LINKS TO RESEARCH-BASED PROGRAMS BELOW
CSAP BEST PRACTICES
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Mentoring
Across Ages Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Middle School and Community Center Target Population Age: 10-13 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
Child Development Project Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Elementary School Target Population Age: 6-12 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
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Creating Lasting Connections
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Community Center, Church and School Target Population Age: 11-15 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: African American and Caucasian |
Family Effectiveness Training (FET)
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Community Agencies, Schools, Clinics, Churches, Youth Centers Target Population Age: 6-12 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Hispanic |
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Keep A Clear Mind (KACM)
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: School and Home Target Population Age: 9-11 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
Positive Action Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Schools, Families, Communities, Businesses, Churches, Penal Institutions Target Population Age: All Ages Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
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Project ALERT Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Middle School Target Population Age: 11-14 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
Project Toward No Tobacco Use (TNT) Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Middle School Target Population Age: 10-15 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
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Reconnecting Youth: A Peer Group Approach to Building Life Skills Evaluation | Implementation Setting: High School Target Population Age: 14-17 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
Residential Student Assistance Program (RSAP) Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Residential Facility Target Population Age: 13-17 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
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The Strengthening Families Program
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Community Centers, Housing Communities, Mental Health Centers, and Schools Target Population Age: 6-11 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
Athletes Training and Learning to Avoid Steroids (ATLAS)
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: High School Athletic Team Target Population Age: 14-18 Gender: Male only Ethnicity: Mixed |
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Communities Mobilizing for Change on Alcohol
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Community Target Population Age: N/A Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
Dare To Be You
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Community Center and Pre-School Target Population Age: 2-5 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
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Incredible Years
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Pre-School and Elementary School Target Population Age: 2-8 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
Life Skills Training (LST)
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Middle School Target Population Age: 10-14 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
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Project ACHIEVE
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Pre-school, Elementary School, and Middle School Target Population Age: Pre-Middle Aged School Children Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
Project Northland: An Alcohol Prevention Curriculum
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Middle School Target Population Age: 11-13 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
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Smart Leaders
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: Community Center Target Population Age: 13-17 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
Towards No Drug Abuse (TND)
Evaluation | Implementation Setting: High School Target Population Age: 14-19 Gender: Male and Female Ethnicity: Mixed |
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CSAP PROGRAMS NOT READILY AVAILABLE, BUT EFFECTIVE
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The programs listed below are ones that met all the criteria as the model programs identified on this Website. The only difference is that, for a variety of reasons, these programs are not currently available to be widely disseminated to the general public and professional communities. Hence they are identified as effective rather than model. If and when they are available for national dissemination, their status will be upgraded. After the identification of each of the models on this page, a brief explanation of their current status, contact information, and a summary is provided.
| Stopping Teenage Addiction to Tobacco (STAT) This program is no longer in operation. Contact Joseph R. DiFranza, M.D. Department of Family Medicine and Community Health University of Massachusetts Medical School 55 Lake Avenue Worcester, MA 01655 Phone: (508) 856-5658 Fax: (508) 856-1212 E-mail: difranzj@ummhc.org The Stop Teenage Addiction to Tobacco (STAT) initiative is an environmental campaign to enforce laws against tobacco use by minors and to stimulate communities to implement other strategies such as banning vending machines or installing lockout devices on vending machines to curtail youth access to tobacco. Where traditional youth smoking prevention initiatives have focused on reducing the demand or desire for tobacco among youth, the S.T.A.T. effort focuses on cutting off the supply of tobacco to minors. STAT is an effort targeting law enforcement, vendors, and other community groups concerned with reducing the ability of minors to purchase tobacco. The aim of the program was to convince merchants to obey the law by refusing to sell tobacco to minors. The town of Woodridge, Illinois, was the first in the Nation to put a tough enforcement program in place. As a result of this enforcement program, Woodridge’s rate of tobacco use among teenagers was reduced by half. |
SMART Leaders This program is available only to Boys and Girls Clubs of America. |
| FAN Club This program is available only to Boys and Girls Clubs of America. Contact Tena L. St. Pierre, Ph.D. D. Lynne Kaltreider, M.Ed. The Pennsylvania State University, Institute for Policy Research and Evaluation In collaboration with Boys & Girls Clubs of America 1230 West Peachtree Street, NW Atlanta, GA 30309-3447 Phone: (404) 487-5766 Fax: (404) 487-5789 The FAN Club program directly involves parents of youth participating in Boys & Girls Clubs of America's SMART Moves program, including the SMART Leaders booster program. This parent involvement program is offered in combination with a 3-year sequential drug prevention program for early adolescents at high risk for substance abuse in Boys & Girls Clubs. The FAN Club is designed for parents of participants in B & GCA's SMART Moves program, including Start SMART (ages 10 to 12), Stay SMART (ages 13 to 15), and SMART Leaders, which is designed for 14- to 17-year-olds who have completed the Stay SMART program. Combined with these other SMART Moves components, the program can be implemented in community-based youth organizations, recreation centers, and schools, in collaboration with a local Boys & Girls Club. FAN Club activities fall into four general categories: basic support, parent support, educational program, and leadership activities. The program strengthens families by creating a bond between youth and their parents, providing opportunities for families to have fun together, and helping parents influence their children to lead drug-free lives. Project STAR: Students Taught Awareness and Resistance Replication efforts for this program are still in transition and not available for widespread dissemination. Contact Karen Bernstein Project Manager University of Southern California Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center 1441 Eastlake Avenue Los Angeles, CA 90089-1976 |
Back to Best Practices Index Project STAR, also known as the Midwestern Prevention Project (MPP), is a comprehensive, community-based drug abuse intervention program that uses school, mass media, parent education, community organization, and health policy programming to prevent and reduce tobacco, alcohol, marijuana, and other drug use by adolescents. Developed by the University of Southern California, the project first offers a series of classroom-based sessions for the school program during middle school that continue with the parent, media, community, and policy components. Project successes include the net reduction of 40 to 70 percent in drug use, including up to 40 percent in daily smoking among participants in the program thus far through early adulthood. Project STAR is an intervention with multiple components, which are implemented over a 5-year period, targeting the entire community. By using multiple program channels (including schools, parents, community organizations, mass media, and policy), skills that are learned initially in the school program are reinforced by a consistent anti-drug community social norm. Greater message consistency is likely to lead to more rapid formulation of non drug use attitudes, intentions, and behaviors. Other advantages of using multiple program channels include access to a larger pool of prevention activities and resources, increased community support of prevention programming, and the ability to reach a larger target audience. Project STAR services include the following: Project STAR has resulted in net reductions of 40 to 70 percent in drug use, including up to 40 percent in daily smoking, which have been maintained thus far up to early adulthood. Also, by early adulthood (age 23), program participants demonstrated reductions in need for drug abuse treatment. Back to Best Practices Index |
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Center for Substance Abuse Prevention
Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration
For questions or comments please visit our CONTACT page
or call our toll-free number at 1-877-773-8546.
Last Updated: 12-12-2001
| ADOLESCENT TRANSITIONS PROGRAM (ATP) (school based) Best Practice
(Starting at Kennedy & Cal Young) This program focuses on parenting practices and integrates the universal, selective, and indicated approaches for middle school interventions. Universal Level Strategy: Family Resource Room directed to help parents of all students. The goal via collaboration with school staff is to engage parents, establish norms for parenting practices, and disseminate information about risks for problem behaviors and substance abuse. A video tape help parents identify risk factors and focuses on the use of effective and ineffective family management skills. Selective Level Strategy: The Family Checkup, offers family assessment and professional support to identify those families at risk. Indicated Level: Parent Focus Curriculum - helps parents make changes indicated on Family Checkup. Services might include behavioral family therapy, parenting groups, or case management. P19 |
ALL STARS PROGRAM (school based) Best Practice Three formats ( middle school curriculum, community intervention and student improvement team) develop: 1) protective personal values, 2) resilience by creating strong personal commitments, 3) appropriate group norms, 4) strong bonds between teens and positive institutions. The Curriculum target the first year of middle school and uses classroom activities, one on one meetings, small group meetings, parent training and a graduation celebration. Infusion training for host teachers is offered. The Community Intervention is for community youth leaders. It includes small group activities and one-on-one sessions. The Student Improvement Team targets high school youth in school and community settings. It is used by student leaders to build responsibility and independence among peer leaders. P 21 |
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This model mobilizes communities to address adolescent problem behaviors. The program was field tested in Oregon as TOGETHER! Communities for Drug Free Youth. Critical components: Broad spectrum of individuals, groups, organizations Builds support for risk and protective factor - focused prevention from key leaders and grass root community members Widespread communication and collaboration Provides opportunities, skills and recognition to foster bonding to community Utilizes a data driven assessment on risk and protective factors Long term commitment to achieve a shared healthy vision for the future P43 COUNTER ADVERTISING (tobacco specific) (school based) Best Practice The primary goal is to change perceived norms among children and adolescents regarding tobacco use. Research and experience demonstrate that youth develop attitudes, beliefs and behaviors regarding tobacco use from peers, family members, television, and cultural sources. Youth often think tobacco use is more widespread and acceptable than it really is. Activities: Radio and TV campaigns Multilevel media campaigns that include billboards, posters, magazines, radio TV A mass media campaign linked to a school-based prevention intervention. Airing of antitobacco media campaigns on prime-time television. P47 Back to Best Practices Index |
CREATING LASTING CONNECTIONS (community based) Best Practice This model uses a pivotal community agency to implement a culturally competent / appropriate early intervention program for high risk youth. This project identified churches. The churches developed Church Advocate Teams (CAT) composed of 5-10 church staff and nominated community members. CAT staff underwent 20 hours of training over seven sessions, and then performed outreach activities, identified and recruited 10-15 year old high risk youth and their families, scheduled and performed family training, prepared and implemented field data collection, and prepared linkages for successful self-referrals with various human service providers. Participating parents/guardians received about 55 hours of training on AOD issues (20 hours), parenting skills (20 hours), and communication skills (15 hours). Youth receive about 15 hours of training concerning AOD issues, communication skills, and refusal skills. P 49 ECONOMIC INTERVENTIONS (Increasing Taxes) Best Practice The primary goal is to raise the price of tobacco and alcohol products through increased taxes and thereby prevent youth from taking up smoking and drinking, delay the age at which they might begin, and decrease the level of consumption. P59 EFFECTIVE BLACK PARENTING (community based) Best Practice The cognitive-behavior program is designed to foster effective family communication, healthy African-American identity, extended family values, child growth and development, and healthy self-esteem. It is designed to facilitate community efforts to combat child abuse, substance abuse, juvenile delinquency, gang violence, learning disorders, behavior problems, and emotional disturbances. Two major parenting strategies: 1. The Family Approach for Developing Respectful Behaviors -utilizes family rules and family rule guidelines. 2. Thinking Parent’s Approach to Disrespectful Child Behaviors (utilizing systematic decision making processes - rule development, family meeting and problem assessment skills, and information to help build age-appropriate rules. P 61 |
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FAMILIES & SCHOOLS TOGETHER (FAST) (school/community based) Best Practice. Goals include empowering parents to be the primary prevention agent for their own children, improving the child’s behavior, performance and success in school with parental support, increasing knowledge of substance abuse and linking families to services, and reducing every day stress by developing an ongoing support group for parents of at-risk students. Strategies: Eight week curriculum of mutiple-family group activities Ongoing monthly meetings (host family serves meal, has family sing along, has structured family communication exercises, exercises on identify family feelings, parent support meeting while children play, one-to-one quality time, winning-as- a-family-unit exercises, a closing ritual) A substance abuse education component Graduation School based Advisory Council of FAST program graduates P 63 |
FAMILIES IN ACTION (FIA) (families based) Middle School Youth Target, Promising Practice The goals were to increase resiliency and protective factors including family cohesion, communication skills, school attachment, peer attachment, and appropriate attitudes about alcohol and tobacco use by adolescents. The program offers sessions once a week for six consecutive weeks to parents and youth. Program sessions address parent/child communication, positive behavior management, interpersonal relationships for adolescents, and factors which promote school success. FIA focuses on involving the community in all stages of its program. 67  Back to Best Practices Index |
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| FAMILY THERAPY (family based) Best Practice The prevention approach targets families at high risk. The goal is to improve family functioning and reduce juvenile delinquency, recidivism, child abuse, and other strong antisocial behaviors. Family therapy helps family members develop interpersonal skills, improve communication, and improve family dynamics. Anyone of a number of family-centered therapies can be used (e.g., Functional Family Therapy. Structural Family Therapy, Multi systemic Family-Ecological Therapy. P75 |
FRIENDLY PEERsuasion (school/community based) Promising Practice Girls Incorporated designed Friendly PEERsuasion to help girls of middle-school age acquire the knowledge, skills and support systems to avoid substance abuse. In the first phase girls participate in 14 one-hour sessions facilitated by a trained adult leader involving hands-on, interactive and enjoyable activities such as games, group discussions and role plays. Girls lean short and long term consequences of substance use, experience healthy ways to manage stress, learn to recognize media and peer pressure to use drugs, practice skills for making responsible decisions about drug use, and prepare to become peer leaders. In the second phase small teams of peer leaders create 8-10 short sessions on substance abuse for children 6-10. P81 |
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HOME-BASED BEHAVIORAL SYSTEMS FAMILY THERAPY (Gordan)
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| IOWA STRENGTHENING FAMILIES PROGRAM (SFP) (for parents and youth
10-14) (community) Best Practice The SFP 10-14 has seven two hour sessions for parents and youth, who attend separate skill-building groups for the first hour and spend the second hour together in supervised daily activities. Four booster sessions are designed to be used six months to one year after the end of the first seven sessions. Youth sessions focus on goal setting, dealing with stress and strong emotions, communication skills, increasing responsible behavior, and improving skills to deal with peer pressure. Booster sessions focus on making good friends, handling conflict, and reinforcing skills learned in the first seven sessions. Parents discuss showing love, setting limits, house rules, encouraging good behavior, using consequences, building bridges, and protecting against substance abuse. Booster sessions focus on handling parent’s own stress, communicating when partners don’t agree, and reinforcing earlier skills. P103 |
LIFE SKILLS TRAINING PROGRAM (Botvin et al.) (school based) Best
Practice The program is designed to address a wide range of risk and protective factors by teaching general personal and social skills in combination with drug resistance skills and normative education. The program consists of a 3-year prevention curriculum for middle schools. It has 15 periods the first year, 10 booster sessions for year two and 5 sessions for year three. Drug resistance skills include teaching about social factors that promote drug use, correcting wrong notions about numbers using drugs, teaching prevention information, and teaching refusal skills. Self management skills provide skills for increasing independence, personal control, and a sense of self-mastery (e.g., problem solving, goal setting, self appraisal, coping strategies). General social skills include communication skills, overcoming shyness, learning to meet new people, and developing healthy friendships. The skills are taught through demonstration, feedback, reinforcement, behavioral rehearsal, and extended practice through homework assignments. P107 |
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 Back to Best Practices Index MENTORING Best Practice Mentoring is one-on-one relationship between adults and youth at higher risk. Most mentoring programs feature three to four meetings a month or more between mentor and child, with each meeting lasting at least several hours. Community based mentors see juveniles in a wide range of settings like homes, movies, sports, plays and concerts. They may talk frequently on the phone. Mentors may be paid or unpaid, college students or adults. All of them receive some sort of training. Key elements: 1) The adult sees the potential in youth, not only the problems, 2) The adult respects the opinions, feelings, and perspectives of youth, and 3) The adult recognizes that youth are not all the same. P 115 |
MULTI-COMPONENT SCHOOL-LINKED COMMUNITY APPROACHES (tobacco specific) Best Practice The primary goal is to discourage adolescent tobacco use by mobilizing community systems through school-based programs. Research demonstrates that multi component programs are more effective than single component programs. Cluster # 1 - Parent Involvement (e.g., parent surveys, take home quizzes, letters to parents, smoking cessation services bulletins to parents, TV segments, pamphlets home, parent training, community organizing) Cluster # 2 - Student - Antitobacco Activism (e.g., writing letters to sports team, holding poster contest, creating antitobacco art projects, writing songs, revising school policies, mural painting, producing a video) Cluster # 3 - Media Intervention (e.g., press conferences, interviews, talk shows, articles, daily 5 minute TV segments, curricula, antitobacco ads) P 118 |
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NICASA PARENT PROJECT (work sites in community) Best Practice |
NORMS FOR BEHAVIOR AND RULE SETTING IN SCHOOL Best Practice The strategy focuses on school-wide efforts to redefine norms for behavior and signal appropriate behavior through the use of rules. It includes activism such as newsletters, posters, ceremonies during which students declare their intention to remain drug-free, and displaying symbols of appropriate behavior. Page 127 |
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PARENT AND FAMILY SKILLS TRAINING (general) Best Practice This program teaches family skills for two clusters. Cluster I is for those families with no know risk factors. Cluster II is for those families who are at high risk because they are exposed to multi-risk factors or have a high level of exposure to one risk factor. (page 137) Cluster I Focus: a. Parents - parenting skills, child management, psychological helping, relation- ship development b. Families - improving cohesion, organizations, relationships, and conflict resolution. c. Youth - improving child behavior, psychological adjustments, attachment to family, commitment to school Cluster II Focus: a. Parents - improving parents’ attitudes towards children, parenting, child management, problem solving, communication, crisis management b. Youth - improving behavior, self control and compliance, reducing antisocial behaviors, reducing arrests. P 137 |
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| PARENTING ADOLESCENTS WISELY (PAW) (Gordan) (family based) Best
Practice This program is interactive CD-ROM based and is for K-12 families. The program seeks to help families enhance relationships and decrease conflict through behavior management and support. It enhances child adjustment and potentially reduces delinquency, substance abuse and involvement with the juvenile justice system. PAW builds parental confidence in parenting skills. It seek to improve communication, problem solving, and parent-school communication, while improving school attendance and grades, and reducing disciplinary infractions. Parents view video scenes of common family problems. For each problem, parents choose a solution, see it enacted and listen to a critique. The video covers communication skills, problem solving skills, speaking respectful, assertive discipline, reinforcement, chore compliance, homework compliance, supervising children who are hanging out with peers who are a bad influence, step-family problems, single parent issues, violence and others. (page 141) |
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PREPARING FOR THE DRUG FREE YEARS (Hawkins and Catalano) (family intervention) Best Practice The program covers the following topics: 1) understanding the risk factors of drug abuse, 2) understanding the nature and extend of the problem, 3) reducing risk by strengthening family bonds, 4) conducting family meetings and fostering family communication, 5) establishing a family position on drugs, 6) identifying and establishing positive reinforcements and appropriate negative consequences, 7) reinforcing a child’s use of refusal skills, 8) expressing and controlling anger, 9) increasing children’s participation in the family, 10) creating a parent support network. The program is designed to have two volunteer workshop leaders. Ideally, one leader is a parent. Leaders learn to present the curriculum in a 3 day workshop directed by certified DRP trainers. There is a curriculum kit. P167 |
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PROJECT ACHIEVE (schools) Best Practice Project Achieve is an educational reform program targeting academically and socially at-risk and underachieving students in pre-K through middle school settings. The program focuses on helping individual schools with large numbers of special education referrals and schools at-risk for multiple incidents of violence to strategically plan for and address their immediate and long-term student needs. Students learn social skills, problems-solving methods, and anger-reduction techniques. Objectives: 1. Enhance the problem-solving skills of teachers to address violence and academic difficulties. 2. Improve the building and classroom management skills of school personnel (via a building based social skills and aggression control training program. 3. Improve the school comprehensive services to students with below average academic performance. 4. Increase the social and academic progress of students via parent connections. 5. Create a climate where every staff member sees every student as their responsibility. |
Back to Best Practices Index PROJECT NORTHLAND (Perry) (school-based) Best Practice The goal is to prevent or reduce alcohol use among young adolescents by using a multi-level, community-wide approach. The program consists of social-behavioral curricula in schools, peer leadership (designed to increase peer pressure resistance and social competence skills), parental involvement/education ( to provide parental support and modeling), and community-wide task force activities (designed to change the larger environment). P177  |
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PROJECT STAR (Pentz et al.) (school/community) Best Practice This is a community-wide, multi-component universal substance abuse prevention program for students in early adolescence, grade 7-8. Project STAR (Students Taught Awareness and Resistance) uses the school, family and broader community environments as the launch sites. The Program has 5 elements: 1) school-based, 2) mass media, 3) parent, 4) community organizing, 5) health policy change. The entire community benefits from the media prevention messages. All students in designated grades receive the school program, and their families receive the parent program. The core of the school-based program is a social influence curriculum. During the first year 13 lessons are taught, followed by a five-lesson booster curriculum the second year. Each lesson takes about 45 minutes. Homework involves both students and parents. Teachers get a 3 day training. P183 |
RAISING THE MINIMUM LEGAL DRINKING AGE (community) Best Practice Minimum legal drinking age legislation is intended to reduce alcohol use among those under 21, to prevent traffic deaths, and to avoid other negative outcomes. P199  Back to Best Practices Index |
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| RESTRICTION OF ADVERTISING AND PROMOTION OF TOBACCO (community) Best Practice The goal is to decrease child and adolescent exposure to tobacco promotion and pro-tobacco influences. Research demonstrates that tobacco company sales promotions are reaching adolescents and that this exposure may put them at greater risk for smoking. Activities: 1) provide threat of adverse publicity through protesting events sponsored by the tobacco industry, 2) provide alternative non-tobacco funding for promoters, 3) develop policies that ban tobacco industry sponsorship, 4) promote tobacco free events, 5) develop tobacco free messages and embed them in sports education, 6) include tobacco-free messages in events’ promotional materials. P207 |
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TOBACCO-FREE ENVIRONMENTAL POLICIES (community-based) |
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TUTORING (general) Best Practice Academic tutoring has been found to be effective in improving reading and math achievement for socially rejected low achieving fourth graders (Hawkins et al., 1992) . The Office of National Drug Control Policy cited tutoring as an effective substance abuse strategy. P231 WOODROCK YOUTH DEVELOPMENT PROJECT (schools/community) Best Practice Components include: 1. Weekly human relation classes to resist pressure to participate in destructive behaviors. 2. Get youth advocates to be connection between teachers, students, and parents. 3. Monthly meetings with youth advocates and teachers to monitor student progress. 4. Conduct an annual home visit to familiarize parents with the program. 5. Conduct workshops that allow parents to exchange parenting strategies. 6. Provide field trips and weekend retreats to program youth. 7. Implement after school clubs designed to develop students’ individual talents and interests and build self-esteem and human relation skills. P233 |
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ZERO-TOLERANCE LAWS (community/school) Best Practice “Zero-tolerance laws” set maximum blood alcohol concentration limits for driver under age 21 to .02 percent or lower. P 235 |
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Safe & Drug Free Schools Exemplary & Promising
Practices List
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2003 List of Programs Evaluated by Government Panel of Experts
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ONE EXAMPLE:
LIFE SKILLS PROGRAM |
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IMPLEMENTING RESEARCH-BASED PREVENTION
PROGRAMS WITH FIDELITY |
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| 1) Overview of Life Skills Training The Life Skills Training program is an extensively researched and evidence based tobacco, alcohol, violence and drug abuse prevention program for students in grades 3-9. Dr. Gilbert J. Botvin, a Professor of Public Health and Psychiatry at Cornell University Medical College and Director of Cornell’s Institute for Prevention Research, initially developed the program in the late 1970’s and has continuously updated LST over the years. The main goals of Life Skills Training are to teach prevention-related information, promote anti-drug norms, teach drug refusal skills and foster the development of personal management skills and general social skills. |
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2) Importance of Fidelity. Fidelity means full and faithful implementation of the curriculum in content and process. In order for Life Skills Training to achieve its researched outcome, it must be implemented with fidelity. The following definitions are also useful when working with fidelity issues. Implementation Fidelity means teaching every unit of the program, in the sequence provided, for the specific number of sessions. Content fidelity means teaching the specific objectives of each session and including the entire teaching points, activities and exercises. Fidelity is compromised when activities, exercises, and/or session learning objectives are deleted. Process Fidelity means the curriculum is delivered using the specific teaching skills of facilitation, coaching and behavioral rehearsal. Fidelity to the program is compromised when a didactic or lecture type teaching methods are used. |
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3) Program Providers A critical element of any effective intervention program is the provider. Life Skills Training providers should be selected based on their experience, enthusiasm, commitment to drug abuse prevention and their ability to be a positive role model. The provider must also be able to fully implement the intervention and consider attending a training workshop. To maximize the program’s effectiveness, a student-teacher ratio of 25:1 is recommended. LST has been taught in a wide range of subject areas with no noticeable difference in effectiveness. The program can either be taught as an intensive mini-series (every day, or two to three times a week) until the program is complete, or it can be taught on a more extended schedule (once a week). Both of these formats have proven equally effective. LST can also be team taught by several teachers as long as the program sequence is maintained. The Life Skills Training Workshop is designed to prepare providers to deliver the curriculum with content and process fidelity. It is an immersion training that focuses in the acquisition of specific teaching skills through modeling and practice. The training also explores the theoretical foundations of the Life Skills Training approach to prevention education. For more information on Provider Training Workshops, please call National Health Promotion Associates at 1-800-293-4969, or visit our website at <http://www.lifeskillstraining.com/>www.lifeskillstraining.com. |
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| 4) Sequence of chapters Activities from the Life Skills Training program should not be deleted or substituted. However, additional skill practice is encouraged. If coaches, parents, community leaders or other teachers are interested in supporting LST, a provider can meet with them to discuss the ways that students can practice the behavioral and cognitive skills learned in class sessions. In general, an activity must accomplish the goals and objectives of the lesson and be consistent with the principles of social learning and problem behavior theory, as well as result in cognitive learning. Life Skills Training should also not be combined with any other prevention curriculum. Some activities may seem congruent with LST, but it may actually compromise or contradict its theory or design. |
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| 5) Relevancy to each classroom Fidelity is not compromised when validated providers employ interactive teaching techniques. Providers should use creative, interactive strategies for teaching the specific components of the curriculum that will fit the classrooms individual needs. |
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6) Technical Assistance Technical assistance is available by contacting National Health Promotion Associates (NHPA), a firm that was founded by Dr. Botvin to provide consulting and Training services related to health promotion and disease prevention. They can be reached at 1-800-293-4969. For further information on Life Skills Training, please visit our website at <http://www.lifeskillstraining.com>www.lifeskillstraining.com. |
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Other Links to Best Practices
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National Coordinator Training and Technical Assistance
Center
http://www.k12coordinator.org/model.asp |
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NIDA, National Institutes of Drug Abuse |
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Other Alcohol, Tobacco and Drug Research-based Practices
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"D.A.R.E. Plus" Wins Applause
http://www.jointogether.org/y/0,2521,556568,00.html?U=85340 A study of the effectiveness of the D.A.R.E. anti-drug education program finds that an enhanced version appears to be more effective. http://archpedi.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/157/2/178 |
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Best Practices in Violence Prevention
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NEW VIRGINIA WEB SITE BRINGS YOUTH VIOLENCE PREVENTION
MODELS TO THEIR COMMUNITIES
A new web site makes it easier than ever for Virginians to bring national best practices in youth violence prevention to their local communities. Visiting <http://www.preventviolenceva.org> will connect you with the new Virginia Best Practices in School-Based Violence Prevention site that contains an extensive database of close to 200 youth violence prevention programs. These programs have been scientifically demonstrated to be effective. Visitors to the site will able easily to: * Learn about best practices approach * Browse descriptions of top national programs * Search for programs by grade level, topic, and program type * With one click, request a program's information packet * Store a personal list of programs of interest * Discover where specific programs are being used in Virginia For questions or comments about the web site, contact Jim Vetter, Director of the Suicide and Youth Violence Prevention Program at (804) 786-2611 or <mailto:jvetter@vdh.state.va.us>jvetter@vdh.state.va.us. |
