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Date: April 30, 2024 Tue
Time: 2:55 am
Time: 2:55 am
Results for cognitive behavioral programs
2 results foundAuthor: Lynch, Mathew Title: Arches Transformative Mentoring Program: An Implementation and Impact Evaluation in New York City Summary: The Arches Transformative Mentoring program (Arches) advances New York City's commitment to maintain public safety through community-based programming that supports personal development as a mechanism to avoid future criminal activity. Through a combination of credible messenger mentoring and an evidence-based curriculum, Arches reduces one-year felony reconviction by over two-thirds and reduces two-year felony reconviction by over half. These findings demonstrate the promise of combining an evidence-based curriculum and credible messenger mentoring to achieve recidivism reduction. This evaluation report reflects the findings of a qualitative and impact evaluation of Arches, a group mentoring program serving young adult probation clients ages 16 to 24. Arches uses an evidence-based interactive journaling curriculum centered on cognitive behavioral principles, delivered by mentors with backgrounds similar to those of their mentees, known as "credible messengers," direct service professionals with backgrounds similar to the populations they serve, often including prior criminal justice system involvement. Launched in 2012 as part of the NYC Young Men's Initiative (YMI) and with private funding from Bloomberg Philanthropies and oversight from the Mayor's Office for Economic Opportunity (NYC Opportunity), Arches is managed by the NYC Department of Probation (DOP) and currently operates with City funding at 13 sites across the five boroughs. The evaluation was conducted using a matched comparison group to assess the impact of Arches on participant outcomes, including recidivism reduction; to explore participant and staff experiences in and attitudes toward the program; to identify practices associated with successful programmatic operation and positive outcomes; and to develop recommendations for program enhancement. The evaluation finds that Arches participants are significantly less likely to be reconvicted of a crime. Relative to their peers, felony reconviction rates among Arches participants are 69 percent lower 12 months after beginning probation and 57 percent lower 24 months after beginning probation. This impact is driven largely by reductions among participants under age 18. The evaluation also indicates the program helps participants achieve improvement in self-perception and relationships with others. Pre- and post-assessment show gains in key attitudinal and behavioral indicators, including emotion regulation and future orientation. Qualitative findings show that participants report very close and supportive relationships with mentors, attributed to mentors' status as credible messengers, their 24/7 availability for one-on-one mentoring, and a "family atmosphere" within the program. The report presents several recommendations to enhance the Arches program model and capitalize on its success, including better tailoring the content of the curriculum to reflect the lived experience of the participant population, increasing the frequency and length of programming to support participant engagement, and introducing wraparound and aftercare services. The report highlights the potential for expanded collaboration across Arches providers to improve knowledge sharing and adoption of best practices, as well as enhanced partnerships between Arches providers and other young adult programming to supplement service delivery and grow community awareness of the program. The report also calls for expanded mentor supports, including opportunities for full-time employment and advanced training. This evaluation confirms that Arches is an impactful program with demonstrated ability to reduce participant recidivism and great promise to produce sustainable attitudinal and behavioral change for justice system-involved young adults. New York City has already formalized its commitment to Arches through the new allocation of City funding to sustain the program following the completion of Bloomberg Philanthropies grant funding. Additionally, as part of the Mayor's Action Plan for Neighborhood Safety, the Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice has launched the Next STEPS program, a modified version of Arches targeted to serve young adults at risk of justice-system involvement who reside in select high-crime New York City Housing Authority developments Details: Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2018. 81p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed March 19, 2018 at: https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/96601/arches_transformative_mentoring_program.pdf Year: 2018 Country: United States URL: https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/96601/arches_transformative_mentoring_program.pdf Shelf Number: 149523 Keywords: Cognitive Behavioral ProgramsEvidence-Based ProgramsFelony OffendersMentoringProbationersRecidivismRehabilitation ProgramsYoung Adult Offenders |
Author: Jarjoura, G. Roger Title: Evaluation of the Mentoring Enhancement Demonstration Program: Technical Report Summary: Introduction -- In 2012, OJJDP launched a demonstration field experiment, the Mentoring Enhancement Demonstration Program (MEDP) and Evaluation to examine: (1) the use of an "advocacy" role for mentors; and (2) the use of a teaching/information provision role for mentors. The overall goal of MEDP was to develop program models that specified what advocacy and teaching look like in practice and to understand whether encouraging the general practice of advocacy and teaching could improve youth outcomes. The American Institutes for Research (AIR) conducted a rigorous process and outcome evaluation of programs funded by OJJDP in 2012. The evaluation was designed to rigorously assess the effectiveness of programs that agreed to develop and implement enhanced practices incorporating advocacy or teaching roles for mentors, including providing focused prematch and ongoing training to mentors, and providing ongoing support to help mentors carry out the targeted roles. The Mentoring Enhancement Demonstration Program MEDP grantees comprised collaboratives that would offer coordinated implementation of the same set of program enhancements in three or four separate established and qualified mentoring programs located within the same regional area. The MEDP collaboratives varied widely in their geographical locations, their size and experience in mentoring, and the structure of their mentoring programs. The types and structures of mentoring programs also varied across, and sometimes within, collaboratives. All the collaboratives proposed enhancements in the way they would train mentors for their roles, and in the way they would provide ongoing support to the mentors and in some cases, the matches. The evaluation of MEDP was designed to: (1) provide rigorous evidence about whether the enhancements improved youth outcomes and reduced risk for delinquency, and (2) describe the practice models and program characteristics associated with these improvements. This combined outcome and implementation analysis was guided by a theory of change. The MEDP Evaluation -- Based on recent research and theory in mentoring as well as the broader field of youth development, the theory of change posited that mentors exposed to enhanced training and support should be more likely to engage in the types of behaviors encouraged through the initiative, and through these behaviors promote more positive, longer-lasting relationships with their mentees, which should, in turn, promote stronger positive outcomes for youth. The implementation evaluation focused on understanding how different the proposed enhancements were from the existing (i.e., the business-as-usual) program practices and whether these differences were big enough to lead us to expect that they might result in differences in match and youth outcomes. We also examined the extent to which the enhanced program practices were delivered as intended. Finally, we wanted to understand what it took for the programs to implement their planned programmatic enhancements. The impact evaluation was designed to understand whether the programmatic enhancements had an impact on the intermediate and distal youth outcomes. We were also interested in understanding - based on the theory of change-what processes led to these outcomes, and whether mentor experiences could be shaped by exposure to the enhanced program practices. Sources of data for the evaluation included program documents, mentor training rosters, notes from site visits, notes from staff focus groups, surveys of staff, and baseline and follow-up surveys of youth, parents, and mentors. Throughout the initiative, the research team took a collaborative approach to working with the program staff who supported data collection activities, to increase their capacity to participate in the evaluation and to ensure data quality. Details: American Institutes for Research, 2018. 233p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed November 27, 2018 at: https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/grants/252167.pdf Year: 2018 Country: United States URL: https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/grants/252167.pdf Shelf Number: 153846 Keywords: Cognitive Behavioral ProgramsDelinquency PreventionEvidence-Based ProgramsMentoringRehabilitation ProgramsYoung Adult Offenders |