Measuring Client Satisfaction and Engagement: The Role of a Mentor Parent Program in Family Drug Treatment Court

• Author: Edward Cohen,Laurie A. Drabble,Hilary Kushins,Lisa L. Haun
• Published date: 01 March 2016
• Date: 01 March 2016
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/jfcj.12053

Measuring Client Satisfaction and Engagement:

The Role of a Mentor Parent Program in Family

Drug Treatment Court

By Laurie A. Drabble, Lisa L. Haun, Hilary Kushins, and Edward Cohen

ABSTRACT

Parent engagement is an important intermediate outcome in Family Drug Treat-

ment Court (FDTC) and child welfare services. This study explored the utility and

reliability of a client satisfaction and engagement survey designed to measure interim

outcomes of a Mentor Parent Program, operating in conjunction with a FDTC. Find-

ings suggest the survey is a useful, parsimonious and reliable tool for measuring key

dimensions of parent mentor services including client engagement; client-centered

support and empowerment; and help with systems navigation and accessing resources.

The survey may be adapted for use in other FDTC or parent mentor contexts.

Key words: peer mentor, mentor parents, recovery coach, family drug treatment court,

program evaluation, child welfare, addiction treatment.

Laurie Drabble, Ph.D., is a Professor at the San Jose State University (SJSU) School of Social Work.

She is also an Affiliate Scientist at the Alcohol Research Group, in Emeryville, CA and, among other pro-

jects, serves in a leadership role with the SJSU Institute for Community Partnered Research (ICPR) and the

Child Welfare Partnership for Research and Training (CW-PART), a university/community partnered

research model designed to organize faculty and student research teams to investigate research questions of

interest to local county and community agencies.

Lisa Haun, MSW, is a Support Counselor at the non-profit agency Above the Line in Aptos, CA. She

works with children placed in intensive treatment foster care (ITFC) to provide educational, emotional, and

behavioral support to improve overall well-being and promote successful long-term outcomes, including

achieving permanency through successful reunification with birth families or adoption.

Hilary Kushins, MSW, JD, and DAC co-founder is currently the Drug Court and Training Pro-

grams Manager at Dependency Advocacy Center, a non-profit legal services organization that represents par-

ents in child abuse / neglect cases in Santa Clara County, CA. She is one of the primary attorneys representing

parents in DWC. She was a staff attorney at Dependency Legal Services for 6 years and a supervising attorney

for 3 years. Ms. Kushins has also been a faculty member of the National Drug Court Institute. In 1998, she

received a Juris Doctorate and a Masters in Social Work from the University of Maryland at Baltimore.

Ed Cohen, Ph.D., is Associate Professor at the School of Social work at San Jose State University. He

received his Masters and Ph.D. in Social Welfare from the University of California at Berkeley, and is former

director of the Center for Social Services Research at U.C. Berkeley. Dr. Cohen’s research focuses on mental

health services and program evaluation for children, adolescents and adults. He serves on the editorial board

of the journal “Child and Adolescent Social Work.”

Juvenile and Family Court Journal 67, No. 1

©2016 National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges

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