Pace Center for Girls
Program overview
Academic and social services for girls at risk of delinquency: The Pace Center for Girls is a nonprofit organization that provides academic classes, counseling, and social services to girls of middle school and high school age who demonstrate risk factors for juvenile justice system involvement. It aims to improve utilization of academic and social services as well as increase school enrollment and attendance.
Serving girls at risk of negative outcomes: The Pace Center serves girls who have a history of involvement with the juvenile justice system or demonstrate other risk factors, such as a recent expulsion from school, patterns of substance use, or certain mental health conditions. Participants are often recruited through referrals from school districts, departments of juvenile justice, or community-based organizations.
Creating individualized plans for girls: When girls begin participating in Pace Center programming, Pace staff build an individualized plan for each girl based on their personal goals and academic requirements. These plans are designed to help girls make progress toward their target outcomes, typically within about one year. For younger girls, the goal is generally to transition back to their previous school, while for older girls the goal is to graduate high school and begin either postsecondary education or a career.
Offering academic services for progress toward credit accumulation: The Pace Center provides classes and academic services to replace education in a traditional middle or high school setting. The Pace academic curriculum aligns with state standards and provides girls with credits transferable to any future schools. In addition to in-class instruction, girls also meet with a dedicated academic advisor every other week to discuss their grades, review progress toward credit requirements, examine test results, and set academic goals.
Providing social services to increase protective factors: Because girls who attend the Pace Center often demonstrate a range of overlapping risk factors, the program model includes extensive social services to meet participants’ non-academic needs. The Pace Center offers individual and group counseling, an integrated life skills curriculum, community service and career exploration opportunities, and 12 months of follow-up services once girls leave the program.
Utilizing gender-responsive, strength-based, trauma-informed practices: The Pace Center provides programming through a gender-responsive, strength-based, trauma-informed lens. Programming is designed with an awareness of gender-specific issues, focuses on girls’ talents and positive attributes, and reflects best practices in trauma-informed care.
One study with a rigorous design provides some evidence for the PACE Center for Girls as a strategy for increasing uptake of academic and social services and improving school enrollment and attendance.
- A 2019 randomized controlled trial found that girls who were offered a program slot at Pace accessed more academic and social services, particularly from professional sources; increased their likelihood of ever being enrolled in school by 4.4 percentage points; and attended an average of 9.8 more days of school, when compared to a control group.
Build a network of partnerships: The Pace Center relies on partnerships in two key areas: recruitment and access to services. Since participation is voluntary, it is important to establish relationships with schools, the juvenile justice system, and local community-based organizations in order to share information about the program and identify girls who could benefit most. Pace Center staff also rely on partnerships to connect girls with services outside of Pace (e.g., physical health services), so relationships with local service providers can prove crucial.
Emphasize a strengths-based approach: The Pace Center model is designed to help girls build their self-confidence and sense of self-worth by identifying and building on their individual strengths. This is achieved through extensive staff training to ensure that staff are approaching and interacting with girls by focusing on their skills, areas of interest, and resiliency. It is also present in the formalized Pace reward system in which girls receive tangible rewards or privileges for competing specific milestones (e.g., maintaining high attendance).
Prioritize family involvement: The parents and families of girls participating in Pace Center programming can be extensively involved. This involvement helps ensure buy-in to the Pace model and supports parents in maintaining consistency between supports at Pace and at home. In order to encourage parent and family involvement, Pace staff conduct interviews and home visits with parents during the recruitment process and then continue to check in through monthly progress reports, informal phone calls, and office sessions.
Customize academic approach for the student population: In order to best serve their specific student population, the Pace Center uses a low student to teacher ratio and increased academic advising. In addition, teachers emphasize individual, self-paced work to increase engagement and help girls build confidence and competence in academic settings.