APP Innovation and Program Impacts

By weaving rigorous evaluation into many APP-funded programs, we are continuing to learn about the impacts of our programming and to feed learning back to the field. At times, ACF has overseen evaluation – this is called federally-led evaluation; at other times, grantees have conducted evaluations – these are called “local evaluations.”

Federally-Led Evaluations

APP has undertaken rigorous evaluation of a subset of four PREP-funded programs. These programs completed implementation study and impact studies.

• Design for an Impact Study of Four PREP Programs
  • Report (January 2015)
  • Brief (May 2015)
• In-depth information on programs evaluated may be found on the APP Program Design and Implementation page.

Additional information on impacts will be posted on this page when available.

APP Innovation and Research Programs

Personal Responsibility in Education Innovative Strategies (PREIS) program

Through Personal Responsibility Education Innovative Strategies Program (PREIS), APP supports research and demonstration projects that implement innovative strategies for preventing pregnancy among youth aged 10-19 years. The PREIS project serves youth who are the most high-risk or vulnerable for pregnancies. This group includes, but is not limited to, youth in or aging out of foster care, homeless youth, pregnant and/or parenting youth who are under 21 years of age, and youth who live in areas with high adolescent birth rates. PREIS projects implement a broad range of approaches to teen pregnancy prevention with a focus on interventions that fill gaps in the evidence-based curricula with new promising program models. Every PREIS project conducts their own independent evaluation, supported by Federal training and technical assistance. These rigorous evaluations are designed to meet the HHS Teen Pregnancy Prevention Evidence-Based Standards. PREIS projects are expected to generate lessons learned so that others can benefit from these strategies and innovative approaches.

For more information on PREIS, see the PREIS Fact Sheet.

For a list of 2015 PREIS grantees, see the 2015 Personal Responsibility Education Innovative Strategies (PREIS) Grant Awards.

Pregnancy Prevention Approaches (PPA) Study

The evaluation of Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Approaches (PPA) is an experimental study focused on assessing the implementation and impacts of innovative strategies and untested approaches for preventing teenage pregnancy. There are three ACYF Personal Responsibility Education Program Innovative Strategies (PREIS) grantees, three OAH TPP Research and Demonstration grantees (Tier 2), and one non-federally funded program included in the PPA study. Implementation and impact reports for ACYF led studies can be found in APP Research and Evaluation Reports.  Get more information on the PPA study.

Local Evaluations

Since its inception, APP has supported grantees as they oversee independent rigorous evaluations, called “local evaluations.” Summaries of final reports from these evaluations will be posted here when available.