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Systematic Early Detection and Self Determination Approach for Mental Health Intervention in Head Start

Description:
This project is a partnership between the University of New Mexico and the Albuquerque Youth Development, Inc., for the purposes of improving mental health of Head Start children and their families. The project emphasizes use of two critical approaches. The first is the Early Screening Project (ESP), a multiple-gating procedure for early detection and screening that is not only extremely user-friendly for Head Start staff but also provides multiple sources of teacher, parent, and observational data on potentially high-risk children. The second is a 10-week Self-Determination Curriculum, a primary prevention approach to develop protective factors in both children and caregivers that not only enhances the Head Start curriculum but also serves a universal strategy from which nonresponders can be targeted for the next levels of intervention in the primary grades. The research design not only takes advantage of the pre/post-testing capabilities of the ESP but also follows Head Start subjects into kindergarten and first grade. A "rolling wait list" design enables control classrooms in each previous year of the project to serve as experimental classrooms in the following years, for added practical benefit. In addition to quantitative analyses, qualitative data from classroom ethnography and focus groups will be used to enhance the interventions at the end of each Head Start experience for use in the next year. A specific transition approach will also be studied for its impact on nonresponders who remain at risk for the self determination intervention. We will also examine the difference in potential impact, if any, between the intervention package as delivered by university staff as compared with that delivered independently by Head Start staff after training.
Resource Type:
Administration for Children and Families/OPRE Projects
Grantee(s)/Contrator(s):

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