Carolina Children's Initiative -
Pitt County (CCI-PC)

This social intervention was a collaborative effort between the Jordan Institute for Families (JIF) at the School of Social Work at UNC-Chapel Hill and the Save Our Sisters and Sons Program (SOS) at Cornerstone Missionary Baptist Church in Greenville, North Carolina. Its goal was to reduce anti-social aggressive behavior in young school aged children. Its focus was children at risk for oppositional and/or disruptive behavior, peer rejection, and academic failure. Using two curricula developed by the JIF, their staff trained local service providers and assessed the effectiveness of intervention services.

Fiscally, the program was funded through the Governor’s Crime Commission with it beginning in 1998. The Program Director was Virginia Gaynor, a local School Psychologist. Pitt County and more specifically, the Pitt County Sheriff Department agreed to be the local implementing agency.

Programmatically, CCI-PC provided cognitive and behavioral-based counseling interventions to at-risk and non at-risk students and their parents from the a prescribed curricula designed by staff from the Jordan Institute for Families called Making Choices and Strong Families. Students ages 6 -11 participated in the program from two inner city elementary schools in Pitt County: South Greenville and Sadie Saulter.

Additionally, program features included an in-school component which provided after school services provided twice a week and the parenting skills training component that occurred with parents in their homes or at the school.

Baseline (pre-test) and post test data was collected throughout the tenure of the project to help assess the therapeutic effectiveness of the program. Research technical oversight was provided by staff from UNC-Chapel Hill, Social Work Division of the Jordan Institute for Families.

Results of the program indicated positive therapeutic gains for parents and students with significant reductions in antisocial behaviors among students and improved parenting skills with parents. Research results are published with Jordan Institute for Families.

The program tenure was four years and ended due to the lack of fiscal funding sources.