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AVANCE Family Support and Education Program (AVANCE)

Scientific Rating:
3
Promising Research Evidence
See scale of 1-5
Child Welfare Relevance Rating:
2
Medium
See scale of 1-3

Note: The AVANCE program was not responsive to the CEBC's inquiry. The following information was obtained from publicly available sources.

Brief Description

The AVANCE Family Support and Education Program (AVANCE) program has been rated by the CEBC in the area of: Home Visiting for Child Well-Being.

  • Child Welfare Outcome: Child/Family Well-Being
  • Types of Maltreatment: Does not target any specific kind of maltreatment
  • Target Population: Not Specified

AVANCE is program to support low-income Hispanic families. The program includes a 9-month center-based component, as well as monthly home visits. Mothers are provided transportation to centers, where they make educational toys and receive training on child development and a curriculum aimed at helping them see themselves as effective role models and teachers. This curriculum is supported by the home visits. Children participate in and educational day-care setting during mothers' classes. During a second year, mothers may attend courses in English as a Second Language and take college or GED classes or courses in vocational skills.

Education and Training Resources

Publicly available information indicates there is a manual that describes how to implement this program, and there is some training available for this program.
See contact info below.

Training Contact:

Relevant Published, Peer-Reviewed Research

This program is rated a "3 - Promising Research Evidence" on the Scientific Rating Scale based on the published, peer-reviewed research available. The practice must have at least one study utilizing some form of control (e.g., untreated group, placebo group, matched wait list study) establishing the practice's benefit over the placebo, or found it to be comparable to or better than an appropriate comparison practice. Please see the Scientific Rating Scale for more information.

Johnson, D., Walker, T. B., & Rodriguez, G.G. (1996). Teaching low-income mothers to teach their children. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 11, 101-114.

Type of Study: Randomized controlled trial (at one site only)
Number of Participants: 486 mothers

Population:

  • Age range — Children between 1 and 24 months
  • Race/Ethnicity — Mexican American
  • Gender — Not Specified
  • Status — Mothers from low income families.

Location / Institution: San Antonio, TX

Summary: (To include comparison groups, outcomes, measures, notable limitations)
The intervention was tested at two sites. At one site, mothers were randomly assigned to the intervention or a control group. At the second site, mothers receiving the intervention were matched with a comparison group on child's age, mother's age, child's gender, mother's marital status, number of children, mother's education, family income, and mother's country of origin. Participants were observed at the beginning of the intervention, at the end of the first year, and at 1-year follow. Mother-child teaching interactions were assessed with the Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (HOME), a videotaped Mother-Child Interaction free play session, and the Early Learning Questionnaire, which assesses mothers' attitudes about teaching their children. Significant intervention effects were found for both the randomized and matched comparison sites. Mothers in the intervention displayed more positive affect, better communication skills, and higher quality cognitive stimulation. One issue noted was that there was a 47% dropout rate for intervention families. This was attributed to greater time demands on intervention families. The usual reasons for dropping out were moving farther from program sites and conflicting employment schedules.

Length of post-intervention follow-up: 1 year.

References

Johnson, D. L., Walker, T. B., & Rodriguez, G. G. (1991). Final report of an evaluation of the Avance Parent Education and Family Support Program. San Antonio, TX: Avance.

Walker, T. B., Rodriguez, G. G., Johnson, D. L., & Cortez, C. P. (1995). Avance Parent-Child Program. In S. Smith & I. E. Sigel (Eds.), Advances in applied developmental psychology: Vol. 9. Two generation programs for families in poverty: A new intervention strategy (pp. 67-90). Norwood, NJ: Ablex.

Contact Information

Name: Glendelia Zavala, EdD
Title: Chief Program Officer
Website: gzavala.nat@avance.org
Phone: (210) 270-4630 x677

Date Reviewed: June 2011 (originally reviewed in April 2008)