The Strengthening Hispanic Families Program
The Denver Area Youth Services (DAYS) in Denver, CO, modified the Strengthening Families Program for greater effectiveness with Hispanic children and families in several inner-city housing projects. This 5-year program with high-risk youth, funded by a grant from CSAP, was recently completed. Preliminary results suggest that the program was successful in attracting and maintaining high-risk families in SFP.
SFP and a child-only Basic Prevention Program (BPP) comparison intervention were implemented with 311 participants. Twenty-five percent of referrals came from schools and other community agencies, and 75 percent came from DAYS' aggressive outreach efforts in housing complexes. The children ranged in age from 5 to 12. One major success of this program was its high completion rate of 92 percent, which was based on two criteria: attending at least 70 percent of the sessions and participating in the graduation ceremony to receive a certificate of completion (Kumpfer, Wamberg, and Martinez, 1996).
Retention was an integral part of the followup design; 87 percent of families completed the 6-month followup, and 75 percent completed the 1-year followup. A relatively low level of risk factors is being reported for these children, possibly because, unlike the original NIDA research or Alabama, Michigan, and Utah studies, this program was not targeted to children of substance abusers. Also, families often underreport problems at the pretest stage because they are unsure about the confidentiality of the information they provide (Kumpfer, 1991a). Baseline data suggest that the greatest increase in exposure to tobacco, alcohol, and other drugs occurs in these Hispanic children at age 8 or 9. As in the Utah studies, many of the Hispanic children (33 percent) reported being sad or depressed, and 28 percent said they have thought about hurting themselves or committing suicide. As many as 20 percent of these elementary school children were having difficulties adjusting to school, and 44 percent had been involved in fistfights.
The levels of satisfaction and perception of usefulness reported by children and parents in each of the two comparison programs were almost identical. Parents rated SFP slightly higher in almost all categories, but they rated BPP about 20 percent higher than SFP on the variables of helping children do better at school and making friends. The children considered both programs equally useful.
| Previous | Contents | Next |
 |
|
| Family Skills Training for Parents and Children | |