Evaluation of the Making Proud Choices! Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program

Mathematica Policy Research

Status: Completed

Conditions: Teen Pregnancy Prevention

Treatments: Behavioral: Business as usual; Behavioral: Making Proud Choices

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT04863326

HHSP23337014T

Details and patient eligibility

About

Under contract to the Office of Population Affairs (OPA), Mathematica is conducting an impact study of the Making Proud Choices! (MPC) teen pregnancy prevention program. The impact study is designed to estimate the impact of MPC, compared to the business-as-usual condition, on risk and protective factors, sexual behaviors, and longer term health goals including pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections.

Full description

This evaluation used a cluster randomized controlled trial (RCT) design to assess the effectiveness of MPC, with schools within districts randomly assigned to one of two conditions: (1) MPC implemented by health educators, or (2) business as usual. In total, 31 school clusters were randomly assigned to condition, including roughly 2800 students, in four geographic areas across the U.S.

The study was implemented over the course of three school years (2016-17, 2017-18 and 2018-19), with youth in each year considered a separate evaluation cohort, and with participating schools (and new cohorts of eligible youth) randomized to condition each year.

There are two main sources of data for this study: outcome and implementation data. Youth in the study completed two waves of self-report surveys: (1) a baseline survey administered before programming began, and (2) a follow-up outcome survey administered approximately six months after the end of programming (approximately 9 months after baseline, on average). The surveys measured antecedents to sexual behavior (risk and protective factors), sexual behaviors, and ultimately, MPC's health goals of reducing sexually transmitted infections and teen pregnancies. Program implementation data included fidelity and attendance logs, observations, interviews, study youth focus groups, staff surveys, and technical assistance logs.

The benchmark analytic approach for estimating program impacts focuses on individuals with observed (non-missing) outcome data, and will statistically adjust for several baseline and location variables to produce credible and precise estimates of program effectiveness. Several sensitivity analyses will be conducted to understand the robustness of the findings across alternative specifications, and to understand the effect of MPC across a variety of subgroups.

Enrollment: 2,810 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 13 to 19 years old

Volunteers: No Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• Enrolled in a study school
• Attending the targeted class (e.g. health class) for the first time

Exclusion criteria

• None

Trial design

Primary purpose: Prevention

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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2,810 participants in 2 patient groups

Making Proud Choices

Experimental group

Description:

This evaluation tests the effect of the MPC School Edition, the version of the MPC 5th Edition designed for implementation in school. This edition includes 9.5 hours of content implemented in 14 40-minute modules. Schools assigned to the MPC condition received MPC in a targeted class.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Making Proud Choices

Business as usual

Active Comparator group

Description:

The control group continued with their regular programming in the targeted class, which was often a health or Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) class.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Business as usual