Age range

Website: news.pacificnews.org/news/

Mission/Goals: Redeeming the Irredeemable is a collaborative partnership between three organizations (Pacific News Service, The Mentoring Center, and the Alameda County Department of Probation) with a long track record of work with Oakland youth considered by many as "irredeemable." The core of the work with incarcerated youth assumes that their hunger to communicate will enable them to reconnect with society. Pacific News Service provides writing workshops with Oakland youth in juvenile detention, publishes their work in the weekly Beat Within, and provides follow-up services upon leaving detention.

Source(s): www.ofcy.org; news.pacificnews.org/news/

Type of Evaluation: Outcomes Monitoring.

Objective: The Oakland Fund for Children and Youth (OFCY) evaluation was designed to assess service provision and the effects of services provided by organizations that received grants from OFCY. Please note that the following summary focuses on evaluation findings regarding the effects on children, rather than on service provision.

Impact/Outcomes: Youth-reported satisfaction with services declined between fall 2003 and spring 2004 (79.3% versus 84.9%). The percentage of youth reporting improvement across the seven developmental assets increased between the fall and spring (51.8% and 66.2%); in fall 2003, staff indicated that all (100.0%) youth showed improvement. Similarly, the percentage of youth reporting improvement across the five areas of attitudes, skills, knowledge, and behaviors increased (55.4% to 63.8%); the percentage for staff reports in fall 2003 was 87.5%. Staff ratings were high for youths'
expectations of themselves as well as their
ratings of youths' participation in home,
school, and community (exactly 91.7% for both indicators). 73% of a selected subgroup of youth had writing samples that indicated their communication skills and willingness to connect with others had increased; 1 out of 9 youth violated her probation.