Delinquency Prevention through Targeted Outreach Mentoring (DPTTOM) Program

The Second Chance Act (P.L. 110-199) authorizes grants to government agencies and nonprofit groups to provide employment assistance, substance abuse treatment, housing, family programming, mentoring, victims' support, and other services to help adult and juvenile ex-offenders make a successful transition from incarceration to the community. In support of this goal, OJJDP will provide grants to support mentoring and other transitional services essential to reintegrating juvenile offenders into their communities. The grants will be used to mentor juvenile offenders during confinement, through transition back to the community, and post-release; to provide transitional services to assist them in their reintegration into the community; and to support training in offender and victims issues. Targeted youth must be younger than 18 years old. The initiative's legislative authority is found in the Department of Justice Appropriations Act, 2010 (Pub. L. 111-117).

The Boys & Girls Clubs of the Tennessee Valley seeks funding for the Delinquency Prevention through Targeted Outreach Mentoring (DPTTOM) Program to serve 50 juvenile offenders, ages 11 to 17, who have been detained at the Richard L. Bean (RLB) Juvenile Detention Center in Knoxville or Knox County, Tennessee. The DPTTOM programs purpose is to have Boys & Girls Club program staff provide programming and build mentoring relationships with juvenile offenders within the RLB Juvenile Detention Center and to continue the mentoring relationship and provide support services once they are released from detention in support their successful and transition back into their communities. The DPTTOM model consists of three major components. First, is assessment, mentorship, and youth development programming for juvenile offenders while detained within the RLB Juvenile Detention Center. Next is evidenced-based skill building programs, and lastly, intensive mentoring, aftercare, case management, and support services to youth once released. DPTTOM participants will increase social competency skills while also being less likely to return to juvenile detention. Outcomes will be measured by a third-party evaluator, the Institute on Research and Evaluation.

CA/NCF