Search

Youth with severe emotional and behavioral problems receiving services in public behavioral health systems have strengths that are understudied in research and underutilized in practice. This study explores four alternative strategies (individual item scores, the number of "actionable" strengths, subscales, and a total composite) for summarizing the strengths of youth assessed with the Child and Adolescent Needs and Strengths (CANS) in a large, urban, public behavioral health system. The paper examines whether these summarization strategies produce divergent understandings of the prevalence of strengths across gender, age, and racial groups. Analyses suggest that youth enter this system with high levels of strengths. There are few group differences in strengths across the diverse summarization strategies. Though the practice-preferred method of using individual strengths items provides the most interpretable information about strengths, the aggregation strategies may be useful for programs and systems. Implications for policy and practice are discussed.

Measurement of nonlinearity in social service research and evaluation relies primarily on spatial analysis and, to a lesser extent, social network analysis. Recent advances in geographic methods and computing power, however, allow for the greater use of simulation methods. These advances now enable evaluators and researchers to simulate complex adaptive systems (CASs) by applying agent-based modeling (ABM). CASs reflect the interactions of competitive and cooperative tendencies found in agents. ABM simulations create and test generated observable patterns using the fewest number of plausible decision rules and agents. This primer presents essential concepts for understanding ABM as social service applications of complexity theory shift from a metaphorical perspective to a formalized evaluation method. Further developments in ABM methods need to focus on concepts emanating from the study of complexity science, including the concepts of the wisdom of groups, strengths found in diverse perspectives, robustness, interconnectedness, sustainability, and conflict and cooperation. Appropriate software programs for developing and testing agent-based models are provided.

For more than 20 years, the system of care philosophy has comprised a central strategy of service reform in children's mental health at the federal, state, tribal, and local levels. System of care terminology has become widely used in many different service sectors but often without a shared understanding of what a system of care is. This manuscript, the feature article for this special issue of "Evaluation and Program Planning," briefly traces the history of the system of care movement, discusses the more widely used definitions in the field of children's mental health, and offers an expanded version of the definition that takes into account the complex nature of systems of care. This manuscript was the product of a process used by the "Case Studies of System Implementation" research team to identify established system of care communities for inclusion in the research study. The purpose of this manuscript is to describe the process the research team engaged in while developing the revised definition and to open a public dialogue about how to characterize the essential properties of a system of care. (Contains 2 tables.)

In 1987 Congress authorized the Stewart B. McKinney Homeless Assistance Act to protect the rights of homeless students and to ensure that they receive the same quality and appropriate education that other students receive. This article summarizes key aspects of the 2001 reauthorization of the act, now known as the McKinney-Vento Act, outlines how school social workers can become more involved in the implementation, and offers suggestions for expansion of services and further evaluation of service provision effectiveness.

This study explored risk factors for violence among a sample of adult women with physical disabilities. Fifty-six percent (100) of the 177 women participating in the study indicated a positive history of abuse. Of the women who reported abuse, most reported multiple abuse situations and abusers who were typically their male partners. In addition, only a small proportion of women sought and received adequate help. Women who indicated that they did not seek help were asked why this was the case. Their responses included: feeling that they could handle it themselves, having other sources of support available, being unaware of where to go, feeling embarrassed, feeling guilty about being a burden or that it was their fault, fear that abuser would come after them, fear of not being believed, and, to a lesser extent, concern that the shelter would lack appropriate accommodations. These findings highlight the importance of intervention strategies including advocacy activities for women with disabilities, activities with schools, activities to deter and prevent partner and caregiver violence, community awareness activities, and dissemination activities.

This article provides guidance for child and family service organizations seeking to develop useful performance metrics for their programs. It describes four frames for this work, based on strategic planning, decision points, logic modeling, and implementation science. These four frameworks are applied to two cases, an afterschool program and a therapeutic foster care program. Additional considerations are provided for reducing potential metrics to a meaningful few. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In 1987 Congress authorized the Stewart B. McKinney Homeless Assistance Act to protect the rights of homeless students and to ensure that they receive the same quality and appropriate education that other students receive. This article summarizes key aspects of the 2001 reauthorization of the act, now known as the McKinney-Vento Act, outlines how school social workers can become more involved in the implementation, and offers suggestions for expansion of services and further evaluation of service provision effectiveness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous reviews of person-centered planning indicate a need for more comprehensive training to promote skill generalization. A three-phase training intervention was implemented with 22 planning teams for people with a disability in the Detroit metropolitan area. Independent observers rated team meetings posttraining on consumer orientation regarding three components of person-centered planning: meeting structure, interpersonal skills, and planning strategies. Analyses of ratings indicated that structural skills were significantly more readily incorporated than either interpersonal or strategic skills. Exploratory analyses indicated that the number of family members, friends, and advocates at the planning meetings was positively correlated with planning strategies, while living arrangements were negatively correlated with planning strategies. Implications for the acquisition and generalization of more complex planning skills are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]