Evaluation of SAFER Latinos' Program to Prevent Youth Violence

Joanne Klevens

Status and phase: Completed; Phase 3; Phase 2

Conditions: Violence

Treatments: Behavioral: SAFER (Seguridad, Apoyo, Familia, Educacion, y Recursos)

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; Other U.S. Federal agency

Identifiers

NCT00527358

CDC-NCIPC-4924

Details and patient eligibility

About

This is an evaluation of a primary prevention program to prevent youth violence by improving family cohesion, networking among families, school bonding, and access to services for Latinos in Langley Park, MD.

Full description

To prevent youth involvement in violence, outreach workers will work with families and youth to improve school bonding, family cohesion and awareness and utilization of existing services; and a youth drop-in center will provide youth with an adult supervised place to "hang out", do homework, or participate in sports and job training.

Following implementation of the intervention, we will collect detailed process data (regarding implementation), and evaluate impact/outcome using a quasi-experimental design with baseline (prior to intervention) and two followup data collections in both the intervention and a control community (Culmore, Virginia), measuring change in a selected set of aggregate community variables that represent mediating factors and outcomes for youth violence in Langley Park. Data will be collected via a survey and focus groups.

Enrollment: 1,400 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 12 to 24 years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• youth 12-24 and their caregiver

Exclusion criteria

• residence outside of Langley Park or Culmore

Trial design

Primary purpose: Prevention

Allocation: Non-Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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1,400 participants in 2 patient groups

SAFER

Experimental group

Description:

The intervention community will receive 4 services: 1. community lay workers will do family outreach and assist families in networking with other families and accessing community services, facilitating parent-youth and family-school communication and homework help for children, and help with translation of school or government/official notices; 2. youth leaders will provide a supportive presence, help youth navigate the system at school so that they can get help if needed, disseminate information about job training and possibilities, and provide education about avoiding violence; 3. school support services will offer academic support, acculturation orientation, language, conflict resolution skills training, advocacy and referrals; 4. Youth drop-in center: will provide youth with an adult supervised place to "hang out", do homework, or participate in sports and job training.

Treatment:

Behavioral: SAFER (Seguridad, Apoyo, Familia, Educacion, y Recursos)

2

No Intervention group

Description:

Business as usual.