NIJ Researcher-Practitioner Partnerships: Evaluation of Grants to Encourage Arrest Policies for Domestic Violence, Executive Summary

• NCJ Number: 187345
• Author(s): Jennifer A. Mastrofski Ph.D.; Debra Derman; Elizabeth Phillips; Gary Woodling
• Date Published: 2001
• Length: 9 pages
• Grant Number(s): 1998-WE-VX-K012
• Agencies: NIJ-Sponsored
• Publication Type: Program/Project Description

Annotation

This report summarizes the results of a process evaluation of a grant project of the State College Police Department concerned with encouraging arrest policies for domestic violence that was funded between 1998 and 2000.

Abstract

The process evaluation was designed to correspond with the first 18 months of the grant project. Funded as a researcher-practitioner partnership grant in Pennsylvania, the process evaluation was based on a long-term collaborative relationship between the primary researcher and practitioners. Project goals were to expand mandatory arrest policies, update and expand domestic violence training, and improve case tracking and victim services, as well as centralize efforts by police, prosecution, probation and parole, and the judiciary in handling domestic violence cases. The process evaluated goals and objectives of the grant project in four areas--training, tracking and monitoring, safety audit and case management, and victim services. The process evaluation indicated practitioners faced the challenge of balancing cooperation with the evaluation and meeting obligations to victims. Commitment and time had significant impacts on data collection in the grant project as well. Practitioners were more than willing to provide needed information for the process evaluation but did not have time to meet requested deadlines. The process evaluation reinforced the importance of collaboration between researchers and practitioners on a continual basis throughout a project.