Brief Intervention at Adult Education

Conditions

• Behavioral Health Challenges

Eligibility Criteria

Sex

ALL

Age

17 Years - N/A

Healthy Volunteers

Accepted

Interventions

• Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral for Treatment (SBIRT) — BEHAVIORAL
  A single-arm, open pilot design maximizes the ability of the investigators to work collaboratively with NHAEC staff and administration to tailor the implementation strategy, establish the feasibility and acceptability of study methods and interventions (e.g., recruiting students, training SRSs to deliver SBIRT with integrity, response rates to assessment measures, student receipt of SBIRT, retention of SRSs and students), address the structural barriers within the AEC setting, identify the needs of the populations of interest, and gather data that points to best approaches to ensuring the study's success.

Study Details

Many Americans fail to receive their high school diploma. Individuals enrolled in Adult Education classes have exited the K-12 education system without a high school diploma. This reduces their access to economic resources, heightens their risk for poverty and poor health, limits their ability to meet occupational and social expectations of adult life, and exacerbates their stress. Behavioral health (i.e., depression, anxiety, anger, substance use) is implicated in K-12 school failure, as it negatively impacts students' acquisition of academic skills and their achievement of educational and vocational goals. Students enrolled in Adult Education Centers (AECs) are often ignored in most analyses that explore how behavioral health issues impact students' general functioning and academic outcomes, even though behavioral health challenges in AECs may be greater than that in the general population. AECs are ill equipped to address students' behavioral health challenges. Few evidence-based, behavioral health interventions are currently deployed in AECs that target the behavioral health challenges AEC students may experience. Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT), often informed by Motivational Interviewing (MI), positively impacts health outcomes. Positive outcomes are associated with the successful screening and referral to behavioral health services. In turn, these behavioral health improvements may also help to facilitate positive academic results for impacted AEC students. Implementation Facilitation is a promising strategy for ensuring the successful implementation of SBIRT in AECs. Guided by the integrated-Promoting Action on Research Implementation in Health Services (i-PARIHS) framework, the investigators propose an R34 project to: 1) conduct an iterative, mixed methods formative evaluation approach to identify barriers and facilitators of SBIRT implementation in AECs and tailor an Implementation Facilitation strategy to support the delivery of SBIRT to AEC students by SRSs; and 2) examine the acceptability, feasibility, and preliminary effectiveness of Implementation Facilitation to promote the use of SBIRT by SRSs with AEC students.

Key Dates

Start date

Dec 9, 2025

Status verified

Mar 2026

Primary completion

Jul 31, 2028

Completion

Jul 31, 2028

Study Design

Enrollment

340 participants (estimated)

Allocation

NA

Intervention model

SINGLE_GROUP

Primary purpose

SCREENING

Arms

• Experimental: Accessibility, feasibility and preliminary effectiveness
  The students will complete the Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information Systems (PROMIS) measures, receive feedback from the SRSs about their behavioral health, receive a brief MI intervention, if indicated, and referral to community-based supports, as needed. This will continue at the start of each semester for 15 months to month 25. Student outcomes will be tracked at baseline and at 3- and 6-months post study enrollment. Main outcomes will be assessed according to the RE-AIM evaluation framework to capture both SRS-level (e.g., students reached wit SBIRT, adoption of SBIRT consistently, implemented SBIRT well) and student-level outcomes (e.g., retention; treatment referral engagement; changes in PROMIS measured scores; NHAEC program attendance, 12hr classroom instruction completed/received, credits earned). Acceptability of Implementation Facilitation and SBIRT will be determined for NHAEC staff, SRSs, and students (i.e., Client Satisfaction Questionnaire-8, CSQ-8

Primary Outcome Measure

Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System (PROMIS) - Depression [ Time Frame: pre-intervention, day 1; 3; 6 months ]

Locations (1)

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