EScore
EScore (Electronic Service Coordination, Outcomes, Research and Evaluation) is a statewide initiative that will introduce a web-based technology platform that will provide key stakeholders at local, regional, and state levels the ability to gain access to data related to census tracking, service coordination activities, and outcomes associated with those efforts.

Click here to go to EScore

Global Risk Assessment Device (GRAD)
The development of an instrument known as the Global Risk Assessment Device (GRAD) was initiated in order to assist juvenile justice professionals in making recommendations and referrals that are based on reliable and valid information about risk factors in a wide variety of relevant domains, including: prior offenses, family and parenting issues, peer relationships, substance abuse, mental health symptoms, accountability, education and vocational issues, traumatic events, and health-related risks.

The Successful Students Strong Families Program
A family-based program to enhance school attendance and participation in learning. Today’s students face multi-fold challenges that can result in poor school attendance, educational neglect, and truancy. Buffering students from these effects is a priority for Franklin County courts, educators, and families. The Successful Students Strong Families Program, jointly created and implemented by COSI and The Ohio State University Center for Family Research (CFR), was developed to address this need. The program strengthens relationships between parents, students, schools, and communities with the goal of improving school attendance, participation, and family involvement in education.  Designed for families at risk of court involvement for truancy and educational neglect, the program provides family-focused activities that strengthen relationships within the family while building a sense of belonging and responsibility to a larger community. Together parents and students define and identify success in the context of their family. Through COSI activities and sound parenting curriculum, they practice making success happen. All families completing the program will receive a one-year membership to COSI where they can enjoy and hone their new skills.
Click Here to see a recent newspaper article on S3F

The Miracle Gro-Capital Scholars Program
The Miracle Gro-Capital Scholars program, a collaboration between COSI and the Scotts Miracle Gro corporation, involves comprehensive, multi-year, out-of-school and in-school scholarly support for 50 college-bound students. CFR’s evaluation of the project provides the program with both accountability and quality improvement information.  In keeping with CFR’s interest in developing a framework for creating and using Self-Determination Theory-driven logic models, the evaluation measures progress toward internalized motivation for and attainment of the program’s objectives in four areas: academic achievement, career readiness, self efficacy, and social responsibility. MGCS staff receive biannual reports which they use to individually and collectively plan strategies and activities for program participants. By monitoring program effect on students’ internalized motivations, the evaluation also includes indicators of unintended program consequences. In addition, it generates information about how program staff, student family members, and student mentors are supporting student motivation. Staff uses monthly and bi-annual reports to create individualized and overall program plans. A semi-annual rapid-cycle quality improvement process, whereby staff uses the data to set short-term objectives, helps to ensure the evaluation’s utility.  This project is one of the many examples of CFR's collaborations with COSI. To Learn more about Miracle Gro Capital Scholars please go to the links below.

http://www.cosi.org/educators/afterschool/

Parent Advocacy
The Center for Family Research (CFR) was awarded a research grant from the Ohio Department of Mental Health Office of Program Evaluation and Research in order to lay the groundwork for better understanding of how parent advocacy matters in outcomes for youth and the empowerment of family caregivers whose children and adolescents are receiving treatment for behavioral health care issues. The CFR is working with NAMI Ohio on this project to conduct a systematic examination of the process by which families are (or are not) linked to parent advocates, as well as systematically documenting the actions and services provided by these advocates on behalf of the families with whom they are working. CFR will also be working with Family and Children First representatives in two Ohio Counties (Butler and Franklin) in order to conduct this year-long research. The CFR team is focusing on both the qualitative and quantitative nature of parent advocacy efforts and their association with child and adolescent well-being indicators.

The main objectives of this research are:
Objective 1: To explore potential differences in the characteristics of those families that used PA services in comparison to those families that did not use these services.
Objective 2: To examine the degree to which parent advocacy efforts lead to increases in family empowerment and improvement in youth well- being.
Objective 3: To document current advocacy services (as both types and amounts) and advocate characteristics (experience level, prior training, etc.), with the longer-term goal of developing an advocacy services checklist that will provide greater assistance in tracking these efforts and their impact.
Objective 4: To examine the procedures in place by which families are offered (or are not offered) advocacy services, to document how often families take advantage of advocacy services when they are offered, and record the reasons why families choose not to utilize the services of parent advocates.