CD-45098
Adoption awareness : evaluation of a national level training program for pregnancy counselors.
Children and Youth Research Services.
Grantee Final Report
[332] p.
Copyright
Published: 2005
Available from: Trafford Publishing
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This final report discusses the activities and outcomes of a federally funded project designed to train health system personnel to discuss adoption as an option to pregnant clients on an equal basis with parenting and abortion. The project implemented a nationwide Adoption Awareness Training Program using a train-the-trainer model. The project resulted in the training of 190 adoption practitioners at seven geographical sites to be Master-Trainers. Over a 3-year period, more than 13,000 adoption specialists and adoption liaison personnel received Adoption Awareness training. An Inter-University Evaluation Panel was used to develop quasi-experimental group designs as a basis for evaluating training effectiveness. Using a cohort-control model, a series of comparative group assessments aimed at testing training effects were conducted. Results indicate the Adoption Awareness training was highly beneficial and that statistically significant gains were recorded in each of the more than 900 training sites. Specifically, participants increased their ability to communicate adoption and to respond to client questions by more than 50%, trainees reported significant benefits from Adoption Awareness workshops, and follow-up analyses indicate increased efforts to communicate and expand adoption awareness. The report provides information on the need for adoption awareness in pregnancy counseling, the Adoption Awareness Act, the anti-adoption bias in hospital facilities, components of the Adoption Awareness Training Program, issues in communicating adoption, the evaluation plan, characteristics of programs and trainees, and program effectiveness. The report also provides information and exercises on skill building in non-directive counseling and facilitating counselor awareness of non-directive counseling. A CD-ROM of the report is also included. 20 references.
Keywords:
pregnancy; adoption awareness; training; evaluation