Summary
“Beginning in 2010, the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority (Authority) awarded several grants to the National Alliance on Mental Illness of Chicago (NAMI-C) to fund Crisis Intervention Training for Youth (CIT-Y) courses to officers at the Chicago Police Department (C. An Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in the amount of $249,000 provided resources for 12 Crisis InterventionTraining for Youth (CIT-Y) courses - four training sessions per year for three years offered on a volunteer basis. An additional two years of funding in the amount of $97,000 per year was provided through Justice Assistance Grants. The program was the first 40-hour, five-day law enforcement youth crisis intervention training offered in the country. NAMI-C and CPD developed the course to answer requests for additional training from officers responding to calls for service involving youth with mental, emotional, or behavioral disorders. CIT-Y training objectives were to improve officer awareness of signs and symptoms of youth mental, emotional, and behavioral disorders, increase knowledge of risk levels and corresponding crisis de-escalation techniques, and provide information on CPD’s mental health related directives on youth service call dispositions. Preparing officers to identify youth in crisis, assess their risk of harm, and apply de-escalation techniques may reduce additional trauma to responding officers, youth and their families, as well as criminalization of juvenile offending behavior related to unmet needs (National Federation of Families for Children’s Mental Health, 2008). This study was part of a multi-year evaluation conducted by Authority researchers. It was designed to assess CIT-Y core training components and measure the curriculum’s effect on officer knowledge of and attitudes toward appropriate responses to youth crisis calls during the second year of training implementation in 2012. The evaluation also sought to assess progress on recommended diversification of training participation among the various levels of CPD staff, especially those responsible for supervising trained officers. Authority researchers designed evaluation tools to measure training effectiveness, including a pre-/post-curriculum test, 18 training module evaluation surveys, and follow-up focus group questions. Data was collected from 144 officers attending advanced CIT-Y training courses from January 2012 through May2013 after completing basic adult CIT training, and a comparison group of 137 officers volunteering for adult CIT training classes but not yet trained in crisis intervention techniques.”--Page iv.