Implications for Evaluating Multi-Component, Complex Prevention Initiatives: Taking Guidance From the Safe Schools/Healthy Students Initiative

• NCJ Number: 220056
• Journal: Journal of School Violence Volume: 6 Issue: 2 Dated: 2007 Pages: 3-22
• Author(s): Erika Felix; Michael Furlong; Jill Sharkey; David Osher
• Date Published: 2007
• Length: 20 pages
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Program/Project Evaluation
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This article reviews the history of the Safe Schools/Healthy Students (SS/HS) Initiative (a school-based program to prevent school violence and student substance abuse), as well as the national evaluation that monitored its effectiveness.

Abstract

SS/HS is an unprecedented collaborative effort among three Federal departments in providing students, schools, and communities with comprehensive, coordinated educational, mental health, social service, and law enforcement services. By fall 2005, 230 programs were operating in all 50 States, the District of Columbia, Guam, the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and American Samoa. The goals of SS/HS were to increase and improve services to at-risk students and their families, to link child-serving agencies in a consistent and complementary way, to decrease violence and drug abuse, to diminish school discipline problems, and to foster the healthy development of all students. The evaluation of the SS/HS programs posed a challenge, because grantees in diverse contexts responded to the six program elements in distinctive ways. Each SS/HS site was required to conduct a local evaluation of its services and activities. In addition, an independent national evaluation collected cross-site evaluation data for 97 communities during 2000-2003. Seventeen sites were chosen as "sentinel" sites for more intensive data collection. These sites represented the various regions, sizes, and scopes of SS/HS projects. The national evaluation collected both process and outcome data. The process evaluation focused on how and at what cost SS/HS affected local planning and implementation of comprehensive, integrated strategies for achieving healthy child and adolescent development and a safe school environment. The outcome evaluation addressed the impact of the initiative on student health and a safe school environment. The articles in this journal issue report on evaluation findings of several SS/HS sites across the Nation. 44 references