The document describes the Mentoring Gang-Involved Youth Project by Roca, Inc., which aims to reduce incarceration rates and improve employment prospects for young male adults aged 17-24 with substance abuse issues. The project employs a combination of needs assessment and summative evaluations to track participant progress and guide interventions, utilizing data on risk factors related to incarceration and employment disconnect. Additionally, the report indicates the project's success and potential for continued funding and implementation, demonstrating the effective use of data in informing policy and programmatic decisions.

1. Introduction Ideally, program and/or policy
interventions must seek to address an identified challenge/gap
in a given sector/segment of society (McDavid & Hawthorn,
2013). To enable stakeholders make informed decisions on what
program/policy choices to make there is the need for
information and such information can be gathered through a
process known as evaluation – the outcome of an evaluation
process creates/provides information and this information
influences policy choices and/or programmatic interventions
(McDavid & Hawthorn, 2013). In this post, I briefly describe
the Mentoring Gang Involved-Youth Project with is being
implemented by Roca Inc, a Massachusetts-based nonprofit
working with young male adults from Boston, Chelsea, and
Springfield Massachusetts. I also explain the type of evaluation
employed in evaluating the Project and the kind of data used for
the evaluation and I indicate whether comparisons were used.
Description of the project According to the Justice Center:
Council of State Governments (2012), the Mentoring-gang
Involved-Youth Project, targets young male adults between the
ages of 17 and 24 who are suffering from substance abuse and
are in detention. The primary objective of the Project is to
reduce incarceration rates and enhance the ability of
participants to retain employment (Roca, 2016). Under the
Project, it is recognized that participants lack healthy
relationships that will help them say away from criminal and/or
antisocial behavior hence under the program three types of
mentoring support are offered (Justice Center: Council of State
Governments, 2012). The Justice Center: Council of State
Governments (2012) informs its readers that mentoring support,
under the Project, extends to supporting participants get jobs
and remain employed. The project proceeds under the
philosophy that keeping participants occurred by positive
activities steers them away from antisocial criminal behavior
(Justice Center: Council of State Governments, 2012). Some of
the mentors under the Project have served jail time and

2. successfully reintegrated into the community and are deemed to
be role models hence using them to mentor participants is seen
as offering participants with real life examples of persons who
were just like them and have managed to emancipate themselves
from the hands of criminal/antisocial conduct and are living
better lives. Cognitive-restructuring is the objective of the
Project and it seeks to achieve this through skills development
and behavioral change for/of participants (Roca, 2016). Where
this Project successfully restructures the cognitive behavior of
participants and they acquire skills and get employment, their
economic situation will change and this will translate into
economic development. According to Roca (2016) the Project
runs for four years - the first two years focus on inculcating into
participants behavioral change whilst the remaining period
focuses on sustaining the positive change in behavior that the
first 2 years have engendered in the participant. To track the
performance of the Project, the Project has an evaluation
mechanism built into it (Roca, 2016). Explanation of the type
of evaluation employed in the case I am of the opinion
that, the Project used both needs assessment and summative
evaluation. McDavid & Hawthorn (2013) posit that the process
of identifying gaps and hence gathering evidence, to inform
policy or programmatic choices by decision makers is referred
to, as needs assessment. It is evident from page 3 of Roca’s
2016 report on the Project that an assessment tool is used by
Roca to identify participants’ risk factors and this informs the
tailoring of interventions to assist them. As previously noted,
the Project also used a summative evaluation. McDavid &
Hawthorn (2013) relying on a definition provided by Scriven
(1996) assert that summative evaluation has one principal goal
i.e. to ascertain whether the project has met its objectives. It
therefore occurs during the post implementation phase of the
project (Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation. 2010). A
close review of Roca’s 2016 report on the Project leaves one in
no doubt that the report does not only demonstrate that is has
met is objective but it also effectively sets the stage for

3. decision making by Roca to continue implementing the project.
Importantly, the content of the report would potentially attract
funding for further implementation of the Project. Furthermore,
the Project’s report states that the Project has data tracking and
performance management mechanisms/processes built into it
(Roca, 2016) – this is further demonstration that a summative
evaluation is used for the Project’s evaluation. Describe the
type of data used As earlier noted, data used for the
Project and its report were gathered through a needs assessment
process and a summative evaluation. According to Roca (2016)
it used its assessment tool to identify the factors that make
participants prone to “long term incarcerations and
disconnection from employment/education” (p.3) - these factors
include behavior that increase the likelihood of incarceration,
present and past involvement in criminal conduct, level of
education and employment history – these are what is used to
generate data for policy making and programming. Whether
comparisons were employed Yes, comparisons were
employed. For instance on page 1 of Roca’s 2016 report on the
Project under discussion, reference is make to the number of
participants in the Project in comparison to the previous fiscal
year. There is also data that evidences the number of
participants coming from each of the geographical areas covered
by the Project. Conclusion From the foregoing, it is
evident that data is a condition precedent for formulating,
implementing and reporting on every project. To generate this
data, an evaluation of the project and/or a needs assessment
have to be conducted. I am of the view that how the data is
generated and the nature of the data generated are as important
as the accuracy of the data generated. Reference Justice
Center: The Council of State Governments. (2012). Mentoring
gang-involved youth: How Roca, Inc. combines mentoring and
services in a high-risk intervention model. Retrieved from
http://csgjusticecenter.org/nrrc/posts/mentoring-gang-involved-
youth-how-roca-inc-combines-mentoring-and-services-in-a-
high-risk-intervention-model/ McDavid, J. C., Huse, I., &

4. Hawthorn, L. R. L. (2013). Program evaluation and
performance measurement: An introduction to practice (2nd
ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Office of Planning, Research
and Evaluation. (2010). The program manager’s guide to
evaluation (2nd ed.). Washington, DC: Author. Retrieved from
https://class.waldenu.edu/webapps/blackboard/content/listConte
nt.jsp?course_id=_16304483_1&content_id=_42992485_1 Roca
(2016), Roca’s high risk young men fiscal year 2016
performance benchmark and outcomes report. Retrieved from
http://rocainc.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/fy16-young-men-
outcomes-report.pdf