Projects

An Assessment of Philadelphia's Crisis Nurseries

CAPD was selected to evaluate Philadelphia’s Crisis Nursery Centers. The sponsor agency, Youth Services Incorporated, has undertaken a two-year effort to institutionalize its crisis nursery program as an ongoing part of the Philadelphia child welfare system. The evaluation will assess benefits to children and families, as well as to the larger service community, of the nursery model. Specifically, our evaluation approach will include: describing how the nurseries operate including who participates and how. This work will be based upon the modification of existing forms, development of new forms, and use of case records/MIS to track participant groups, their system history/use, participation patterns, and service use; measuring changes in child and family conditions and behaviors between the time clients first encounter the crisis nursery program and several months in the future after they have received program services. Existing and modified tracking forms, as well as client and staff interviews will be used to collect data; analyzing to what extent the crisis nurseries represent a piece of the child and family safety-net in the community. We will develop and conduct structured interviews with provider partners and others groups who are part of the continuum of care but do not link with crisis nurseries; and assessing what evidence in support of crisis nurseries key stakeholders would find compelling. This work will involve interviewing key child welfare policy-makers, providers, and funders or potential funders.