OJJDP News @ a Glance September 2024 | Case Management and Crisis Intervention Help Reduce Violence at a Philadelphia High School | Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention

Photo of John Bartram High School — Bartram High School in Southwest Philadelphia (Photo courtesy of the School District of Philadelphia)

After just 1 year, a school-based program to reduce youth violence is already producing results in a Southwest Philadelphia neighborhood. Students at John Bartram High School have experienced a significant drop in gun violence victimization—both inside the school and in the community surrounding it.

The School District of Philadelphia is leading the Youth Violence Reduction Initiative, which began in the spring of 2023 and is funded under OJJDP’s Enhancing School Capacity To Address Youth Violence solicitation. The school district is partnering with the Penn Community Violence Prevention Program to provide crisis intervention, violence interruption, de-escalation, and mediation services to youth living in the area surrounding Bartram. The initiative provides intensive case management services to 30 students at Bartram and to children at risk for violence who attend the elementary and middle schools that feed Bartram.

Program Implements OJJDP’s Comprehensive Gang Model

The Youth Violence Reduction Initiative at John Bartram High School follows the core strategies of OJJDP’s Comprehensive Gang Model, with alterations to accommodate a school setting. Implementing the model at a school gives participants access to project staff throughout the school day, Dr. Blasko notes. Building relationships with students and establishing trust are critical to preventing violent incidents from happening in the first place. For example, program staff recently learned about a conflict between two students; one had plans to shoot the other, Ms. Johnson says. A staff member intervened, reminding the two students about the lifelong repercussions each could suffer by resorting to gun violence. The students ultimately dropped their dispute.

The initiative is helping to reverse an increase in gun violence and homicides seen at the school in recent years, says Brandy Blasko, who directs all research in the school district’s Office of School Safety. From the beginning of the 2020–21 school year through the end of the 2023–24 school year, 15 Bartram students were shot and 4 died, Dr. Blasko says. Since the initiative’s start, Bartram has seen an 80-percent decrease in firearm assaults by students, a 62-percent drop in school incidents involving police, and a 64-percent reduction in gun violence within one-half mile of the school.

Services available in Bartram or through the school district include counseling, mentoring, and academic support. Community partners provide services such as healthcare, substance use treatment, and employment assistance. Additional services—such as housing and legal support—are available from outside organizations. Initiative staff also participate in local events and offer assistance to help the community recover from violent incidents.

“The goal is to provide anything that will help you transition to a positive lifestyle,” says Denise Johnson, Community Violence Prevention Manager for the Penn program.

A multidisciplinary team of school personnel and community partners meets weekly to discuss prevention and intervention strategies for individual students and to address any serious incidents of violence. The team’s ability to customize support to a student’s unique needs is one key to the program’s success, Ms. Johnson and Dr. Blasko say. The initiative’s safety team—which includes staff from the Office of School Safety, the Philadelphia Police Department, and the Juvenile Probation Department—meets monthly. School and program leaders attend the safety meetings, where they discuss neighborhood activities, individual cases, and strategies to suppress violence.

The initiative also aims to improve participants’ academic achievement. In one case, a 17-year-old student faced placement in a juvenile detention center for carrying a gun. He was granted probation on one condition: that he work for the program. The program hired him, and the student worked to support its outreach efforts. He completed probation—and he also graduated from Bartram, an outcome that would have been unlikely if he had been incarcerated, Dr. Blasko says.

Resources:

OJJDP’s National Gang Center offers resources to help schools and communities implement the Comprehensive Gang Model, including videos, webinars, and a Strategic Planning Tool to develop strategies for working with gangs.

Read about another project supported by OJJDP’s Enhancing School Capacity To Address Youth Violence initiative in the August 2024 issue of OJJDP News @ a Glance.

Date Created: July 26, 2024