AndreaBozzo/ceres-open-data-index huggingface dataset:
Student Engagement and Empowerment (SEE) Project, Washington, 2014-2019

Discipline in schools is typically disproportionate, reactive and punitive. Evidence-based strategies that have been recently developed focus on shifting schools to a more proactive and positive approach by detecting warning signs and intervening early. This project evaluates the implementation of an evidence-based intervention to improve students' mindsets and feelings of school belonging. This grant-funded project was designed to enhance school capacity to implement a Tier 2 intervention, Student Engagement and Empowerment (SEE), to improve student attendance, behavior, and achievement, while simultaneously evaluating the effects of this intervention. The intervention and research project were individualized to fit existing school operations in the school district. A grant-funded coach supported delivery of SEE at each school for the duration of the 3-year grant. SEE was delivered by trained teachers in the classroom over the course of a seven-session curriculum. The overarching project goal was to scale up and simultaneously evaluate a Tier 2 intervention that could be sustained after completion of the grant.
The originally proposed research procedures consisted of an evaluation of the effects of the SEE program on the outcomes of students at elevated risk for disciplinary action and school dropout. Outcome data was collected for at-risk students in classrooms delivering the SEE program, and a comparison sample of at-risk students in classrooms not delivering the SEE program. Researchers initially hypothesized that students receiving the program would evidence a greater sense of belonging to school, endorse greater growth mindset, have better attendance and fewer suspensions/expulsions and course failure, and have better behavioral outcomes than students in the comparison group.

Tags: program-evaluation, school-age-children, school-attendance
Organization: Department of Justice
Youth Violence and Victimization: Predicting Responses to Peer Aggression, South Carolina, 2017-2018

Youth violence is violence or aggression perpetuated by or targeted against youth and includes many forms such as violent crime, physical violence (e.g., fighting, use of firearms), and the numerous manifestations of bullying (e.g., overt, social/relational, and cyber bullying). New research is needed to enhance our understanding of the factors and processes associated with youth violence. This research focuses on key factors within individuals and multiple contexts that may robustly predict the perpetration and amelioration of violence among youth but that have received scant attention in previous research, especially in concert with each other. Specifically, the factors within individuals the investigators examined include cognition (e.g., attitudes towards retaliation and bystander intervention) and social-emotional adjustment (e.g., rejection sensitivity, affect, aggressive behavior and victimization) while the multiple contexts will include peer (e.g., characteristics and status of peer group, sociometric and perceived popularity), school (e.g., school connectedness, student-teacher relationship), and family contexts (e.g., attachment, family hostility). This dataset seeks to  aid scholars hoping to understand adolescents' attitudes and judgments surrounding peer aggression, with attention both to attitudes surrounding bystander intervention to stop aggression and retaliation when exposed to such aggression. This project is a year-long longitudinal study with 6th graders and 9th graders in order to identify factors related to responses to peer aggression and to examine these relations over time.

Tags: adolescents, aggression, bystander-intervention, violence, youthful-offenders, youths
Organization: Department of Justice
Evaluation of the My Life My Choice (MLMC) Program for Victims of Sex Trafficking, Connecticut, Florida, Massachusetts, and New Jersey, 2015-2018

Commercial sexual exploitation (CSE) is an increasingly urgent problem for criminal justice systems in the United States. Despite the staggering individual and societal consequences of CSE, evidence-based prevention and intervention programs are profoundly lacking. This study used a quasi-experimental, mixed methods, longitudinal follow-up design to evaluate a service provision program for CSE survivors or those identified as high-risk for CSE, My Life My Choice (MLMC). Researchers followed youth who received MLMC services from baseline to multiple follow-up points to see how they progressed over time in terms of building up resistance to being sexually exploited.
Youth received one of two different type of MLMC services. One group (Source 1) received one-on-one survivor mentoring, otherwise known as "tertiary prevention." Participants in this program are paired with mentors who have been trained and free from CSE for at least five years. Mentors provide long-term and consistent emotional support to exploited youth or those MLMC believes are at high-risk for exploitation. The Source 1 youth were recruited only from Massachusetts. They participated in quantitative and qualitative data collection at baseline, six months post-baseline, and 12 months post-baseline.
A second group (Source 2) received 3-10 sessions of a psychoeducational prevention group following the MLMC curriculum, otherwise known as "secondary prevention." These groups are led by trained facilitators and are intended for youth at high-risk for exploitation. Participants are taught about sexual exploitation, healthy relationships, sexual health, and how to find help. Source 2 youth received MLMC services in Massachusetts, Florida, New Jersey, or Connecticut. They participated in quantitative data collection at baseline, time of the last group session, and six months post-baseline.
Measured outcomes included instances of sexual exploitation in the past six months, frequency and type of substance use, partner abuse victimization, and housing stability. Researchers hypothesized that, among the secondary prevention group, youth who chose to interact with MLMC staff more often (in terms of attending educational sessions) would score higher on desired outcomes than those frequently absent or who do not interact with staff as often. Among the tertiary prevention group, researchers hypothesized that those who participated would demonstrate improved outcomes from baseline to six months and baseline to 12 months.

Tags: adolescents, evaluation, exploitation, human-trafficking, sex-trafficking, social-services
Organization: Department of Justice
Understanding and Measuring Bias Victimization Against Latinos, San Diego, CA, Galveston, TX, Houston, TX, Boston, MA, 2018-2019

This study surveyed immigrant and non-immigrant populations residing in high Latino population communities in order to:

Assess the nature and pattern of bias motivated victimization.
Explore the co-occurrence of bias motivated victimization with other forms of victimization.
Measure reporting and help-seeking behaviors of individuals who experience bias motivated victimization.
Identify cultural factors which may contribute to the risk of bias victimization.
Evaluate the effect of bias victimization on negative psychosocial outcomes relative to other forms of victimization.

The study's sample was a community sample of 910 respondents which included male and female Latino adults across three metropolitan areas within the conterminous United States. These respondents completed the survey in one of two ways. One set of respondents completed the survey on a tablet with the help of the research team, while the other group self-administered the survey on their own mobile device. The method used to complete the survey was randomly selected. A third option (paper and pencil with an administrator) was initially included but was removed early in the survey's deployment. The survey was administered from May 2018 to March 2019 in the respondent's preferred language (English or Spanish). 
This collection contains 1,620 variables, and includes derived variables for several scales used in the questionnaire. Bias victimization measures considered both hate crimes (e.g. physical assault) and non-criminal bias events (e.g. racial slurs) and allowed the respondent to report multiple incidents, perpetrators, and types of bias victimization. The respondents were asked about their help-seeking and reporting behaviors for the experience of bias victimization they considered to be the most severe and the measures considered both formal (e.g. contacting the police) and informal (e.g. communicating with family) help-seeking behaviors. The victimization scale measured exposure to traumatic events (e.g. witnessing a murder) as well as experiences of victimization (e.g. physical assault). Acculturation and enculturation scales measured topics such as the respondent's use of Spanish and English and their consumption of media in both languages. The variables pertaining to acculturative stress considered factors such as feelings of social isolation, experiences of racism, and conflict with family members. The variables for mental health outcomes measured symptoms of anger, anxiety, depression, and disassociation.

Tags: discrimination, ethnic-discrimination, hate-crimes, hispanic-or-latino-americans, hispanic-or-latino-origins, immigration-status, prejudice, victimization
Organization: Department of Justice
The Consequences of School Violence: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis, Global, 1990-2016

This project seeks to to provide clear and comprehensive answers to the questions that plague researchers on how school violence impacts future student outcomes. To that end, the principal investigators plan to review, organize, and synthesize extant research on consequences of school violence and aggression for perpetrators and victims by conducting a systematic review and meta-analysis on longitudinal studies of school violence and outcomes. The primary goal of the current study is to conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis of the extant longitudinal research literature on the consequences of school violence.

Tags: aggression, delinquent-behavior, deviance, mental-health, school-age-children, school-violence, victimization, youths
Organization: Department of Justice
Common Operational Picture Technology in Law Enforcement: Three Case Studies, Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Camden County, New Jersey, Chicago, Illinois, 2015-2019

The use of common operational picture (COP) technology can give law enforcement and its public safety response partners the capacity to develop a shared situational awareness to support effective and timely decision-making.
These technologies collate and display information relevant
for situational awareness (e.g., the location and what is known about a crime
incident, the location and operational status of an agency's patrol units, the
duty status of officers).
 CNA conducted a mixed-methods study including a technical review of COP technologies and their capacities and a set of case studies intended to produce narratives of the COP technology adoption process as well as lessons learned and best practices regarding implementation and use of COP technologies.
This study involved four phases over two years: (1) preparation and technology review, (2) qualitative case studies, (3) analysis, and (4) development and dissemination of results. This study produced a market review report describing the results from the technical review, including common technical characteristics and logistical requirements associated with COP technologies and a case study report of law enforcement agencies' adoption and use of COP technologies. This study provides guidance and lessons learned to agencies interested in implementing or revising their use of COP technology. Agencies will be able to identify how they can improve their information sharing and situational awareness capabilities using COP technology, and will be able to refer to the processes used by other, model agencies when undertaking the implementation of COP technology.

Tags: crime, law-enforcement, police-officers, technology, training, violent-crime
Organization: Department of Justice
Reducing Youth Access to Firearms Through the Healthcare Setting, Denver, Colorado, 2018-2019

The purpose of this project was to determine whether the health care setting can be utilized to decrease firearm access for adolescents, including those who are demonstrating a higher risk probability of accessing firearms that would result in harmful consequences. This project evaluated firearm access
screening for youth and parents, means restriction counseling education for
health care providers, the delivery of means restriction counseling to parents by health care providers, the effectiveness of means restriction counseling on parental storage practices, and whether the distribution of firearm storage devices decreased adolescent access to firearms.

Tags: firearms, health-care-services, youths
Organization: Department of Justice
Waiver of Attorney in Juvenile Court, Massachusetts and Virginia, 2014-2018

The goal of this study is to examine age-based differences in knowledge and beliefs regarding the role of counsel, presumptions about counsel, and maturity of judgement when making decisions about whether to waive the right to counsel or the right to trial in a plea context. The study extends existing limited work on age-based differences in knowledge and decision making in several ways that improve ecological validity. The study examines knowledge, beliefs, and decisions among parent-youth pairs from the same family. This sampling strategy more closely approximates the real-life circumstances of waiver of counsel in which knowledge, beliefs, and decisions are nested and tested within family units. The dyadic analysis can offer insight into the challenges and opportunities that face youthful defendants at these critical junctures in case processing. It provides information about whether parents and youth understand these rights and whether assumptions that parents compensate for youths' lack of knowledge is reasonable.

Tags: adolescents, attorneys, juvenile-justice, legal-proceedings
Organization: Department of Justice
Chicago Public Schools "Connect and Redirect to Respect" (CRR) Program, Illinois, 2015-2018

In 2014, Chicago Public Schools, looking to reduce the possibility of gun violence among school-aged youth, applied for a grant through the National Institute of Justice. CPS was awarded the Comprehensive School Safety Initiative grant and use said grant to establish the "Connect and Redirect to Respect" program. This program used student social media data to identify and intervene with students thought to be at higher risk for committing violence. At-risk behaviors included brandishing a weapon, instigating conflict online, signaling gang involvement, and threats towards others. Identified at-risk students would be contacted by a member of the CPS Network Safety Team or the Chicago Police Department's Gang School Safety Team, depending on the risk level of the behavior. To evaluate the efficacy of CRR, the University of Chicago Crime Lab compared outcomes for students enrolled in schools that received the program to outcomes for students enrolled in comparison schools, which did not receive the program. 32 schools were selected for the study, with a total of 44,503 students.
Demographic variables included age, race, sex, and ethnicity. Misconduct and academic variables included arrest history, in-school suspensions, out-of-school suspensions, GPA, and attendance days.

Tags: intervention-strategies, juvenile-gangs, juvenile-victims, school-violence, social-media
Organization: Department of Justice
Development of a Brief Elder Abuse and Neglect Screening Tool for Emergency Medical Services: Detection of Elder Abuse Through Emergency Care Technicians (DETECT), Texas, 2015

In collaboration with Texas Adult Protective Services (APS) and one of the largest mobile healthcare providers in North Texas -- MedStarMobile Healthcare (MedStar) -- this study developed and piloted an elder abuse (EA) screening tool: Detection of Elder Abuse Through Emergency Care Technicians (DETECT). The DETECT tool was designed specifically to help medics identify potential EA among community-dwelling older adults during an emergency response. DETECT relies entirely on the medics' systematic observations of the older adults' physical and social environment -- no direct questioning of the older adult or their caregivers is involved. The DETECT tool was developed through an iterative, user-centered design process in which input was gathered from key stakeholders, and revisions to the tool incorporated their feedback. The intent was for that process to result in an EA screening tool that was easy for medics to use in the field and that helped medics capture information about older adults, their environments, and their caregivers that is thought to be associated with the occurrence of EA.

Tags: elder-abuse, eldercare, emergencies, older-adults, paramedics, social-environment
Organization: Department of Justice
The Criminalization of LGBQ/GNCT Youth, California, 2014

The researchers examined sexual-orientation and gender conformity disparities in criminalization for prostitution. The specific purpose of this study was to  explore the links between family rejection, homelessness, child welfare involvement, and prostitution charges for youth in the justice system.

Tags: gender-identity, homosexuality, juvenile-crime, juvenile-detention, juveniles
Organization: Department of Justice
Wisconsin School Violence and Bullying Prevention Study, 2015-2017

 The Wisconsin School Violence and Bullying Prevention Study sought to understand the impact of comprehensive bullying prevention programs on outcomes related to violence, safety, and bullying rates. This study focused on 24 middle schools (grades 6 to 8) in Wisconsin.
 To examine the effectiveness of the school's current anti-bullying program, the Bullying Prevention Program Assessment tool (BPPAT) was completed at the end of the school year. The BPPAT focused on administrative policy and procedures geared towards students, faculty, parents, or administrators. This tool examined the following items: policy and procedures, program implementation, staff training, parental education and communication, student training, reporting systems, and continuous quality improvement (CQI). Students and faculty were given surveys to determine bullying rates and perceptions of school safety. The school safety survey was given to all students concerning their bullying victimization and perception of school safety. This survey contains the following demographic variables: age, sex, grade, and race. The verified bullying incident data contains incident reporting from faculty, which focused on the type of bullying and the demographics of the perpetrator and victim. After new bullying prevention programs were implemented, students were given the safety and bullying victimization survey which focused on perceptions of bullying and school safety.
 The number of bullying incidents, number of student victims and perpetrators, and the demographic characteristics of victims and perpetrators were retained in aggregate form for each school were submitted to the Department of Public Instruction (DPI) for analysis.

Tags: abuse, bullying, educational-environment, educational-policy, middle-schools, program-evaluation, school-age-children, school-security, training, victimization
Organization: Department of Justice
Measuring Success in Focused Deterrence Through an Effective Researcher-Practitioner Partnership, Philadelphia, PA, 2003-2015

In the fall of 2013, Temple University's Department
of Criminal Justice was awarded a research grant by the National Institute of Justice
to evaluate Philadelphia's Focused Deterrence (FD) strategy.  The study was designed to provide a comprehensive, objective
review of FD and to determine if the law enforcement partnership accomplished
what it set out to accomplish. The findings from this study highlight
the key results from the impact evaluation that assessed whether gun violence
saw a statistically significant decline that could be attributed to FD. The
impact evaluation focused on area-level reductions in shootings. The evaluation uses victim and
incident data from 2003 through March 2015 received from Philadelphia Police Department. The post-FD
period of examination consists of the first 24 months after the implementation
of FD (April 2013 through March 2015).

Tags: program-evaluation, violent-crime
Organization: Department of Justice
School Emergency Preparedness Study, United States, 2018

The School Emergency Preparedness Study, United States, 2018, was conducted to
better understand the state of knowledge concerning violent emergency preparedness in schools and the interrelationship between federal, state, district, and school
perspectives on safety planning. RTI International conducted a two-year study
in four phases. In Phase I, the project team reviewed federal and state
guidelines and mandates for school safety planning. In Phases II and III, a survey was administered to district safety and security directors and superintendents, then the team reviewed guidelines and mandates for a subset of districts. In Phase IV, interviews were conducted with administrators from 37 schools and results were analyzed from all four phases.

Tags: emergency-preparedness, school-readiness, school-violence, schools
Organization: Department of Justice
Ethnocultural Influences on Women's Experiences of and Responses to Intimate Partner Violence, Los Angeles and Orange Counties, California, United States, 2014-2017

Research about ethnocultural influences on women's
experience of and response to intimate partner violence (IPV) is scarce,
contributing to culturally incongruent processes that may deter some survivors
from engaging with community systems. To
fill this gap in the literature, this project examined the ways that cultural
beliefs and contexts serve as a lens through which European-American,
Mexican-American, Korean-American, and Vietnamese-American women experience and
respond to IPV in their lives.
Community-based recruitment techniques were used to recruit female
survivors of intimate partner violence from the four target ethnic groups. Data collection included qualitative
interviews (n = 112) and online surveys (n = 193) with survivors of intimate
partner violence as well as focus groups with service providers (n = 37). While there were many shared experiences
across survivors from the four ethnic groups, important differences in
survivors' interpretation of abuse, strategies for managing the abuse, and
help-seeking experiences did emerge.
These differences have important implications for the development of
culturally competent prevention and intervention strategies for survivors from
different ethnic groups.
This collection only contains the online survey data. The focus group and individual interview data will be released at a future date.

Tags: cultural-identity, domestic-violence, ethnic-groups, family-violence, intimate-partner-violence, spouse-abuse, victim-services
Organization: Department of Justice