meet more leaders over time than their comparison group counterparts (p<0.001), 
as do male MYDev youth (p<0.001). There is no statistical difference between male comparison and 
intervention group youth at baseline (p=0.06); by endline, however, male MYDev youth had met more 
leaders (1.60) than male comparison group youth (1.38) (p<0.001). While female comparison group youth 
had met more leaders (1.55) than female intervention group youth (1.42) at baseline (p=0.04), by endline, 
female MYDev youth had met more leaders (1.64) than female comparison group youth (1.44) (p<0.001). 
MYDev may positively influence the number of leaders whom highly urban MYDev youth meet, though
MYDev’s programming does not appear to have had the same effect for MYDev youth in partially urban 
and rural areas. 
 Intervention group youth in highly urban areas meet more leaders over time than their 
comparison youth counterparts (p<0.001). At baseline, comparison group youth in highly urban 
areas had met more leaders (1.87) than their MYDev youth counterparts (1.44) (p<0.001), but at 
While MYDev’s programming appears to have 
increased the number of institutions recognized for 
partially urban and rural intervention youth the 
most, highly urban youth benefited more in regards 
to the number of leaders they met by endline.
27
endline, MYDev youth had met more (1.63) than comparison group youth (1.42) in highly urban 
areas (p<0.001). 
 There is no statistical difference in the gain scores of MYDev and no-MYDev youth in partially 
urban areas (p=0.66). At baseline, intervention group youth had met more leaders (1.54) than 
comparison group youth (1.21) in these areas (p<0.001). At endline, too, MYDev youth had met 
more leaders (1.59) than comparison group youth (1.30) in partially urban areas (p<0.001). 
 There is no statistical difference between the two rural groups at baseline (p=0.18) or at endline 
(p=0.26).
SOFT SKILLS
Among the MYDev project’s key activities is intensive training (MYDev’s Life Skills training) that develops 
a series of soft skills including general life skills, work readiness skills, and leadership skills. Coupled with 
practical technical skills training, community service projects, participation in community-based youth 
networks, and involvement in the youth-promoting activities led by MYDev’s OSYDA, this intensive skills 
training is intended to prepare youth for meaningful and productive engagement in their communities, 
with their families, and at their jobs. MYDev has measured skill gains through self-reported questions 
answered directly by youth (see Figure 24). Findings in the following section suggest that MYDev youth 
may improve their life skills, work readiness skills, and leadership skills as a result of training.
Beyond these key findings that respond to MYDev’s evaluation questions, the richness of data collected 
on soft skills, employment outcomes, and perceptions and engagement outcomes from the same youth 
over time allows MYDev to explore some new hypotheses and uncover some emerging findings. Thus, 
this section closes with an exploration of the relationship between changes in a youth’s soft skills,
employment, perceptions, and engagement outcomes. 
Soft Skills and the MYDev Intervention
MYDev youth seem to improve their life skills, work readiness skills, and leadership skills to a greater
extent than non-MYDev youth as a result of MYDev training. 74.9% of MYDev youth improve either 
Life Skills
•Communicating 
with a variety of 
people
•Goal-setting
•Understanding 
One's Learning 
Style
•Providing for 
Family
Work Readiness 
Skills
•Speaking Clearly
•Overcoming 
Challenges
•Solving Conflict
•Finding work
•Improving a work 
situation
•Developing 
business proposals
•Starting a Business
Leadership Skills
•Leading at work
•Leading in one's 
community
 Figure 24: Skills Self-Assessed by Youth
28
their life skills, work readiness skills, or leadership skills between baseline and endline. While this is not 
statistically more than the percent (72.1%) of comparison group youth who improve their skills by 
endline (p=0.220), MYDev youth do improve their skills to a greater extent. When asked to rate a series 
of statements based on how well they understood and could perform a soft skill, MYDev youth improve
their skills in life, work readiness, and in leadership more than comparison group youth do (see Figure 
25) (this difference is statistically significant at p<0.001). 
Soft Skills and Gender
MYDev skills training seems to reduce a skills gender gap between males and females. Amongst non￾MYDev youth, males improve their scores more than females (with 95% confidence on life skills and 
leadership skills and 90% confidence on work readiness skills). Yet this pattern cannot be observed 
amongst MYDev youth, where males and females have statistically similar gain scores from baseline to 
endline (see Figure 26) (all p>0.10). Indeed, a comparison of MYDev and non-MYDev males’ and 
females’ gains on skills indices shows that MYDev males and females consistently outperform non￾0.21 0.20
0.34
0.05
0.01
0.08
Work Readiness Life Skills Leadership Skills
MYDev Youth Improve Skills More than Non￾MYDev Youth
Intervention
Comparison
0.21 0.22
0.34
0.21 0.19
0.34
Work Readiness Life Skills Leadership Skills
MYDev Males' and Females' Skill Gain Scores
Male Female
Figure 26: MYDev Youth's Skill Gain Scores, by Sex 
Figure 25: MYDev Youth's Skill Gains Relative To Non-MYDev Youth's Skill Gains
29
MYDev males and females (see Figures 27 and 28) (p-values for males range from 0.01 to 0.054, and p￾values for females are all less than 0.000).
Soft Skills and Urban/Rural Location
While MYDev may have leveled the playing field between highly urban, partially urban, and rural 
youth a little bit across most skill areas, a gap for rural youth persists when it comes to leadership 
skills. While highly urban MYDev youth have the highest baseline scores relative to both partially urban 
and rural youth for all skill areas (p<0.001), by endline, some leveling seems to have taken place: highly 
urban youth score better than rural youth in leadership skills only and no better than partially urban 
youth. While this same pattern cannot be found in comparison group youth at baseline, where partially 
urban youth tend to score higher, highly urban youth in both the comparison and intervention groups 
score higher on leadership skills at endline than do rural youth (p<0.001 for the comparison and p=0.016 
for the intervention group).
Emerging Soft Skills Findings
The richness of the data allowed MYDev to explore two additional questions, beyond the evaluation 
questions asked above:
 What is the relationship between soft skills and employment outcomes?
 What is the relationship between soft skills and perceptions and engagement outcomes?
Despite the data’s richness, soft skill indices only provide data on soft skill outcomes. In the context of a 
project in which a positive youth development approach—which by definition requires the 
implementation of interventions that target multiple aspects of a youth’s interactions with the world 
around him or her—an examination of soft skills alone may not provide the whole story behind the 
mechanisms at play in a MYDev’s youth’s success. Indeed, this section’s findings suggest, at best, the 
Figure 27: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Males' Gain 
Scores
0.21 0.22
0.34
0.10
0.10
0.15
Work Readiness Life Skills Leadership Skills
MYDev and Non-MYDev 
Males' Gain Scores
Intervention Males
Comparison Males
0.21 0.19
0.34
-0.0037
-0.1118
0.0019
Work Readiness Life Skills Leadership Skills
MYDev and Non-MYDev 
Females' Gain Scores
Intervention Females
Comparison Females
Figure 28: MYDev vs. Non-MYDev Females' Gain Scores
30
need for more research, hinting as they do that the relationships between soft skills and other outcomes 
do not well explain7
the positive outcomes found above.
Soft Skills and Employment
MYDev youth’s soft skills alone do not seem to have a meaningful influence on MYDev youth’s 
employment outcomes. First, the regression models used explain only a small part of employment 
outcomes, suggesting that other, as of yet untested, variables have a larger effect on outcomes. Still, 
when the effect of soft skills is isolated, it becomes apparent that while MYDev youth outpace non￾MYDev youth in both their gain scores and in their endline scores for all skill areas, comparison group 
youth who improve their work readiness and leadership skills at the same rate as MYDev youth are 
more likely to find new or better employment by endline than are MYDev youth8
. Further, non-MYDev 
youth who have the same level of soft skills at endline—regardless of how much they have improved—
are more likely than intervention group youth to find new or better employment at endline9
. When 
incidence of new employment only is investigated, these findings still hold true. 
Soft Skills, Perceptions, and Engagement
Similarly, MYDev youth’s life, work readiness, and leadership skills alone do not seem to have a 
meaningful effect on their perceptions or engagement outcomes. While again, regression models only 
partially explain employment outcomes, relative to comparison group youth, MYDev youth with similar 
skill gains or similarly high endline skill scores do not tend to be more involved in the organizations of 
which they are a member, have not improved their perceptions of the community or government more, 
and have not increased the number of leaders they have met more10
.
These findings are, as of yet, inconclusive, and should not be used as a measure of program 
effectiveness. Instead, they point to the need for further research on the MYDev model in order to 
improve our understanding of how different elements work together to produce the positive outcomes 
observed above. What we have learned from these emerging findings thus far is that soft skills do not 
tell the whole story. 
GENDER
The MYDev project equally embraces male and female participants, presenting youth with as much 
choice as possible while providing all youth with a solid foundation in the skills they will need regardless 
of their sex. The evidence above suggests that MYDev is successful in building this solid foundation for 
 
7 Note the low R2
scores in regression output in Annex 1.
8 Logistic Regression: New or Better Employment Dummy = -1.771 + .680 Treatment Group + .635 Work Readiness Gain - .524 
(Work Readiness Gain * Treatment Group). 
Logistic Regression: New or Better Employment Dummy = -1.727 + .689 Treatment Group + .403 Leadership Gain - .439
(Leadership Gain * Treatment Group). 
(See Annex 1.1 for regression output.)
9 Logistic Regression: New or Better Employment Dummy = -4.619 + 2.244 Treatment Group + 1.074 Work Readiness Endline 
Score - .609 (Work Readiness Endline Score * Treatment Group). 
Logistic Regression: New or Better Employment Dummy = -3.736 + 2.027 Treatment Group + .775 Leadership Endline Score -
.533 (Leadership Endline Score * Treatment Group). 
(See Annex 1.1 for regression output.)
10 See Annex 1.3 for regression output.
31
work regardless of a youth’s sex: where gender gaps exist in baseline data, MYDev youth consistently 
experience smaller or disappeared gender gaps by endline compared to non-MYDev youth.
 MYDev seems to have reduced the new employment gender gap for MYDev youth. While 
amongst non-MYDev youth, males find employment almost twice as much as females (a gap of 
92%), amongst MYDev youth this gap is much 
smaller (a gap of 42%).
 MYDev seems to level the playing field for males 
and females striving for better employment. While 
fewer non-MYDev males than females have
improved their employment by endline (p=0.067), 
no statistical difference can be found in the 
incidence of better employment amongst MYDev 
males and females (p=0.502).
 MYDev may have begun to reduce a gender gap amongst youth looking for work. While a 
gender gap exists for MYDev youth at baseline but not for non-MYDev youth at baseline, by 
endline, this gap has closed for MYDev youth but opened for non-MYDev youth. Specifically, 
while MYDev males and females look for work at endline at rates that are only statistically 
different at the 90% confidence level, non-MYDev youth look for work at endline at rates that 
are statistically different at the 95% confidence level.
 MYDev skills training may reduce a skills gender gap. While non-MYDev males improve their 
life, leadership, and work readiness skills more than non-MYDev females (all p<0.10), MYDev 
males and females improve their skills at a statistically similar rate for all skill areas (all p>0.10).
 MYDev civic engagement activities may have reduced the gender gap in youth’s familiarity 
with government institutions. At baseline, female intervention group youth recognize more 
institutions on average (2.95) than male intervention group youth (2.74) (p=0.03). At endline, 
however, MYDev eliminates the gap between male and female MYDev youth (p=0.28).
It is clear that MYDev youth experience smaller or disappeared gender gaps compared to non-MYDev 
youth in several cases. While this suggests that MYDev is leveling the playing field for males and 
females, more research needs to be done to understand the mechanisms behind this leveling.
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
This evaluation suggests that the MYDev project may positively influence participating youth in key 
ways. While claims to causality cannot be made, this evaluation does make clear some areas in which 
the MYDev project seems to be supporting youth in achieving positive employment, skills, and civic 
engagement outcomes. This evaluation also sheds light on a few areas in which additional progress 
could be made. Finally, emerging findings highlight some areas for further research and programmatic 
reflection.
MYDev youth consistently 
experience smaller or disappeared 
gender gaps by endline compared 
to non-MYDev youth.
32
KEY FINDINGS
Employment
MYDev youth outpace non-MYDev youth in finding new employment between baseline and endline. 
While MYDev youth do not outperform non-MYDev youth in finding better employment, they do better 
manage their savings to meet their needs and eat more meals per day, suggesting that they better 
manage their money despite not obtaining higher paying or better jobs than non-MYDev youth.
Even amongst youth who have not found employment 4-6 months after graduating from MYDev, 
MYDev’s programming seems to have positively affected their outcomes. Unemployed MYDev youth 
less often cite a lack of skills as a reason for not looking for work, and they more often cite attending job 
fairs—a key OSYDA activity—as a way of looking for work compared to non-MYDev youth.
MYDev’s project activities seem to positively affect youth’s employment outcomes in the areas over 
which the project has more direct control, including soft skills training, financial management training, 
and providing job search support. MYDev activities seem to have exerted less influence on improving 
the work situations of already working youth.
Recommendation: With the understanding that better employment is observable in MYDev youth 
mostly through financial management indicators, the project should further examine what “better” 
employment can look like for MYDev youth as well as potential paths through which a working youth 
can achieve better employment. MYDev should harness these findings into supplemental project 
activities and employment evaluation tools. 
Youth’s Perceptions and Engagement
MYDev youth may improve their perceptions of their communities, and they report being more satisfied 
with their communities and the government than non-MYDev youth, though they do not improve their 
perceptions of the government more than non-MYDev youth. This nuanced difference between 
perceptions and satisfaction may be explained by two findings: MYDev youth become more deeply 
engaged in community organizations and come into contact with more community leaders between 
baseline and endline. While this may not change their broader perceptions of their governments and 
communities, their increasing involvement may allow them greater satisfaction with those governments 
and communities.
Again, MYDev’s project activities seem to positively influence areas in which the project has more direct 
control: youth’s contact with leaders and their engagement in community organizations, which may 
influence the high levels of satisfaction MYDev youth have with their communities and government. 
However, MYDev activities do not seem to have influenced youth’s broader perceptions of their 
communities and the government. 
Recommendation: Given findings that show small changes in youth’s perceptions, but meaningful 
changes in their engagement, the project should review project evaluation tools to ensure they 
appropriately measure project activities.
33
Soft Skills
MYDev youth improve their life skills, work readiness skills, and leadership skills more than non-MYDev 
youth over the course of their participation in MYDev, suggesting that the MYDev activities that 
influence skill outcomes may have a positive effect on youth.
Recommendation: MYDev’s value-add is in the level of soft skills MYDev youth obtain. The project 
should continue to implement soft skill development activities, while harnessing this information for 
the benefit of external stakeholders and the youth themselves.
The Gender Gap
MYDev project activities focused on employment seem to have contributed to reducing gender gaps 
where they exist: gender disparities present in the comparison group disappear or do not appear for 
intervention group youth when new employment, better employment, looking for work, and youth’s 
skills are examined.
Regarding youth’s participation and engagement, MYDev project activities seem to contribute more to 
the improvement of MYDev females compared to non-MYDev females than to MYDev males compared 
to non-MYDev males: MYDev females improve their community satisfaction, perceptions of 
government, and satisfaction with the government relatively more than non-MYDev females, whereas 
this does not hold true for MYDev males compared to non-MYDev males. 
Recommendation: MYDev’s ability to reduce gender gaps seems to be corroborated consistently in the 
data. The project should continue in its gender work, focusing additional efforts on civic engagement￾oriented activities to ensure that male MYDev youth benefit as much as females. 
EMERGING FINDINGS
The Relationship between Soft Skills and Other Outcomes 
New research by MYDev investigating the link between soft skills outcomes, employment outcomes, and 
perceptions and engagement outcomes suggests that soft skill outcomes alone only poorly explain other 
outcomes. At the same time, isolating the effects of soft skills outcomes on other outcomes suggests 
that comparison group youth who improve their work readiness and leadership skills at the same rate as 
MYDev youth are more likely to find new or better employment or have better perceptions of the 
government or community. 
These findings, at best, suggest the need for further inquiry to understand what aspects—or bundling of 
aspects—of the MYDev model lead to the positive outcomes observed above. 
Recommendation: The initial—and as yet un-replicated—finding that soft skills on their own do not 
explain youth’s positive outcomes requires further investigation by the project team and should be 
explored through further qualitative and quantitative study. 
34
The Urban/Rural Gap
New data from this evaluation on the urban rural gap reveal highly urban/partially urban/rural gaps in 
several areas: new employment, job search methods, the attainment of leadership skills, perceptions of 
the government and community, and interactions with government leaders. 
Recommendation: An emerging understanding of the influence of geographic area on youth’s 
outcomes suggests that the project should systematically target programming to meet the different
needs of youth in those areas while further investigating how area affects programming. 
Overall, this evaluation suggests that MYDev’s activities seem to have positively influenced the 
outcomes of MYDev youth. MYDev’s deep expertise in work readiness, community engagement in the 
region, and gender are highlighted by the positive outcomes found across employment, civic 
engagement, and a closing gender gap found in this evaluation. While some areas remain for continued 
thought and focus—including how the project measures youth’s government and community 
perceptions and how it targets youth from different geographic locations—this evaluation makes clear 
the effective work of the Mindanao Youth for Development project.
35
ANNEX 1: REGRESSION OUTPUT
1.1. WORK READINESS AND LEADERSHIP SKILLS GAINS AND NEW/BETTER 
EMPLOYMENT
Work Readiness Output
Model Summary
Step -2 Log likelihood
Cox & Snell R 
Square
Nagelkerke R 
Square
1 1488.055a
.030 .047
a. Estimation terminated at iteration number 5 because 
parameter estimates changed by less than .001.
Variables in the Equation
B S.E. Wald df Sig. Exp(B)
Step 1a
treat .680 .140 23.725 1 .000 1.975
workreadiness_gain .635 .134 22.335 1 .000 1.887
workreadiness_gainxtreat -.524 .171 9.369 1 .002 .592
Constant -1.771 .109 265.281 1 .000 .170
a. Variable(s) entered on step 1: treat, workreadiness_gain, workreadiness_gainxtreat.
Work Readiness Calculations
Comparison Group Odds (where treat=0)= e^.635=1.88702
Intervention Group Odds (where treat=1)=e^.111=1.11739
Odds Ratio (treatment:comparison)=1.11739/1.88702 = .5921
Leadership Output 
Model Summary
Step -2 Log likelihood
Cox & Snell R 
Square
Nagelkerke R 
Square
1 1478.950a
.025 .038
a. Estimation terminated at iteration number 5 because 
parameter estimates changed by less than .001.
Variables in the Equation
36
B S.E. Wald df Sig. Exp(B)
Step 1a
treat .689 .139 24.663 1 .000 1.991
leadership_gain .403 .104 15.053 1 .000 1.496
leadership_gainxtreat -.439 .132 11.096 1 .001 .645
Constant -1.727 .107 260.610 1 .000 .178
a. Variable(s) entered on step 1: treat, leadership_gain, leadership_gainxtreat.
Leadership Calculations
Comparison Group Odds (where treat=0)= e^.403=1.04876
Intervention Group Odds (where treat=1)=e^-.036=.96464
Odds Ratio (treatment:comparison)= .96464/1.04876=.9198
1.2 WORK READINESS AND LEADERSHIP SKILLS ENDLINE SCORES AND 
NEW/BETTER EMPLOYMENT
Work Readiness Output
Model Summary
Step -2 Log likelihood
Cox & Snell R 
Square
Nagelkerke R 
Square
1 1474.025a
.042 .065
a. Estimation terminated at iteration number 5 because 
parameter estimates changed by less than .001.
Variables in the Equation
B S.E. Wald df Sig. Exp(B)
Step 1a
treat 2.244 .714 9.878 1 .002 9.430
workreadiness_e 1.074 .198 29.523 1 .000 2.927
workreadiness_extreat -.609 .246 6.146 1 .013 .544
Constant -4.619 .573 64.973 1 .000 .010
a. Variable(s) entered on step 1: treat, workreadiness_e, workreadiness_extreat.
Work Readiness Calculations
Comparison Group Odds (where treat=0)= e^1.074=2.92706
37
Intervention Group Odds (where treat=1)=e^.465=1.59201
Odds Ratio (treatment:comparison)= 1.59201/2.92706=.54389
Leadership Output
Model Summary
Step -2 Log likelihood
Cox & Snell R 
Square
Nagelkerke R
Square
1 1478.705a
.037 .058
a. Estimation terminated at iteration number 5 because 
parameter estimates changed by less than .001.
Variables in the Equation
B S.E. Wald df Sig. Exp(B)
Step 1a
treat 2.027 .527 14.791 1 .000 7.595
leadership_e .775 .149 27.201 1 .000 2.171
leadership_extreat -.533 .183 8.497 1 .004 .587
Constant -3.736 .432 74.812 1 .000 .024
a. Variable(s) entered on step 1: treat, leadership_e, leadership_extreat.
Leadership Calculations
Comparison Group Odds (where treat=0)= e^.775=2.17059
Intervention Group Odds (where treat=1)=e^.242=1.27379
Odds Ratio (treatment:comparison)= 1.59201/2.92706=.58684
1.3 CIVIC ENGAGEMENT AND SKILLS RELATIONSHIPS
Dependent Variable = Coefficient + Treatment Dummy + Variable of Interest + (Treatment * Variable of 
Interest)
Coefficients on (Treatment * Variable of Interest) for all Regressions
Variable of 
Interest
Dependent Variable
Change in 
Number of 
Leaders Met
Change in 
Number of Duties 
Performed in Orgs
Change in 
Government 
Perceptions
Change in 
Community 
Perceptions
Work Readiness 
Skills Gain
-.007 .029 -.343 -.250
p=.937 p=.905 p=.684 p=.770
Life Skills Gain -.055 -.267 -.554 -.715
p=.484 p=.214 p=.487 p=.378
-.076 -.132 -1.063 -1.322
38
Leadership Skills 
Gain
p=.236 p=.261 p=.109 p=.052
Work Readiness 
Skills Endline
.256** -.212 -2.146 -2.172
p=.019 p=.435 p=.073 p=.080
Life Skills Endline .225** -.533** -1.572 -2.820**
p=.033 p=.012 p=.165 p=.017
Leadership Skills 
Endline
.038 -.347** -2.818** -2.931
p=.649 p=.028 p=.001 p=.002
**indicates the coefficient is significant at p<.05.
Note that while intervention group youth with similar life skills and leadership skills endline scores met 
more leaders, the regression still presents a negative relationship between scores and meeting leaders. 
39
ANNEX 2: SAMPLE WEIGHTS
Weights for Youth Who Took Both the Youth Perceptions and the Youth 
Employment Surveys
The following table of weights is for the group of youth who took both the YPS and the YES at both 
baseline and endline. These weights were used when data from both the YPS and the YES was examined 
together.
Group Population Proportion of 
population
Sample Proportion of 
sample
Weight
Intervention Male 
Highly Urban
1520 0.113314448 167 0.114071038 0.993367373
Intervention Male 
Partially Urban
1093 0.081482034 142 0.096994536 0.840068291
Intervention Male Rural 1055 0.078649173 183 0.125 0.62919338
Intervention Female 
Highly urban
1091 0.081332936 189 0.129098361 0.630007502
Intervention Female 
Partially Urban
1131 0.084314895 149 0.101775956 0.828436283
Intervention Female 
rural
817 0.060906516 233 0.159153005 0.382691583
Comparison Male highly 
Urban
1520 0.113314448 54 0.036885246 3.072080579
Comparison male 
Partially Urban
1093 0.081482034 72 0.049180328 1.656801352
Comparison male rural 1055 0.078649173 75 0.051229508 1.535231847
Comparison Female 
highly urban
1091 0.081332936 57 0.038934426 2.088972244
Comparison Female 
Partially Urban
1131 0.084314895 65 0.044398907 1.899030863
Comparison female 
rural
817 0.060906516 78 0.053278689 1.143168446
Weights for Youth Who Took the Youth Employment Survey
The following table of weights applies to all youth who took the YES—regardless of whether or not they 
took the YPS as well—at both baseline and endline. These weights were used for analysis that examines 
data from the YES only.
Group Population Proportion of 
population
Sample Proportion of 
sample
Weight
Intervention Male 
Highly Urban 1520 0.113314448 167 0.111037234 1.020508558
Intervention Male 
Partially Urban 1093 0.081482034 157 0.104388298 0.780566743
Intervention Male Rural 1055 0.078649173 186 0.123670213 0.6359589
40
Intervention Female 
Highly urban 1091 0.081332936 191 0.126994681 0.640443641
Intervention Female 
Partially Urban 1131 0.084314895 166 0.11037234 0.763913265
Intervention Female 
rural 817 0.060906516 235 0.15625 0.3898017
Comparison Male highly 
Urban 1520 0.113314448 54 0.035904255 3.156017207
Comparison male 
Partially Urban 1093 0.081482034 73 0.048537234 1.678753133
Comparison male rural 1055 0.078649173 75 0.049867021 1.577178073
Comparison Female 
highly urban 1091 0.081332936 57 0.037898936 2.146047989
Comparison Female 
Partially Urban 1131 0.084314895 65 0.043218085 1.950916952
Comparison female 
rural 817 0.060906516 78 0.051861702 1.174402557
Weights for Youth Who Took the Youth Perceptions Survey
The following table of weights applies to all youth who took the YPS—regardless of whether or not they 
took the YES as well—at both baseline and endline. These weights were used for analysis that examines 
data from the YPS only.
Group Population Proportion of 
population
Sample Proportion of 
sample
Weight
Intervention Male 
Highly Urban 1520 0.113314448 174 0.116935484 0.969033897
Intervention Male 
Partially Urban 1093 0.081482034 144 0.096774194 0.841981015
Intervention Male Rural 1055 0.078649173 185 0.124327957 0.632594425
Intervention Female 
Highly urban 1091 0.081332936 191 0.128360215 0.63363041
Intervention Female 
Partially Urban 1131 0.084314895 158 0.106182796 0.7940542
Intervention Female 
rural 817 0.060906516 234 0.157258065 0.387302971
Comparison Male highly 
Urban 1520 0.113314448 54 0.036290323 3.122442556
Comparison male 
Partially Urban 1093 0.081482034 72 0.048387097 1.68396203
Comparison male rural 1055 0.078649173 75 0.050403226 1.560399583
Comparison Female 
highly urban 1091 0.081332936 57 0.038306452 2.123217691
Comparison Female 
Partially Urban 1131 0.084314895 66 0.044354839 1.90091763
Comparison female 
rural 817 0.060906516 78 0.052419355 1.161908913
41
ANNEX 3: TOOLS
YOUTH EMPLOYMENT SURVEY for Out-of-School Youth of MYDev
Part 1: Demographics
out-of￾school 
youth ID 
Number
Name of 
Youth
Program 
Attended
Place Survey 
Taken
Date of 
Assessment
Sex Age Do you 
have 
immediate 
plans to 
enroll in 
school
______
First Name:
__________
Last Name:
__________
1 ALS
2 Skills 
Training
1 Cotabato
2 Isabela
3 Jolo
4 Lamitan
5 Marawi
6 Zamboanga
7 Parang
8 Indanan
9 Other: 
____
____/____/_____
(day/month/year)
1 Male
2 Female _____
 Yes
 No
Part 2: Employment & Employability
1. In the past 6 months, did you earn any money or were paid in other ways for work you did? 
 Yes  No (if no, skip to Question #16)
Employment Questions
2. How many different jobs/work did you have in the past 6 months? _________
3. How many hours per day do you work on average? _________
4. How many days per week do you work on average? _________
5. What type of employment is your main job? 
 Permanent or Contract
 Temporary/Substitution/Temporary
 Internship/apprenticeship
 I work for myself
 I have my own business
42
6. Do you earn money or in-kind payment for your main job?
 Monetary wages 
 In-kind payment (for example: food, lodging, clothes etc.)
7. In which sector is your primary job?
 Domestic work (for someone other than my family)  Agriculture
 Construction  Transportation services
 Beauty/Health  Business/Enterprise
 Food/Restaurant Services  Textile and Handicrafts
 Telecommunications and Appliances  Entertainment/Recreation
 General Service  Others (please specify_____________)
Earnings Questions
8. How often do your earnings allow you to meet your basic family/household needs?
 Always 
 Sometimes
 Hardly ever
 Never
9. Have your earnings increased in the past 6 months?
 Yes, substantially
 Yes, a little 
 No, remained the same
 No, they have diminished
10. How many meals per day do you usually eat?
 One 
 Two 
 Three 
 More than three
Savings Questions
11. How often are you able to save money (if answer is “never” skip to Question 14)?
 Always
 Sometimes
 Never
12. Does the amount you save meet your needs/goals?
 Yes
 No
13. Have your personal savings/assets increased in the last 6 months?
 Yes
 No
Quality of Employment Questions
43
14. How happy are you with your work situation (the jobs you are working)?
 Very happy 
 Happy 
 Unhappy 
 Very unhappy 
15. How safe physically do you feel on the job?
 Very safe
 Safe
 A little unsafe
 Very unsafe
Non-Working Youth Questions
16. Are you currently looking for a job/work?
 Yes
 No
17. Have you done any of the following in the past six months? 
 Work on CV, job applications
 Attend job fairs/events 
 Apply for a job 
 Interview for a job 
 Develop a business plan for my own business 
 Other____________
18. (Only if answered “no” to Q 16) Why have you not been looking for work?
 Do not need work 
 There are no jobs 
 Do not have time 
 Do not feel I have the skills necessary 
 Do not know how to look for work
 Do not have the resources (transport money etc.)
 I am in school 
 Other: __________________________ 
19. Are you satisfied or dissatisfied with your current situation of having no work or income?
 Very satisfied with not currently working or having an income
 Ok and satisfied with current situation
 Sad and dissatisfied with having no income
 Dissatisfied and uneasy that I do not have an income 
Part 3: Improved Work Readiness, Life, and Leadership Skills
Please rate how strongly you feel that you have the following skills or abilities: 
44
Increase in any area of knowledge and ability is a shift in a positive direction. The composite score for these 
questions can be used as an indicator for work readiness as an outcome of WRN programming, in lieu of or in 
addition to employment data. 
Development of Self
I do not have 
any 
knowledge 
about this
I know a 
little 
about this
I have enough 
knowledge about 
this to do this 
correctly 
sometimes
I have a lot of 
knowledge about 
this and can do this 
correctly and 
consistently
A1 Set a goal for myself and make a plan to reach 
this goal.
A2 Understand my learning style and can identify 
and use strategies to help me learn new skills 
and ideas.
A3 Provide for my family and meet their material 
needs with my current work or business 
activities.
I can provide adequate food, shelter, 
education, medicine etc. for my family to be 
healthy and happy.
Communication Skills
I do not have 
any knowledge 
about this
I know a 
little about 
this
I have enough 
knowledge about 
this to do this 
correctly 
sometimes
I have a lot of 
knowledge about this 
and can do this 
correctly and 
consistently
B1 Communicate with a variety of people.
I know the different methods in order to effectively 
communicate with friends, family, co-workers and 
government persons.
B2 Attract customers and provide good customer 
service.
I know the different ways to attract customers and 
make customers happy.
B3 Speak clearly in front of individuals or groups.
I can confidently speak to one person or to a large 
group and have them understand my message.
Problem Solving & Critical Thinking
C1 Overcome challenges I may face when 
searching for a job or starting my own 
business.
I can problem solve to find a solution to obstacles 
such as a failed attempt at a business, not 
receiving a loan, or being turned down from a job.
C2 Solve a conflict at work peacefully.
If a problem arises with a co-worker or my 
supervisor, I know how to deal with the situation in 
a peaceful manner.
Work Habits and Entrepreneurship
45
D1 Get the type of job/work I want.
I know how to look and apply for a job of my 
choice.
D2 Improve my position/work.
Examples: I know how to work towards a pay 
upgrade, work in a safer environment, get work 
hours that are more convenient for my schedule, or 
get a title promotion to a higher position.
D3 Develop a business proposal. 
I know how to think through type of business, 
things needed, budget, and who the customers will 
be before I start the business.
D4 Start and grow a successful business on my 
own.
I know how to start a business that will make 
money and has the potential for hiring more people 
or expanding to more customers.
Leadership
E1 Demonstrate leadership in my work place
E2 Demonstrate leadership in my community 
(neighborhood and barangay)?
Reviewed by: ______________________________________ Date: _________________________ -
46
YOUTH PERCEPTIONS SURVEY
Part 1: Identifying Information
out-of-school 
youth ID 
Number
Place Survey Taken
Name
Date Accomplished
Last Name First Name MI Type of Administration
(pls.)
 self-administration 
 oral administration
Program 
Attended 
(please check)
 ALS 
 Livelihood Skills Training Name of Administrator
Part 2: Information on Level of Interaction with key persons in government and community
1. Are you currently involved in any organization? 
______ Yes 
If yes, how many organizations are you currently involved in? 
 1  2  3  4  5  more than 5 
If yes, what are your current roles in these organization/s?
 Officer/leader  member  both officer and member
If yes, are you currently doing your duties as officer or member of these organizations?
 None at all  sometimes  always doing my duties as officer or member 
_____ No: If no, why are you not involved in any organization? 
 I am not interested to join organizations or groups
 I have no time because of work and family responsibilities
 I am not capable and qualified to participate in organization
 I don’t want to have additional responsibilities
 I don’t want to be in trouble 
 I believe the organizations cannot help me
 My parents/religion will not allow me to join organizations
 Other, please specify _______________________________
Instructions: You are requested to review the list of government institutions on the chart posted by your IM or 
Life skills Facilitators. This will be your reference for answering the following questions:
47
2. Do you know any of the government institutions that are listed on the chart? 
 _____ Yes _____ No
If your answer is YES, please answer questions 3 to 6 in the next page.
If your answer is NO, please proceed page 3 for Part 3
3. If yes, how many of the government institutions in the list do you recognize? 
 1  2  3  more than 3 but not all  all of the government institutions listed
4. If yes, which of these government institution/s do you recognize most? (write at most, 3 organizations)
 _______________________________________ 
 _______________________________________
 _______________________________________ 
5. If yes, do you know the leaders of these government institution/s you recognized most (you listed 
above)?
 I know the leaders of all the government institutions I recognized
 I know the leaders of only some of the government institutions I recognized
 I don’t know the leaders of all the government institutions I recognized
6. Have you ever met these leaders you know?
 Yes, I met the leaders of all the government institutions I recognized
 Yes, I met leaders from some of the government institutions I recognized
 No, I have not met any of the leaders of the government institutions I recognized 
(If this answer, proceed to Part 3)
7. Have you met these leaders within the past 3 months?
 Yes, I met all of the leaders I recognized in the past 3 months
 I met only some of the leaders I recognized in the past 3 months
 I did not meet all the leaders I recognized in the past 3 months.
8. Describe how you met and interacted with these leaders you met? 
(You may answer more than 1 of the choices below)
 I saw these leaders through media – TV, radio, newspaper, tarpaulins, etc.
 I met personally these leaders but did not talk to them.
 I just listened to these leaders during a certain event (e.g. seminars, trainings, rallies, etc.)
 I had sat down and had one-on-one discussion with these leaders about problems/plans for 
the community 
 I am closely related with these leaders (e.g. family, relatives, neighbors, friends, associates, 
etc.)
 Other, please specify 
_________________________________________________________________
48
9. In general, how do you feel about the performance of your government and community leaders 
in solving the problems of the people in your community? (please check for each category)
Government Leaders (City/Mun LGUs) Community Leaders (barangay & comm leaders)
 Not satisfied and not happy
 Satisfied and quite happy
 Very Satisfied and very happy
 Not satisfied and not happy
 Satisfied and quite happy
 Very Satisfied and very happy
Part 3: Perceptions on Government
Based on your experience, please check () the box of your answer on each of the following statements. There is 
no right or wrong answer. We just want to understand your opinions. If you answer as sincerely as possible, you 
will be helping us a lot. Your views will not be shared with anyone and will be kept strictly confidential.
Statements I don’t 
know 
Strongly 
Disagree
Disagree Agree Strongly 
Agree
1 The government solicits and listens to the views of 
out-of-school youth in making decisions on how to 
use its budget/money. 
2 The government is ensuring that the people in our 
community especially the out-of-school youth have 
enough food to eat and a safe place to live. 
3 The government will surely listen and respond if the 
out-of-school youth ask their help when they are not 
treated fairly by others.
4 Out-of-school youth understand how the government 
provides services to solve the problems of the people 
especially the out-of-school youths. 
5 The government ensures that out-of-school youth 
have a positive future of having stable and 
sustainable jobs 
6 The out-of-school youth can easily approach 
government leaders and discuss with them their 
problems and needs .
7 The out-of-school youth are given by the government 
skills and opportunities to assume major leadership 
roles and tasks in the city/municipality.
8 The government considers the important role of the 
out-of-school youth as its major partners in making 
our community safe and productive.
9 The government is ensuring that the out-of-school 
youth are provided with their rights and privileges as 
citizens of this country. 
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10 The out-of-school youth understand the basic laws of 
the government that should be obeyed by all people 
regardless of age, gender and status in the society.
11 The government is effective in guiding the out-of￾school youth and making them obey and respect the 
laws and become good citizens of the society.
12 The out-of-school youth are helping and coordinating 
with the government in implementing their projects 
and services to the community. 
Part 4: Perceptions on Community
Based on your experience, please check () the box of your answer on each of the following statements. There is no right or 
wrong answer. We just want to understand your opinions. If you answer as sincerely as possible, you will be helping us a lot. 
Your views will not be shared with anyone and will be kept strictly confidential.
Statements I don’t 
know 
Strongly 
Disagree
Disagree Agree Strongly 
Agree
1 The people in my community helps out-of-school 
youth in meeting our basic needs for food, clothing, 
education, health, livelihood and shelter.
2 Out-of-school youth are involved and actively 
participating in solving the problems in my 
community.
3 The people in my community fully accept me and 
doesn’t humiliate me even if I am an out-of-school 
youth who have not finished studies and unemployed. 
4 Local residents in my barangay are kind and 
respectful to out-of-school youths.
5 The out-of-school youth are actively participating and 
are united in organizations that have active officers 
and members. 
6 People in my community trust the out-of-school 
youth and truly help them to become good 
and effective leaders in our 
barangay/community.
7 The leaders in my community are united in 
discussing and finding solutions to the needs 
and problems of the out-of-school youths.
8 The out-of-school youths fully understands their 
roles as important partners of the leaders 
solving the problems of the community.
9 Out-of-school youth are given equal respect like 
other individuals by the local residents in my 
community.
10 The out-of-school youth became inspiration and 
good examples of other people who were 
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convinced to help in solving the problems in the 
community. 
11 In my community, out-of-school youth can have 
a positive future with stable work, healthy, safe and happy life. 
12 In my community, out-of-school youth have adequate 
skills and can do different activities that they need in 
improving their current situation.
Reviewed by: ______________________________________ Date: _________________________ 
 Name / Signature of Administrator