IVDB Update and Progress Report Activities and Achievements August 2007

Update and Progress Report on IVDB Activities and Achievements

August 2007

University of Oregon

Institute on Violence and Destructive Behavior

Clinical Services Building , Floor 3

Telephone (541) 346-3592

Jeffrey R. Sprague and Hill M. Walker, Co-Directors

The Institute on Violence and Destructive Behavior (IVDB) celebrated its thirteenth anniversary this spring as an OUS-authorized research institute. As a designated Oregon University System Center of Excellence, this branding means that the University of Oregon is considered to be the lead institution of the OUS campus network in the areas of violence prevention and school safety. In the past thirteen years, the IVDB and its programs have developed and maintained a strong statewide presence; demonstrated substantive national and international leadership based on the excellence and value of their research and outreach activities and its investigators have been recognized internationally for their expertise and achievements.

The mission of the Institute is to empower schools and social service agencies to address violence and destructive behavior, at the point of school entry and beyond, in order to ensure safety and to facilitate the academic achievement and healthy social development of children and youth. IVDB personnel study the developmental trajectories, and risk-protective factors and interventions that are related to the prevention of violence, school failure, delinquency and other destructive outcomes among at-risk children and adolescents from diverse communities and cultures. IVDB research and outreach activities encompass the following:

1. Translating evidence-based, technical knowledge and procedures into consumer friendly forms that practitioners can use in applied, culturally diverse contexts;

2. Conducting original research on tools and interventions that make schools and communities safer, healthier, and more effective and violence free;

3. Using social marketing and best practices in dissemination to promote adoption, implementation and maintenance of evidence-based best professional practices;

4. Sharing our expertise through legislative testimony, outreach training, and technical assistance provided to federal and state legislative bodies, policy centers, state and local education agencies, and other public and private agencies serving at-risk children and youth and their families;

5. Training and coaching key implementation agents who serve as collaborative partners for our intervention programs located in school districts and social service agencies in Oregon, across the United States, and internationally. And,

6. Supporting the academic mission of the University and the College of Education by integrating knowledge gained in our research and outreach activities into undergraduate and graduate classes, academic advising, and university service.

Expertise Areas

The IVDB is a tightly focused, cohesive organization that has attracted individuals who, collectively, have a broad range of expertise in addressing the needs of at-risk children and youth and who are dedicated to making schools safe, effective settings for student learning and social-emotional development. Attachment 1 lists current IVDB expertise areas.

IVDB Current Status, Progress, and Achievements

This update describes our collective research, development, and outreach activities of the past several years, including key training and technical assistance efforts that have been focused on the prevention and treatment of antisocial, and sometimes violent, behavior among behaviorally at-risk children and youth. Seminal IVDB achievements are noted herein, as are emerging, future areas of IVDB influence and impact.

IVDB Grant Awards

The IVDB has been able to secure a diverse portfolio of competitively-awarded, externally-funded grants and contracts during its brief history. The IVDB was initially funded in 1994 with a $70,000 start-up investment by the U of O under the aegis of Stead Upham, then Vice Provost for Research. This initial investment provided critical capacity to leverage funding and to compete successfully in grant competitions from a range of federal agencies. To date, the IVBD has received competitively-awarded funding from the following agencies:

• The National Institute of Child Health and Development

• The National Institute on Drug Abuse (National Institutes of Health)

• The U.S. Office of Special Education Programs

• The U.S. Agency for Children, Youth and Families

• The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration

• The U.S. Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention

• The U.S. Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools

• The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

• The Institute for Education Sciences

• The National Institute of Mental Health

• The Bureau of Indian Affairs, Office of Indian Education Programs

• The Oregon Department of Education

• The Oregon Governor's Juvenile Crime Prevention Commission

• The Oregon Commission on Children and Families

• The California State Department of Education

• The Mississippi State Department of Education

• The Nebraska State Department of Education

• The Texas State Department of Education

• The Deschutes County Commission on Children and Families

• The Small Business Administration Through its SBIR Program

• The Lane County Council of Governments

• The UO Center for Women in Society

• Multiple Oregon school districts

The diversity of funding support represented here is a cherished accomplishment of the IVDB and reflects the skills, expertise and creativity of IVDB investigators as well as the breadth and range of their activities and accomplishments. This portfolio also confirms the value of our contributions and competitiveness in addressing Oregon 's social agenda and national priorities in our field. It also documents the range of valuable working relationships forged by the IVDB within the State of Oregon and across the U.S. involving grant and contractual arrangements as compensation for the delivery of our expertise, programs, and products. This recognition of the IVDB as a community resource and an Oregon leader in these areas is a harbinger of our continued growth and development in meeting the needs of the state and nation and leading the U of O and College of Education 's research and outreach mission.

We also have partnerships and cooperative working relationships with a number of agencies and organizations in Lane County and the State of Oregon . These include: The Oregon Governor's Office; The Oregon Department of Education; The Oregon Youth Authority; The Oregon Citizen's Crime Commission; The California Department of Education, The Nebraska Department of Education, The New Mexico Department of Education, The Arkansas Department of Education, The Springfield, Eugene, and Bethel School Districts; The Lane Education Service District (ESD), The Linn Benton Lincoln ESD, The Mid-Valley Partnership (Marion and Polk counties); The Committee for Children, The Ribbon of Promise; The Oregon Social Learning Center; The Oregon Research Institute; The Lane County Department of Youth Services; The Oregon Attorney General's Office; The Emerald Valley Boys and Girls Clubs; IRIS Media, Inc., The San Diego Center for Children, and Looking Glass Youth and Family Services. Each of these entities shares the IVDB goal of protecting our children and youth from risk factors and promoting their healthy development through the enhancement and strengthening of protective influences.

Collaborating Faculty

An impressive group of U of O investigators, and researchers from other universities, continue to collaborate through the IVDB in producing research, refereed journal articles, position papers, book chapters and other materials that define best practices in preventing antisocial and violent behaviors in schools and communities. In the past few years, IVDB-affiliated faculty have produced books addressing the topics of violence prevention, school safety, and making schools more effective in meeting the challenges posed by behaviorally at-risk and failing students. They include the following titles: (1) Making Schools Safer and Violence Free: Critical Issues, Solutions, and Recommended Practices , by Hill Walker and Michael Epstein, PRO-ED, Inc. (2001); (2) Safe School Design: A Handbook for Educational Leaders , by Tod Schneider, Hill Walker , and Jeffrey Sprague, ERIC Clearinghouse on Educational Management, University of Oregon (2001); (3) Interventions for Academic and Behavior Problems II: Preventive and Remedial Approaches , by Mark Shinn , Hill Walker , and Gary Stoner , National Association of School Psychologists (January, 2002), (4) Safe and Healthy Schools: Practical Prevention Strategies (January 2005) , a book on school safety by Jeffrey Sprague, Hill Walker , Vicki Nishioka and Stephen Smith published by Guilford Publications School Practitioner Series (edited by our COE colleague Ken Merrell ), (5) Best Behavior: Building Positive Behavior Supports in Schools is guidebook for positive behavioral interventions and supports from Sopris West Publishing, authored by Jeffrey Sprague and Annemieke Golly (2004), and (6) Hill Walker completed the second edition of Antisocial Behavior in Schools: Strategies and Best Practices with Betsy Ramsey and Frank Gresham (2005). These books are valuable in helping to establish the credibility and influence of the IVDB within these critically-important areas to our society.

In addition, we continue to work with faculty in the COE and across the university and nation to develop new proposals for funding that coincide with the IVDB's mission, focus, and goals. Key collaborating faculty are listed here:

Anthony Biglan, Ph.D. (Oregon Research Institute), Shawn Boles, Ph.D., Michael Bullis, Ph.D.; Daniel Close, Ph.D.; Thomas Dishion, Ph.D. (UO Family Resource Center), Debra Eisert, Ph.D.; Dennis Embry, Ph.D. (Paxis Institute), Michael Epstein, Ph.D. (University of Nebraska, Lincoln); Edward Feil, Ph.D.; Annemieke Golly, Ph.D.; Mark Greenberg, Ph.D. (Pennsylvania State University); Frank Gresham, Ph.D. (University of California-Riverside); Robert Horner, Ph.D.; Larry Irvin, Ph.D.; Peter Jensen, M.D. (Columbia University); Mark Katz, Ph.D. (San Diego Center for Children), Carol Metzler, Ph.D. (Oregon Research Institute); Vicki Nishioka, Ph.D.; John Reid, Ph.D. (Oregon Social Learning Center); Julie Rusby, Ph.D. (Oregon Research Institute); Herbert Severson, Ph.D.; Mark Shinn, Ph.D. (University of Chicago); Steve Stieber, Ph.D.; Beth Stormshak, Ph.D.; George Sugai , Ph.D. (University of Conneticut); Tary Tobin, Ph.D.; and Richard Zeller, Ph.D.

IVDB Highlights

The ensuing highlights reflect the competence and commitment of all who contribute to and support the work of the IVDB. Only selected highlights from the recent past are presented here.

Jeffrey Sprague received a 5-year R01 grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse to conduct the first ever randomized trial of Positive Behavior Supports in Oregon Middle Schools. The National Institute on Drug Abuse-funded research project will experimentally evaluate the impact of PBS on early adolescent development through a randomized control trial involving 36 middle schools. The impact of PBS on school staff discipline practices and student behavior will be evaluated. The study will examine whether the likely reductions in negative behavior in school are accompanied by reductions in peer harassment and victimization, peer rejection, deviant peer formation, and the development of antisocial behavior, substance use, high risk sexual behavior, and depression.

Jeffrey Sprague and Pamela Yeaton are conducting an evaluation of Self-Enhancement Incorporated , a nationally recognized program in Portland serving primarily African-american children and youth. IVDB is providing an evaluation to illustrate the individual and collective impact of SEI programs on the lives of identified students, families, and staff members. The results will be used to rigorously document SEI program outcomes, and to inform the development of the information/data system (being separately contracted between SEI and Social Solutions), specifically assisting in the development of data-based decision rules for program improvement.

Sprague is also leading the development of their staff development model to expand SEI services in Portland , and to replicate the program in other U.S. cities. SEI currently serves over 2500 children and youth in the Portland , Oregon area.

Hill Walker, Herb Seversen, & Annemieke Golly received a 4-year IES grant, in the amount of 4.5 million dollars to conduct a randomized trial of the First Step to Success early intervention program for antisocial children (Walker et al., 1997) within the Albuquerque , New Mexico public schools. This grant also includes an annual subcontract to the U of O ECS program, directed by Rob Horner , to conduct a series of concurrent studies on implementation issues associated with the program.

Jeffrey Sprague received a contract from Research Triangle Incorporated to test School wide Positive Behavior Supports in a national randomized trial of “violence prevention” U.S. Middle Schools in Combination with Responding in Peaceful and Positive Ways (RIPP) (Northrup et al.). Best Behavior is a positive behavior supports staff development curriculum that includes methods for school wide, classroom, common area, individual student and family supports. Best Behavior will provide the structure, training and tools to support the school wide intervention component. In this project Best Behavior will be used in conjunction with Responding in Peaceful and Positive Ways (RIPP) a classroom-based curriculum designed to teach a positive approach to conflict resolution.

Jeffrey Sprague collaborated with Anthony Biglan, Thomas Dishion, Carol Metzler and others to establish an NIH Center on the Prevention of Behavior Problems in Middle Adolescence. Center researchers will conduct high quality research on the development, treatment, and prevention of problems of early adolescence and the effective dissemination of empirically based interventions in order to ensure successful social and academic development of all adolescents and to bring about a measurable reduction in the prevalence of adolescents with psychological or behavioral problems. The Center will also disseminate improved methods for research on early adolescence and build a comprehensive program for new investigator development.

Jeffrey Sprague contributes to international prevention initiatives. Jeffrey Sprague has worked with the Behavioral Research Center in Norway ( www.atferd.unirand.no/ ) to train and consult on a quasi-experimental trial of PBS in Norwegian elementary schools. The success of the original experiment resulted in the Norwegian government consenting to support a major scaling up of PBS in Norway with a goal of implementing in 200 schools over the next three years. This project will include translating the highly successful School-Wide Information System ( www.swis.org ) into Norwegian. Jeff will travel to Norway multiple times over the next few years to consult and assist with staff development and cultural adaptation. Jeff is grateful to Jerry Patterson, Marion Forgatch and Nancy Bank of Oregon Social Learning Center for facilitating this relationship.

Jeffrey Sprague recently traveled to Santiago , Chile at the request of the Fundacion Paz Ciudadana to assist them in starting and implementing a school violence prevention project in three schools in one of the poorest municipalities in Santiago . Puente Alto is southeast of downtown Santiago and the project schools were selected based on a number of factors, including the density of delinquent youth, poverty, single parent households, and neighborhood crime. While there, Jeff visited the three schools to get acquainted and to provide an introductory presentation, and he also presented to about 200 school administrators, mental health professionals, and the Mayor of Puente Alto. Jeff will return in the Fall of 07 to help them kick off a three year intervention project and will consult with the Fundacion regularly as they design their project.

Jeffrey Sprague and Stephen Smith have an ongoing collaboration with the California Department of Education to implement School Wide Positive Behavior Supports, for over 400 schools in California . This initiative will continue this year with advanced training, and training of trainers/coaches in California special education regions. Sprague assisted the CDE to successfully apply for an OSEP State Improvement Grant to enhance and expand Positive Behavior Supports in schools and school districts across the state.

IVDB continues to develop partnerships and compacts with agencies and school districts that empower us to engage in broad-based prevention and intervention efforts . IVDB faculty continue to work collaboratively with local school districts, state and local police agencies, state and local departments of youth services, and OUS institutions to develop, fund, and implement prevention and treatment programs for at-risk and antisocial youth in schools and communities.

Hill Walker served on a recent behavioral science panel of psychologists, social workers and sociologists to assist the research staff of the Girls and Boys Town of Omaha, Neb. in developing a long term research agenda for that agency.

The IVDB as a COE Resource to Faculty and Students

The IVDB views one of its key roles as serving in a resource capacity to support the research related needs of COE faculty and students. All faculty members are invited to collaborate with IVDB investigators in designing research initiatives and in the development-submission of grant applications to competitive requests for proposals opportunities from federal agencies. IVDB faculty has worked with a number of younger faculty members in this effort over the last several years. We urge graduate students to discuss possible dissertation topics with IVDB project directors and to apply for GTFs and research assistantships when they are available.

Emerging Areas of IVDB Activity and Impact

The IVDB has emerged as a state and national leader in the area of school safety. We expect that the IVDB's stature and influence will continue to expand in this area.

Finally, perhaps reflecting the IVDB's growing maturity and impact, Jeff Sprague and Hill Walker have been approached by sites in Southern California , Idaho , Nebraska , and Chile about the possibilities of establishing IVDB satellites. These sites represent, respectively, (1) a private residential setting for tertiary-level children and youth that provides outreach technical assistance to school districts and other agencies, (2) a semi-public facility serving secondary- and tertiary-level children and youth across three levels of care (day treatment, regular residential, and secure treatment) that also provides outreach staff development training to school-based personnel, (3) a public school district that wishes to increase its capacity for serving effectively the full range of at-risk children and youth, and (4) foundations and government agencies in Chile that have a goal of translating IVDB products for use in the Latin world. In each case, these sites wish to become certified trainers of others in IVDB interventions and to be able to broker their services to local and regional consumers. This development will require us to develop rules and specifications as to how best to manage such partnership arrangements.

Appreciation of IVDB research and support staff

The IVDB is blessed with a competent and committed research and support staff who carry out the daily tasks of operating each grant, manage fiscal and personnel resources, keep our computers running, and make the IVDB a great place to work. We are especially pleased to recognize Leslie Martinez as our business manager, and John Flanagan, Anne Thurber; and Carrie Watt and as our excellent administrative support staff. We thank them all heartily for their ongoing contributions to the success of the IVDB.

We also are blessed with a competent and dedicated research staff, including Sarah Pedersen, Stephen Smith, Steve Stieber, and Pam Yeaton..

Looking forward to another great year

We are looking forward to another productive year of IVDB activities, which will include building new relationships and providing local, state, national and international leadership in our areas of expertise. Again, we welcome both incoming and current students-faculty interested in collaborating with us to contact either Jeffrey Sprague or Hill Walker at 346-3592 or -3591, respectively.