Project HOPE: Altering Risk and Protective Factors Among High Risk Hispanic Youth and Their Families

Latino youth in urban centers, and more specifically those in families dealing with the challenges of recent immigration to the United States, have special sources of risk for substance abuse and related problems. Project HOPE focused on such a group: Latino seventh and eighth graders in English as a Second Language (ESL) classes at middle school sites with particularly high concentrations of Latino youth. The overriding goals of the project were: (a) to increase protective factors at the individual, family and school level that are likely to lead to reduced abuse of alcohol and other drugs; and (2) to produce actual reductions in rates of use of alcohol, cigarettes, and marijuana. This report describes the results from the third year of this project. With a general risk-protective model as the starting point, several areas of importance were identified for work with this population: (a) the centrality of the family to Latino youth; (b) the importance of cultural identification during times of rapid acculturation; (c) the need to support families in investing in the school institutions influencing their children's lives and (d) increasing the responsiveness of the school institutions to a culturally different population for which they may not be fully prepared. The result was the implementation of a multi-component intervention that addressed change at youth, family and school levels. The youth component engaged youth through three interventions: (a) a school-based prevention curriculum (12 sessions) that focused on substance abuse and on career development; (b) a peer leadership program that focused on building a positive peer culture for Latino youth through a focus on both individual development and team-building in retreats and after-school activities; and (c) a counseling, referral, and advocacy effort that provided counseling and tutoring sessions by bilingual/bicultural Student Relations Specialists (one at each site). These counselors acted as advocates for the students, and mediated with teachers and parents in order to promote school bonding. The parent component engaged the parents of these youth in two ways: (a) a parenting skills workshop (9 sessions) focused on traditional parenting skills content; and (b) an advocacy skills training component that used home visits and workshops to increase parents' ability to be advocates for their children with the school system. A school intervention aimed at increasing teachers' and administrators' sensitivities to Latino needs was planned but not implemented at the time of the report. The design of the evaluation was quasi-experimental, making use of several kinds of comparisons to strengthen causal inferences in a situation where a conventional comparison group was not feasible. Several important results emerged among the 82 youth from whom we were able to collect pre and post data. In terms of the risk/protective factors seen as intermediate outcomes, feelings of Meaninglessness in Life were reduced significantly in the total sample, and perceptions of the school climate became significantly more positive among eighth graders. In terms of ultimate outcomes, 30 day prevalence of alcohol use was reduced by 42% (p < .07). Dose-response analyses indicated that higher levels of program participation were associated with increased levels of cultural pride (p < .02) and greater school attendance (p < .08). Among the 18 Parents for whom we had pre-post data, there were significant increases in self-reported levels of school contact (p < .001), but also significant decreases in perceived parenting skills (p < .04). Project participation may have led parents to a more honest appraisal of their skills. Perhaps more striking is anecdotal evidence that Latino parents have become the most active participants in PTO activities in the two target schools in the HOPE project. In terms of implications, we conclude that a culturally appropriate multi-component intervention can bring about measurable reduction in alcohol use among high risk Latino Youth. Development of culturally appropriate materials and implementation by a culturally sensitive staff (predominantly Latino and from the same origin cultures as the target population) are valuable aspects of interventions for this target group. Building a positive peer culture, addressing cultural identification, and engaging parents to be more invested in and less intimidated by school institutions seem particularly important mediating factors for this population.