The Family Development Project: A University of Michigan and Detroit Head Start Partnership

1. The Family Development Project: A University of Michigan and Detroit Head Start Partnership Michael S. Spencer Laura P. Kohn

2. Special Thanks • The W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the UM School of Social Work Global Program on Youth • The Ginsberg Center for Community Service Learning • UM Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP) • NIMH Center on Poverty, Risk, and Mental Health

3. The Family Development Project • Goal: Improve early screening and intervention for behavioral and emotional problems in Detroit Head Start programs. • Development of collaborative partnership with Detroit Head Start agencies. • University of Michigan faculty: Michael Spencer, Laura Kohn, Oscar Barbarin. • Detroit Head Start Partners: Detroit Public Schools, New St. Paul Tabernacle, City of Detroit Department of Human Services, Vistas Nuevas Agency.

4. Background and Purpose of Research • Increasing rates of serious mental health problems among children (Bird, 1996; Richters, 1993; Shaffer, 1996). • Large numbers of children do not receive services (UNOCAPP, 1998). • Availability, accessibility in urban, low-income,ethnic minority communities. • Research for social change.

5. Transformative Research Process • Original research focus on risk factors for mental health problems. • Skepticism and negotiation. • Re-examination of research paradigm. • Listening to needs of Head Start program. • Evolution of community-based research and service learning project.

6. Value-based, Multicultural, Community Research Approach • Collaboration on all phases of research. • Integrates knowledge/action for mutual benefit. • Incorporates cyclical and iterative process. • Disseminates findings by all partners. • Builds on strengths/resources in community. • Health from positive/ecological perspective. • Promotes co-learning and reciprocal transfer of knowledge, skills, capacity and power.

7. Integrating Service Learning • Need for tangible and immediate benefits. • Greatest need in the classrooms • Attention to emotional/behavioral problems • Undergraduate Volunteer Assistants • Assist in classroom • Assist with research protocols • Graduate Student Field Placement • Research project liaisons • Practice Fieldwork • Supervision of undergraduates

8. Goals of FDP service learning • Develop students’ academic interest in children’s mental health, cultural studies, community psychology and social work. • Develop students’ sense of citizenship and community service. • Promote values of equality and social justice.

9. FDP Service Learning Approach • Undergraduate students work one-half day session per week in Head Start Classrooms. • Graduate students spend several hours per week in fluid roles, depending on needs. • Students attend weekly seminar with readings and critical dialogues. • Pedagogical method to foster student identity development and critical consciousness.

10. Successes • Ongoing research partnership with increasing trust and collaboration. • Collection of qualitative and quantitative data useful for parents and teachers. • Provision of unique educational experiences for undergraduate and graduate students in an economically-disadvantaged community.

11. Challenges and Obstacles • Manifestation of mistrust. • Initial & Individual • Congruency between research and immediate needs. • Administrative realities of partnership agency. • Role of investigators. • Realities of tenure-track. • Values as faculty of color.

12. Results of our research

13. Next steps for screening • Follow up with teacher screen for students in the 75% or above • Provide strategies for parenting for each of the subscales • Provide list of resources for parents and children • Secondary analyses with demographic data • Revise screener based on exploratory analyses and qualitative data

14. Qualitative results • Analyses based on pre-determined set of codes developed from hypotheses • Transcripts have been entered and coded in Atlas TI • Currently, conducting analyses on data • Use interviews to validate screener and to develop interventions for children and parents

15. Service utilization—example • Teachers emphasize formal systems, • Specifically the Head Start mental health system (teachers, specialists, assistants, coordinators) • More specific of the process • Parent denial—source of mistrust • Parents emphasis informal systems • including friends/neighbors, ministers, church pastors, other parents, co-workers • Less specificity—just the who/where, not how • Crisis oriented—police • Parent blame as source of mistrust

16. Other project activities • Presentations to mental health coordinators, parent policy committees, teachers, and parent interest groups • Provide information on specific children’s mental health issues, e.g., selective mutism, parent depression • Resources—parenting strategies, 9-11, dance/movement, gifted children

17. Future directions • Developing curriculum for family advocacy through our service learning program • Developing an intervention for parents with a mental illness (depression) and in crisis • Refinement of screening tool • Development of an ACCESS database for DPS • Survey of service utilization • Feasibility and appropriateness of interventions

18. Summary • Analysis and Dissemination of Research • Qualitative parent and teacher interviews • Quantitative data • Manuscripts on lessons learned, stigmatization of African American children • Nurturing collaborative partnership • Service learning component • Intervention development • Adherence to principles of CBR