Corrections Concepts, Inc.

TRACKING AND FOLLOW-UP RESEARCH

Project Directors:

James Marquart, Ph.D
Anthony Fabelo, Ph. D
Byron Johnson, Ph. D

Summary:

The primary purpose of this project is to evaluate the effectiveness of Habilitation House, a Faith-Based/Work-Ethic Corrections Initiative for adult male offenders. Treatment and matched comparison offenders from the incarcerated population will be selected. Post-release and follow- up data will be collected from Probation Officers, Parole Officers, the DOC and the Habilitation House staff.

Evaluation:

• Randomly assign eligible, consented participants to either the intervention or comparison arm.

• Maintain relative equivalence of exposure to factors that may influence outcomes.

• Follow a very high proportion of original participants in both arms of the study across time, (e.g. often no less than 15% dropout rate)

• Concretely operationalize, deliver, and measure components of the intervention.

• Concretely operationalize and measure the important primary outcome and potential confounding variables; and

• Perform the appropriate statistical analyses necessary to compute observed and adjusted intervention effects.

Monitoring:

• % Completed or graduated from the program

• % Followed for 4 years

• Of those followed for 4 years, % evidencing specific behaviors such as continuing in school, finding suitable housing, relapsing, obtaining and retaining employment, avoiding alcohol and/or drug use, family re-uniting, etc.

Method:

This data will be obtained through on-site interviews with residents, Habilitation House staff, Parole Officers, family, school officials, landlords and employers using techniques developed in previous work with many federal and state agencies. Other studies have shown the one-year post-release period to be crucial, so data collection will focus on that time frame.

Analysis:

All data will be encoded so as to insure confidentiality and will be statistically analyzed using SAS or SPSS to compare treatment and comparison groups as well as pre vs. post treatment behavior.

Reports:

A report will be available six months after the first cohort arrives at Habilitation House and then six months after the first cohort reaches the one-year post-release period and every six months after that for the duration of the 4 year tracking period.