Barriers to Program Completion of a Voluntary Capacity-Building Group Intervention for Individuals Living in Poverty

Background and Purpose:  Poverty is perpetuated in the U.S. due to structural barriers affecting individuals with low incomes and resources, such as decreased opportunity for quality education, barriers to healthcare access, lack of public transportation systems and affordable housing, labor market challenges, and policies that often give advantage to the wealthy.  Additionally, many individuals in poverty also have individual barriers to economic mobility.  Although programs exist to help build individual capacity for overcoming macro-level barriers, individual characteristics/circumstances can prevent program completion.  Thus, the current project sought to examine barriers to program completion in a nationwide voluntary sample of capacity-building program participants.

Methods:  Secondary data were used from a nationwide sample (n = 332) of an outcome study of a manualized 45-hour curriculum designed to help people living in poverty learn about structural causes of poverty and build individual and community capacity.  Bivariate differences between participants who completed the program versus those who dropped out were examined for self-identified potential barriers (difficulty w/social support, difficulty w/transportation, lack of interest, trouble getting off work, finding a new job,  health problems, mental health barriers, or substance abuse barriers), possibility of changing the future, and hope.  Variables significantly different for the two groups at the bivariate level were entered into a logistic regression model to predict program completion. 

Results:   Three baseline characteristics were significantly associated with the likelihood of program completion in bivariate analyses- having a lack of interest in the program, believing they might find a new job, and believing in the possibility to change the future.  Two of these three variables retained significance in the multivariate analysis- lack of interest in the program and belief in the possibility to change the future.  The most significant predictor was the belief in the possibility of changing the future; participants with high belief in the possibility of changing the future were nearly 1.5 times more likely to complete. Participants who reported a lack of interest when beginning GA were 79% less likely to finish the program. 

Conclusions and Implications:  The findings suggest that one of the most important factors for predicting program completion could be belief in the possibility of improving future circumstances.  This implies that capacity-building or anti-poverty programs should work to instill a sense of hope at the beginning of the program to keep participants invested and attending.  Also, the finding that lack of interest in the program itself predicted non-completion provides empirical support that a “one size fits all” approach does not work.  People in poverty are often referred or mandated to programs that may not interest them; these findings suggest that it is important to match appropriate programs to individual wants, needs, and goals. Although not always practical, programs should consider offering multiple services aimed at achieving the same goal so participants can choose the best fit for them.  Limitations of this project as well as implications for future research will also be discussed.