American Institutes for Research is partnering with the YMCA of San Francisco's Reach and Rise® program to test whether pairing research-informed cognitive behavioral treatment practices with mentoring programming could yield targeted benefits to high-risk youth. Reach and Rise® is a national initiative that prepares adult mentors to assume paraprofessional therapeutic roles with youth at increased risk for delinquency and who live or attend school in poor communities. The study will examine the extent to which cognitive behavioral treatment enhancements to the Reach and Rise mentoring model can impact the lives of high-risk youth. The enhancements include pre-match training modules for mentors on cognitive behavioral treatment techniques, strategies for augmenting the youth's growth (i.e., case management plan), mentor-supported targeted "check-in" tools, and a cognitive behavioral treatment parent education and support component.

This project is funded through the OJJDP FY 2016 Practitioner-Researcher Partnership in Cognitive Behavioral Mentoring Program, which supported a partnership between a practitioner in the development and implementation of a mentoring program enhanced with cognitive behavioral treatment and a research partner to conduct a rigorous impact and process evaluation.

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