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Guide
to Effective Programs
for Children and Youth
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FAST TRACK PREVENTION PROJECT
OVERVIEW
The Fast Track Prevention Project is a comprehensive intervention from 1st through 10th grades for high-risk children and teens. The program is designed to prevent antisocial behaviors through the promotion of child competencies and improved school context, parent-school relationships, and parenting skills. Program components include a classroom curriculum (PATHS), tutoring, home visiting, group skills training, mentoring, and various individualized services. An experimental evaluation of three different cohorts shows that participation in Fast Track had modest positive impacts on high-risk children's social, academic, and behavioral outcomes. Furthermore, parents of children in Fast Track exhibited less harsh discipline, compared to parents of children who were not in the program.
DESCRIPTION OF PROGRAM
Target population: At-risk children and teens
The Fast Track Prevention Project was a comprehensive, ten-year-long intervention program for at-risk children and teens. The program began in 1st grade for children who had been identified as at-risk through teacher and parent reports of conduct problems. Participation in Fast Track was designed to "[improve] child competencies, parenting effectiveness, school context, and school-home communications [to] to contribute to preventing antisocial behavior" in later years (Fast Track Project, 1). All children in Fast Track classrooms were administered the PATHS (Promoting Alternative Thinking Strategies) teacher-led curriculum, which was designed to develop emotional communication, social understanding, self-control and problem-solving. Only students identified as high-risk experienced the variety of other Fast Track components, including social skills training groups, reading tutoring, classroom-based peer pairing (to promote friendships), and, for parents, training groups (to promote positive family-school relationships and teach behavior management skills) and home visits (to teach parents problem-solving, self-efficacy, and life management skills). The program design changed slightly for grades 6-10, with declines in group-based interventions and increases in parent and youth group meetings; special emphasis was placed on making a successful transition from one school to the next. Also at this stage, Fast Track's design allowed for many more individualized services according to individual participants' needs, such as mentoring, tutoring, home visiting, and "liaisons with school and community agencies" (Fast Track Project, 5).
Fast Track has been implemented at several sites across the United States and in other English-speaking countries (e.g., Great Britain, Australia, Canada).
EVALUATION(S) OF PROGRAM
Evaluated population: 891 high-risk first-graders (445 experimental, 446 control,) at various schools in Durham, NC, Nashville, TN, Seattle, WA, and rural central PA. The sample was roughly 2/3 male, ½ white, and ½ mostly African American. (Note: All students in selected classrooms received the PATHS curriculum, as explained above; only the outcomes of the high-risk subsample, which received additional services, are described below.)
The evaluations were conducted on three different cohorts-those entering first grade in 1991, 1992, and 1993. Overall, participation in Fast Track produced a variety of statistically significant (though modest) positive impacts. Compared to the control group, Fast Track children improved their social-cognitive and academic skills, exhibited lower levels of aggressive behavior at home and at school, were less likely to be placed into special education, and a greater proportion of the participants had become completely free of conduct problems (37% vs. 27% in the control group). In adolescence, Fast Track participants were arrested at lower levels and exhibited continued lower levels "serious conduct disorder" than their control group peers. Parents of the program participants used harsh discipline less frequently than their control group counterparts. Impacts did not differ by demographic characteristics.
SOURCES FOR MORE INFORMATION
References:
Conduct Problems Prevention Research Group. (1997). Prevention of antisocial behavior: Initial findings from the Fast Track Project. Paper presented at the Society for Research in Child Development Biennial Meeting, Washington, DC.
Fast Track Project. (n.d.). Fast Track Project overview. Retrieved December 3, 2003, from the World Wide Web: http://www.fasttrackproject.org/fasttrackoverview.htm
Greenberg, M. T. (1998, August). Testing developmental theory of antisocial behavior with outcomes from the Fast Track Prevention Project. Paper presented at the American Psychological Association, Chicago, IL.
Website: www.fasttrackproject.org
SUMMARY & CATEGORIZATION
Program categorized in this guide according to the
following:
Evaluated participant ages: 1st-graders (at
program debut) / Program age ranges in the Guide: 6-11, 12-14, 15-21
Program components: School-based, Mentoring/tutoring,
Parent/family, Home visits
Measured outcomes: Education/cognitive, Social/emotional,
Behavioral problems
Program information last updated 12/4/03.
