Youth Enhancement Services receives referrals to our program from the 9th Judicial District.  We believe that by offering our services to at risk youth, we can help youth stay out of trouble and stay in school.  Read on for a clearer understanding of the need, our goals and objectives and our anticipated outcome.

Assessing the Needs in the Community

  1. No other services of this type is currently being provided in Glacier, Teton, Pondera and Toole Counties.
  2. Before the establishment of Youth Enhancement Services, parents had to transport youth to Great Falls and further for the services that YES provides. If families could not provide transportation reliably, the youth often had to be placed in a Shelter Care or Group Home to ensure that they could get to the classes and programs that they needed.
  3. Youth Court has seen a dramatic increase in both formal and informal cases in the past three years. Currently two Youth Probation Officers are actively supervising 75 youth in the 9th District, 40 are from Pondera and Teton Counties. We are dismissing many status offenses because there simply is not the staff to supervise the youth.  With the YES program, these at-risk youth will not go unnoticed or untreated.
  4. Furthermore, Teton County encompasses 2,272.61 square miles and has 6,115 people, of these 22.3% are under the age of 18. Pondera encompasses 1,624.70 square miles and has 6,032 people, of these 23.8% are under the age of 18. (see US Bureau of Census 2000, and State and County Quick Facts, www.mt.gov.) Even with the sparse populations found in Montana as a whole, they rank in the top fifth of the nation in alcohol and drug abuse. (see SAMSHA’s State Estimates of Substance Use from the 2004-2005 National Surveys on Drug Use and Health; Wright, Sathe, Spagnola, DPHHS,  Feb, 2007 I was never good at cites, so if you want me to look up MLA I can.). Just the distance alone makes it very difficult to serve the two counties youth.

Meeting the Need

We assist our at risk youth through Community Service projects, life skills training, Moral Recognation Therapy (MRT), recreational activities, special topic speakers, Youth Court referral supervision, job shadowing, and parenting skills training.

Anticipated Changes

The most effective change that can be made as a result of receiving our services will be the change in academic performance of the youth served, specifically, a reduction in the number of High School Dropouts, an overall school performance increase in the youth served (this will be monitored by statistics available from all of the County schools) and the number of arrests made. (If YES is successful, there will be a reduced rate of recidivism which can be measured by Juvenile Probation in the Montana JCATS program.)

Of 56 youth served by YES during the initial period of March 1 through August 30 of 2007, only 2 youth were sited for additional offenses. Of these, only one was placed outside the home to obtain additional services not available through YES.  Of the youth served, none have dropped out of school since the beginning of YES.