Replication of Recovery and Reunification Interventions for Families (R3-Impact): Evaluation of the Parent Mentor Program

The Replication of Recovery and Reunification Interventions for Families–Impact Study (R3-Impact), funded by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), includes impact and implementation evaluations of the Parent Mentor Program (PMP). PMP is a peer-based, parent-driven recovery coaching intervention for parents with an open child welfare case with substance use as a primary risk factor. PMP is delivered through community-based organizations by Parent Mentors who will receive robust ongoing training and supervision. Parent Mentors, who have been in active recovery for at least two years and have a closed child welfare case for at least one year, provide recovery coaching services tailored to parents’ needs and goals in navigating recovery and their child welfare case. PMP aims to reduce parenting stress, support recovery from substance use, and increase child welfare case engagement, with family preservation and permanency as potential downstream benefits.

The impact evaluation of PMP will study its effects in select counties within four states: Michigan, Minnesota, Oregon, and Virginia. The evaluation will randomly assign parents who consent to participate in the study either to a group that has access to “services as usual” (SAU) or to a group that has access to PMP in addition to SAU. The impact evaluation will examine self-reported measures of parent mental and emotional health, substance use, and engagement with the child welfare case, as well as additional self-reported and administrative outcomes. The implementation evaluation will measure implementation fidelity and seek to understand the barriers to, and facilitators of implementation. The study will enroll parents into the study from summer 2024 until fall 2026.