Since the beginning, we have striven to measure our accomplishments in time, finances and outcomes. Our commitment to improving the health of adolescents has led us to conduct evaluation research to assess the impact of what we do. The evaluation projects were in-house, and even though they were small and lacked the rigor of large scale, third-party research, we began to observe promising outcomes. Armed with this information, the Atlantic Philanthropies—impressed with our work—rewarded us with a grant for a five-year, rigorous scientific study conducted by ICF Macro. We anticipate that the emergence of these findings will authenticate our work and allow us to “place our stake in the ground” as a highly effective model.
Internationally renowned ICF Macro was selected to perform a rigorous, independent evaluation of the Mount Sinai Adolescent Health Center to help us determine the effectiveness, appropriateness, and policy implications for our service model. ICF Macro has designed a multi- component, longitudinal evaluation that will answer these questions through a quasi-experimental, multi-modal, longitudinal study comparing 650 adolescents enrolled in MSAHC services with 650 similar adolescents drawn from the surrounding community who are not receiving our services.
Our evaluation includes a series of policy studies looking at adolescent services and financing in the context of health care finance reform.