The Positive Education Program (PEP), Cuyahoga County, Ohio


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Since 1971, the Positive Education Program (PEP), a contract agency of the Cuyahoga County Community Mental Health Board operated under the auspices of the county board of education, has striven to serve the greater Cleveland community by providing integrated services to children and adolescents with significant social, emotional, and behavioral problems.

Annually, PEP serves over 1,400 children and youth from all 31 districts in the Cleveland metropolitan area. Through a collaborative, ecological approach, PEP has sought to enhance the strengths, reduce the discordance, and build the skills of Ohio’s children and families. PEP currently operates many projects throughout the Cleveland area, including the Transition from School to Work (TSW) program and Connections, a case management service.

Transition from School to Work (TSW)

The TSW program provides integrated employment and related support services to adolescents who are enrolled in PEP that would benefit from vocational training and job coaching. The approach of this treatment program is family-centered, involving program participants, their families, and adult service providers. All services are provided promptly and conveniently to the client; these services include:

Comprehensive vocational evaluation;

Employment planning services;

Employee development services;

Community employment services; and,

Job coaching.

TSW helps youth to realize their vocational potential, develop a sense of independence, increase self-esteem and promote active and positive functioning in the community.

Outcomes

By the end of the fiscal year 1997, during which 127 youth received vocational preparation and job coaching:

47 percent of clients maintained employment 60 continuous days with an average length of job retention of 80 days (exceeding the national average for teenagers);

30 percent of clients maintained employment 90 continuous days at an average wage of $5.10 per hour, working an average of 16 hours per week;

Connections Case Management Services

As a cooperative between the Positive Education Program and child-serving systems throughout Ohio’s Cuyahoga county, Connections is designed to provide intensive mental health case management services to youth experiencing serious emotional disturbances. In 1997, all of the 592 youth who entered the program where involved in multiple systems and were in danger of being removed from the home. In 1995, over 35 percent of the children entering the program were diagnosed with impulse control and disruptive behavior disorders, and another 25 percent with mood disorders.

Connections also helps emotionally disturbed delinquents; in 1995, 37 percent were involved with Juvenile Court at the time of entry into the program. Clients of Connections must be involved with one of the county’s child-caring systems; such as, the Department of Children and Family Services, Juvenile Court, the Board of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities, the Department of Youth Services, or the Alcohol and Drug Addiction Services Board.

Focusing on the "most in need" students in the county, Connections places full-time mental health professionals in the public schools and throughout the community to work with at-risk students to prevent future out-of-home placements. The majority of the students in the program are in school. Of the 517 youth served in 1995, 77 percent were maintained in their own homes or desirable home alternatives. Clients are being served well and effectively. Also in 1995, 19.3 percent of the youth terminated their services, with an average length of service being 722 days.

Case managers, with the help of representatives from other areas of a child’s ecology, such as teachers and community contacts, develop a consultation-driven, strengths-based, individualized service plan for each child, in order to meet his/her specific needs and goals. Family assistance is often provided by PEP aides who are all parents of children with serious emotional disorders, and who have been helped by PEP’s Early Intervention Program. Efforts and services are then coordinated in order to achieve the best possible chance at attaining a positive change in the life of the child.

Outcomes

In 1997, 54.6 percent of youth leaving the program were discharged as having met all their goals or with a referral to another agency sufficient to meeting their goals.

Of the 100 children discharged in 1995, 67 percent had met the goals set for their living arrangements.

At termination of services for 168 children in 1997, 77.4 percent were living in families or in independent living, 4.2 percent were in group homes, 13.1 percent went to more restrictive settings, and 5.4 percent were moved to unknown settings.

The greatest improvement in youth most often occurs in the following presented problem areas: cult involvement, eating disorders, suicide gestures and attempts, firesetting, and neglect.

Other programs supported by PEP include:

Two group homes for adolescent boys returning to the community from psychiatric and juvenile facilities, and

A consultation service to community day care centers.

Achieving Goals

The Positive Education Program seeks to continue to fulfill its mission to help children experiencing serious social, emotional, and behavioral problems and their families, by empowering them to improve the quality of their lives, to function as independently as possible and to avoid destructive outcomes which limit their potential.

To Contact Information for the PEP Program

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