Cross-Site Evaluation of Project LAUNCH: Evaluation Design

Publication Date: August 15, 2012
Current as of:

Introduction

Project LAUNCH (Linking Actions for Unmet Needs in Children’s Health) is a Federal grant program administered by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to promote the wellness of young children ages birth to 8 years of age. Project LAUNCH grantees will participate in a Cross-Site Evaluation (CSE), which will synthesize findings across all grantees to assess the overall performance of Project LAUNCH. The CSE will analyze system and program processes and outcomes for the initiative overall. Through an Intra-Agency Agreement with SAMHSA, oversight of the CSE is provided by the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation (OPRE) within the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Abt Associates Inc. has been contracted to develop and implement the CSE, collaboratively with Project LAUNCH grantees, their grantee-specific evaluators, ACF and SAMHSA.

The information collected through the CSE is of importance to the public health and behavioral health fields in advancing knowledge about comprehensive community-wide approaches to improving child health and development. The CSE will provide information and lessons learned about how coordinated service strategies and system-building activities can be designed to improve the physical, emotional, social, cognitive, and behavioral aspects of health and well-being for children and families.

This report presents an overview of the CSE. Following a brief description of Project LAUNCH, the document describes the research questions, data collection activities, analysis framework and dissemination plan for the CSE.