This evaluation report provides the Ministry of Justice with findings from a two-year evaluation that began late June 2007 and was completed in July 2009.
Te Hurihanga (The Turning Point) is a Ministry of Justice response to the problem of youth offending. It is a three-year pilot that reflects concerns about trends in youth offending and lack of suitable options open to the judiciary when dealing with some young offenders. The focus of this programme is to encourage young people to turn their lives around. It is a nine to eighteen month therapeutic programme for young males (aged 14 to 16 years at entry) who have appeared before the courts and who live within the Hamilton/Waikato region. The three-phased programme aims to: reduce re-offending; hold young people accountable for their offending; and provide tailored, specialist support to young people and their whaanau/families so they can make positive choices rather then continue on current (offending) pathways.
The therapeutic, residential programme is bicultural and community-focused. It is designed to be delivered in a context of care, aroha, manaakitanga, wairuatanga and Whānaungatanga.
The therapeutic framework within which staff carry out their prescribed roles is structured around the following treatment models:
- Risk, Needs, Responsivity Model
- The Good Lives Model: Adapted to Adolescents
- Psycho-Educational Intervention and Cognitive Behaviour Therapy
- Behaviour Theory and Therapy (Based Upon Operant Learning Principles)
- Relapse Prevention Model
- Parenting and Family Therapy Interventions
- Multi-Systemic Therapy Model and, in the future
- Functional Family Therapy.