The Kansas Communities That Care Survey

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The Kansas Communities That Care Survey

• Survey Development

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Development History

• Six State Consortium with SDRG
• First funding from the U.S. Department of Health
  and Human Services through Center for Substance
  Abuse Prevention (CSAP)

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Survey Development Goals

• Self-report instrument appropriate for
  adolescents ranging from 11 to 18 years old
• Cost-effective measurement of a range of
  research-derived risk protective factors and
  problem behaviors
• Provide data on the epidemiology of risk
  protective factors among community youth

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Survey Development Goals

• Help focus prevention interventions on geographic
  areas or subpopulations experiencing the highest
  levels of risk lowest level of protection for
  later health behavior problems
• Provide data to identify which risk protective
  factors are elevated or depressed

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Survey Development Goals

• Allow analysis of the co-occurrence and
  correlates of multiple risk and protective
  factors in different youth populations.
• Assess a broad set of risk protective factors
  that have been identified by longitudinal
  research across domains
• Administered in a school setting in one class
  period (approx. 50 minutes)

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Survey Instrument

• Measures Risk Protective Factors Predictive of
  Substance Use
• Delinquency
• Problem Behaviors
• Gang Involvement
• Frequency of Substance Use
• Frequency of Antisocial Behaviors

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Research Foundation

• Longitudinal Studies have indicated risk
  protective factors that are predictive of
  adolescent drug use, delinquency, violence and
  school dropout

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Definitions

• Reliability
• does the score closely match the true score (lack
  of error)?
• when given multiple times is the same score
  achieved?
• Validity-
• does the survey measure what it claims to measure?

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Publication

• Publication in Peer Reviewed Journal in December
  of 2002
• Survey Development
• Reliability
• Validity

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Findings

• Reliability across all scales is good
• Risk Protective Factors are correlated with
  problem behaviors (validity)
• Is reliable across gender and age (later shown to
  be so across race ethnicity)
• Variability among factor means across grade
  levels reflects the developmental difference in
  exposure to risk
• Scales tap meaningful components of risk
  protection at both school and individual levels

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NCLB Title IV Implications

• Meets requirements of the Principles of
  Effectiveness in No Child Left Behind Title IV
• Scientifically based
• Established set of performance measures
• Provides objective data regarding incidence of
  violence and illegal drug use

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Comparison Data

• Items measuring substance abuse were adopted from
  the Monitoring The Future survey.
• Items measuring delinquency and violence were
  adopted from the National Youth Survey