Contact: Diana Strand, OSLC, 541-485-2711; Jani Iverson, FOTC, 503-281-6633
PORTLAND, OR – The National Institute of Child Health and Development (NICHD) has awarded $2.91million over the next five years to the Eugene-based non-profit Oregon Social Learning Center (OSLC) to fund a national study of the Friends of the Children youth mentoring program. Additional funds to support the costs of delivering the program during the course of the study will be paid for through private funding sources. The study, called the Friends of the Children Longitudinal Randomized Controlled Trial, will be conducted in collaboration with the National Office of Friends of the Children, as well as Friends of the Children chapters located in the inner city areas of Portland, Seattle/King County, Boston, and New York City.
Principal investigator for the study will be Dr. J. Mark Eddy, a Research Scientist and Licensed Psychologist who received his doctorate from the Department of Psychology at the University of Oregon and has worked at OSLC since 1987. Project Coordinators for the study will be Ms. Danita Herrera at OSLC, and Ms. Catherine Beckett at the National Office of Friends of the Children. Other scientists on the research team will be Dr. Charles Martinez, Jr. of the University of Oregon and OSLC; Dr. Jean Grossman of Public/Private Ventures and Princeton University; Dr. Mike Stoolmiller of Marquette, Michigan; Dr. Dana Foney of OSLC; and Dr. Kevin Alltucker of OSLC and the University of Oregon.
Friends of the Children (FOTC) is an established, long-term (12 year) mentoring program for children considered high risk for conduct disorder and delinquency, academic failure and high school dropout, and teen parenthood. The program was developed in Portland and is currently delivered through independent non-profit FOTC chapters throughout the United States. Children eligible for the program are identified through intensive screenings conducted by FOTC during kindergarten or first grade. Mentors, called “Friends”, are full-time, paid, trained, and supervised employees. Friends work with no more than eight children at a time and receive extensive training and supervision to help youth reach their short and long-term goals.
Data on outcomes for youth participating in FOTC over the past 15 years have been promising. With the support of their Friends, youth in the program have excelled in the face of countless barriers and challenges. Of the nearly 300 youth currently served by FOTC’s Portland chapter, 96% of the youth regularly attend school, 92% of the youth are not involved in the juvenile justice system, 99% of the youth avoid early parenting, and 80% of the youth have achieved a high school diploma or GED and 40% of the graduates have attended some post secondary education.
In the study, 256 kindergarten aged participants and their parents will be recruited through collaborating public schools in each of the four participating cities. Participants will be randomly assigned to receive a mentor through FOTC or a to a no-intervention control group, and then will be followed for three years. Data will be collected on social, educational, and developmental milestones. By comparing the results of the two groups over time, the study will be able to determine the immediate impacts that Friends of the Children has on the lives of extremely at-risk youth.
Both the FOTC National Office and OSLC are thrilled to be a part of this study that will generate a wealth of new data on intensive, long-term mentoring programs. The study is one outcome of a decade-long collaboration among FOTC, the Philadelphia-based non-profit Public/Private Ventures, and OSLC that was supported by a variety of foundations and funding agencies, including the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation. Positive results from the study could revolutionize how funds are used in the future to support mentoring efforts for society’s most at-risk children. In addition, information collected from the study will further assist in enhancing the program to have an even greater impact.
Dr. Orin Bolstad, clinical psychologist and Board member of FOTC National, states, “I consider the NICHD funding to be a most welcome endorsement. It reflects a sense of confidence in the Friends of the Children model, enough so to provide grant funding to examine the effectiveness of the program over the long-term against a randomly assigned control group. This gives us an opportunity to examine scientifically the positive results we experience anecdotally on a daily basis. If successful, the results of this landmark study will promote our model to a new level nationally, allowing us to serve many more at-risk children.”
The national network of FOTC reaches more than 600 children and teens across the United States through seven chapters: Boston, Massachusetts; Cincinnati, Ohio; Klamath Falls, Oregon; New York, New York; Portland, Oregon; San Francisco, California; and Seattle/King County, Washington. The National Office, based in Portland, Oregon, was created in 2000 for the purpose of refining and replicating the mentoring program in other communities to break the cycles of poverty, abuse, and violence in order for youth to become contributing members of society. For more information about FOTC, including success stories, please visit www.friendsofthechildren.org. For more information about OSLC, please visit www.oslc.org.