This report presents the results of an evaluation of a community-based violence prevention program for African American male adolescents.
This study, an evaluation of a community-based violence prevention demonstration project focusing on African American male adolescents in Durham, North Carolina, provides encouraging and suggestive evidence that participation in a 7-month Afrocentric guidance and educational training program, combined with mentoring, summer job training and placement, and hands-on entrepreneurial training, can reduce the likelihood of violence-related behavior and other health risk behaviors among African American male adolescents. The Supporting Adolescents with Guidance and Employment (SAGE) program was developed and implemented by three organizations in Durham that came together out of their concern about rising levels of youth violence and other risk behaviors and was funded by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The key elements of this multifaceted effort included an Afrocentric guidance and instructional program, coupled with mentoring; a summer jobs training and placement program; and an after-school entrepreneurial training program. Of the several behavioral self-report outcomes that were examined, the greatest benefits were observed for carrying a gun and selling illegal drugs. Findings for heavy drinking and injuring others with a weapon were also encouraging. The results provide much less support for the efficacy of a combined summer jobs program and entrepreneurial training without the guidance components, although even for this condition the results were generally in the desired direction. Despite the absence of statistical significance, the pattern of results obtained does offer tentative support for the potential efficacy of preventive interventions like the ROP and JTP combination provided by SAGE.