Margaret Wente, Globe and Mail
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Now comes the discouraging part. The evidence to date – such as it is – suggests that many, perhaps most, social programs do not make a difference, except to the legions of administrators and social workers who are directly and indirectly employed in delivering them. This is not a conservative conclusion. It is the conclusion of independent groups such as the Brookings Institution (a non-partisan think tank) and the Coalition for Evidence-Based Policy, which are part of a growing movement to make social spending more accountable.
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Some small, inexpensive interventions appear to work reasonably well. One example is the Montreal Prevention Experiment, which was designed to reduce antisocial behaviour among disruptive boys between the ages of 7 and 9. Just a few family counselling sessions produced modestly positive long-term results. Another successful (though quite expensive) innovation is Pathways to Education, which steers vulnerable kids through high school and on to higher education.