There now exists sufficient scientific research and fiscal evaluation confirming that evidence-based practices in the areas of prevention (e.g., youth violence and crime, adolescent pregnancy, substance abuse, early childhood education, housing and even national defense) and various clinical interventions can and do save dollars as well as achieve better consumer and/or public safety outcomes. There are lots of reasons both documented and suspected as to why this is so. True evidence-supported practices are usually developed in smaller settings, with controlled samples, sufficient budgetary resources along with high degrees of quality training and delivery in their implementation. Bringing them to scale in larger populations and settings has always been a challenge as well as understanding the roles of culture, race, ethnicity and other variables in their relevance. Much effort has gone into translational and implementation science, as well as transdisiplinary research to bring into awareness the key drivers of success when implementing EBP’s.
A missing ingredient in the articulation of “what works” is a clear and practical definition of engagement so that research-to-practice scholars can develop and target specific interventions that (1) truly help those delivering services better engage youth, families and communities; and (2) help those delivering services to know it when they see it (including the measurement of engagement from start to finish). In the November 2013 American Journal of Community Psychology, Pullman et al. document a very innovative action research approach that actually involves the very youth affected by the issues toward the conceptual and practical definition of engagement — I encourage you to read it as it helps put youth engagement into a conceptually clearer light. But the purpose of this post isn’t just to provide kudos to Pullman et al.; it is also to encourage the fiscal and policy “deciders” to invest more in making engagement a core focus of research as well as train both leaders and program providers in the best methods for engaging folks. And I’m talking about engaging folks at multiple levels – consumers of actual interventions; consumers of training; public policy advocates; administrators; and legislators/congressional members. Effective engagement centers on relationships that all parties feel good about; yet, there is much more to it than simply liking each other. Trust, history, attitudes, mutual empowerment, and fitting into the relevant social context all matter (as Pullman et al. demonstrate).
When one participates in social problem solving, there is always a lot of finger pointing – “those kids”, “those parents”, “if the schools would just…..”, “if the government would just…..”. And yes there are justifiable concerns on all fronts. But we will never solve our problems by blaming others or rationalizing our mistakes or inadequacies at their expense. We must invest our resources toward figuring out and delivering culturally and contextually more effective methods for including persons of every community affected by the issues in finding solutions that are relevant and effective within the contexts of their lives. Without more effective engagement strategies we can have all the “best” programs in the world but not a strong way to engage those that need or want change. There is no “if you build it they will come” effect in human services (including juvenile justice State Advisory Groups that, like many other entities hunger for effective tools to help their states). In fact policy makers use the traditional failures of this approach to partially justify their avoidance in investing additional dollars toward prevention programming. We must call on our federal leaders (and other supporters of research) to find interagency and transdisciplinary funding for applied research and high quality training that will get us better engaged with our customers. I would even argue that we should put engagement of key stakeholders in the forefront of training efforts moving forward (prioritize it at least for the short term) even as we train others in program and other strategic innovations. Then we owe it to ourselves to learn all that we can as leaders or practitioners to make sure that we’ve got the very best that research has taught us in our toolboxes — in the end, consumers (customers) don’t care as much about our pedigrees; they care about our abilities to relate to their problems and to apply our techniques/tools to solving their issues in ways that truly change their lives for the better.
Juvenile Justice, Vulnerable Children and Other Things That Matter 