NCJ Number
193823
Date Published
2001
Length
60 pages
Annotation
This report documents some of the most promising practices and early lessons learned in "Starting Early Starting Smart" (SESS) programs, which involve a public-private collaboration in providing integrated behavioral health services in community-based early childhood settings.
Abstract
The 12 grantees, working collaboratively, designed a study whereby integrated behavioral health services (mental health services, substance abuse prevention and treatment services, and family/parenting services) are delivered to families and children in typical early childhood settings. Each site has an intervention and comparison group and delivers similar targeted, culturally relevant interventions for young children and their families. The following set of outcomes was developed to evaluate project effectiveness: access to and use of services; social, emotional, and cognitive outcomes for children; caregiver-child interaction outcomes; and family functioning. Following an introduction to the SESS Program, this report describes SESS Program innovations. These include child-centered and family-centered services, strengths-based services drawn from family traditions and cultural background, intervention, increased services through collaboration, and measured outcomes that can inform practice and policy. A section on lessons learned focuses on recruiting and working with families and the collaboration process. An overview of the next steps in program development is followed by descriptions of the challenges and successes the project sites experienced during their first 3 years of program implementation. These descriptions capture the unique and innovative aspects of the 12 SESS projects. Distinctions are drawn between the program characteristics of early childhood settings, such as child care and Head Start, and primary health care sites where young families customarily receive services for children. Appended mission statements of the SESS national collaborators and a list of grant sites and contact information