Program Evaluation of the radKIDS® Youth Personal Empowerment Safety Education Program

Developing sound evidence of program effectiveness can be difficult for many programs initiated by schools and communities, and impedes many beneficial programs from broader dissemination. This paper shares results of an evaluation approach used with a bullying and victimization prevention program with elementary school children called the radKIDS (R) Personal Empowerment and Safety Education Program. The purpose of this study was to examine indicators of initial effectiveness of the radKIDS (R) program for elementary school child safety skill development and instructor training to reduce child victimization and associated trauma and empower healthy psychosocial child development. The study involved 330 active radKIDS (R) instructors surveyed during two separate two-week periods, resulting in 148 completed questionnaires (45%). Instructors rated their perceptions of what children effectively learned in radKIDS (R), the effectiveness of instructor training, and on Social Emotional Learning (SEL) competencies addressed in the program. Evaluation findings confirmed the theoretical model of the program, and that the developmental safety domains impacting children in radKIDS (R) differs from those in other bullying prevention interventions focused on SEL and other competencies. Recommended areas of improvement for the program included making training less time consuming and more flexible in delivery, provide more practice opportunities and time on skill acquisition during training, and increase supervision and guidance during program implementation.