R3 Supervisor Strategy

Based on Research Conducted at OSLC

Public child welfare systems (CWS) in the United States are populated with vulnerable children and families at high risk of negative outcomes, including substance use, risky sexual behavior, delinquency, incarceration, homelessness, and early mortality. This project will evaluate the effectiveness of a supervisor-targeted implementation strategy in creating organizational change and positive family outcomes such as placement permanency, child stability and well-being.

Project Overview

This NIDA-funded study will evaluate the effectiveness of a supervisor-targeted implementation strategy in creating organizational change and subsequent positive family outcomes. The R³ Supervisor Strategy (R³) was developed to modify the way that the CWS workforce supports families toward completing their treatment plans. Training, consultation, and fidelity-monitoring is provided to supervisors, who are centrally positioned in the system between caseworkers (who have daily interactions with CWS-involved families) and leadership (who make decisions that affect the organization in which families receive services). The three Rs are founded on social learning theory and include reinforcement of (1) effort, (2) relationships and roles, and (3) small steps toward goal achievement. This project will examine: (1) the potential of R³ to influence supervisor interactions with caseworkers and subsequent family outcomes; (2) the impact of R³ on organizational characteristics known to impact staff retention and the successful adoption of innovations such as climate, leadership, readiness, and citizenship; and (3) the potential for maintaining fidelity standards to the R³ strategy as consultation and coaching are fully transferred to the child welfare system.

Year Project Began: 2015

Principal Investigator

Lisa Saldana, Ph.D.

Active Research Projects

Primary Research and Clinical Interests

Lisa joined OSLC in 2007. She received her doctorate in clinical psychology from the University of Missouri-Columbia in 2003 with a research and clinical emphasis in child maltreatment and evidence-based practice (EBP). She has been active in the development, evaluation, and implementation of EBPs, with a particular emphasis in services for child welfare populations.

Lisa currently is the PI of a number of federally funded projects related to implementation in child serving systems. Building on her previous work with the Stages of Implementation Completion (SIC) ®, she and the SIC team are extending the SIC into the Sustainment Phase of the implementation process. Moreover, they are conducting a randomized trial of the SIC-Coaching strategy as a method for integrating implementation fidelity with intervention fidelity to increase rates of successful implementation among adolescent substance use treatment EBPs. Lisa and the SIC team have collaborated with a number of EBP developers in different service sectors, serving different populations to operationalize and monitor real-world implementation efforts. Similarly, the SIC team has developed the Cost of Implementing New Strategies (COINS) tool for assessing implementation costs across the three phases of implementation.

Lisa also is the primary developer and evaluator the R3 Supervisor Strategy. Developed in collaboration with child welfare leaders, R3 aims to bring evidence-based strategies into child welfare worker-family interactions. The model has been implemented and evaluated across both state and county driven child welfare systems. R3 has received strong endorsement from supervisors trained in the model and consistently has produced positive organizational change.

Lisa is the developer of the Families Actively Improving Relationships (FAIR) model, an integrative intervention for families referred to the child welfare system for parental substance abuse. FAIR integrates evidence-based techniques targeting four key treatment components including parental substance use, maladaptive parenting, and mental health symptoms as well as their correlated contextual problems such as housing and employment. Families referred to FAIR receive services in their natural environments (e.g., home, school, court) and receive incentives related to healthy households for meeting individualized treatment goals. Currently, Lisa and her team are implementing FAIR, and its adaptation PRE-FAIR, in five Oregon counties, as part of a NIDA-funded HEAL prevention study. FAIR is recognized by the California Evidence-Based Clearinghouse. Lisa oversees FAIR services provided to Lane and Douglas County residents through the ODI Clinic; for more information, visit odiclinic.org/fair.