Juvenile Rehabilitation Integrated Treatment Model. Legislative Report

Juvenile Rehabilitation (JR) became part of Washington State's Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF) on July 1, 2019. JR serves the state's highest-risk youth who have been charged with a qualifying offense and either adjudicated in a county's juvenile court or convicted in an adult criminal court. In 2000, JR needed to further define and specify the appropriate interventions with both the individual youth in residential care and subsequently in families as the youth returned to their home communities. JR formed the Integrated Treatment Model (ITM) Workgroup, charged with the task of developing a research-based treatment model that utilized cognitive-behavioral principles. The model was to be tailored for use in both residential and community settings in the juvenile justice continuum of care. This model views all behavior, including a youth's criminal behavior as occurring in a larger social and historical context, serving a specific function. As such, criminal behavior is a product of one's learning history, encompassing family dynamics, specific circumstances and thoughts and feelings. In 2019, the Washington State Legislature allocated funds for a fidelity assessment of the ITM in DCYF's Juvenile Rehabilitation. To accomplish this task, the DCYF Office of Innovation, Alignment and Accountability (OIAA) collaborated with external experts to assess the current implementation fidelity of the treatment areas in the ITM. This report presents first the findings that apply to the ITM as a whole, and then summarizes the area-specific findings.