Reclaiming Futures to pilot SBIRT

Reclaiming Futures to Pilot Innovative SBIRT Adaptation
Through a generous $2 million grant from the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, Reclaiming Futures will develop and pilot an adaptation of Screening, Brief Intervention, and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) for youth at the front door of the juvenile justice system. Our SBIRT pilot aims to help youth who show mild to moderate levels of substance use—a population that doesn’t often qualify for or seek treatment, but who are at high risk for worsening substance abuse problems down the road.

Originally developed primarily for adults in medical settings, SBIRT has also shown promising results with adolescents and has become a key strategic initiative of the Hilton Foundation since 2012.

How it Works
This SBIRT adaptation will enable treatment practitioners to segue immediately from a screening to an intervention customized to a young person’s substance abuse within a single appointment. Reclaiming Futures will customize a teen-friendly intervention of one to five sessions, which will be designed in a way that will allow for tailoring to a juvenile justice setting and can be administered flexibly depending on the severity of the youth’s substance use. It will provide greater specificity in the way young people are served, with treatment that fits the level of the problem, and that is accessible and useful to youth who may not need a more intensive intervention.

Request for Proposals
The funding enables Reclaiming Futures to implement and evaluate SBIRT at three of Reclaiming Futures’ 39 existing sites, as well as launch two new Reclaiming Futures sites that will take part in the SBIRT pilot.

If your community is interested in an opportunity to launch a new Reclaiming Futures site and pilot SBIRT with your at-risk youth, visit our request for proposals page. The deadline to apply is November 13.