Good point on the terrible programs, this is part of why I dislike government getting involved, for instance I ran into a nifty charity group called year up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_Up
Which takes at risk youth and trains them to be "administrative assistants"
Which doesnt sound glamorous or a big deal at all, but when your previous life options are crack whore and mcdonalds worker (or equivalent) then it looks really good.
They do a pretty good job to, this has been a good year for me personally so I plan to donate some money to charity, this one is on my list of options.