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Two major reform movements have shaped child and adolescent mental health services over the past quarter-century: the Systems of Care movement, and more recently, the movement toward evidence-based practice. Results from several studies indicate that youth served in traditional residential or inpatient care may experience difficulty re-entering their natural environments, or were released into physically and emotionally unsafe homes (Bruns & Burchard, 2000; President's Commission on Mental Health, 1978; Stortz, 2000; Stroul & Friedman, 1986; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1999). The cost of hospitalizing youth also became a policy concern (Henggeler et al., 1999b; Kielser, 1993; U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 1999). For example, it is estimated that from the late 1980s through 1990 inpatient treatment consumed nearly half of all expenditures for child and adolescent mental health care although the services were found not to be very effective (Burns, 1991; Burns & Friedman, 1990). More recent analyses indicate that at least 1/3 of all mental health expenditures for youth are associated with inpatient hospitalization (Ringel & Sturm, 2001).

In this study the authors use longitudinal data from a randomized experiment to investigate the impact of a feedback and coaching intervention on principals’ leadership behaviors. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

In total, 52 elementary and middle school principals (26 receiving teacher feedback, 26 receiving feedback and coaching) were randomized into a year-long feedback and coaching study. Measures of leadership actions were collected from principals and teachers during the fall, winter, and spring. The authors use instrumental variables approach to examine the impact of treatment.

Behavioral change may take longer than is presented in this study, which implies that these findings represent a lower-bound. As an intervention leadership coaching is costly and this research does not explore alternatives to help principals make feedback data actionable.

It is unlikely that providing school leaders with feedback alone will induce behavioral change. Other systems and supports – such as leadership coaching – are needed to help principals make sense of feedback data and translate data into actionable behaviors.

Few leadership studies use exogenous variation in treatment conditions to examine leadership outcomes. This study builds upon our causal knowledge of leadership behaviors and presents a viable intervention to improve school leadership.

As we have discussed, recognition of the specialized needs of children and adolescents has taken place late in many domains. The same could be said with regard to the mental health services research enterprise. Kimberly Hoagwood, a prominent child mental health services researcher and for many years the program officer overseeing the National Institute of Mental Health's services research portfolio in the area of child mental health services research, recently observed that research in this area has lagged behind that for adults by roughly 10 years (Hoagwood, 2005). Indeed, as late as 1999, Burns was calling for the development of a services research agenda for youth with serious emotional disturbances (Burns, 1999).

This paper aims to explore the evaluation theory in a field closely related to corporate communication and public relations (PR) as well as in other disciplines and argues that embracing the evaluation theory more broadly can break the “stasis” and “deadlock” identified in evaluation of corporate communication and PR. Specifically, this analysis seeks to show that a transdisciplinary approach can contribute to standards and demonstration of impact – two long-sought goals in evaluation of corporate communication and PR – as well as inform methodology.

Critical analysis is applied to review the evaluation theory in a number of fields, including international development, public administration, management and health communication, compared with major frameworks, models and methods used for evaluation of corporate communication and PR.

This analysis shows that the evaluation theory in other fields and related theory of change, program theory and program logic models can contribute to advancing evaluation of corporate communication and PR in three ways: identifying standards in terminology and approaches, shifting focus from activities and outputs to outcomes and impact and applying appropriate and rigorous methodology.

While this paper does not present new empirical data, it expands the theoretical perspectives, models and methods applied to the evaluation of corporate communication and PR and identifies new directions for research.

As well as expanding the evaluation theory and opening up new ground for research, this analysis identifies a need for structural change in the field of practice.

Leadership coaching is an increasingly popular development tool for school principals. However, specific coaching behaviors are rarely conceptualized or examined in prior research. This study presents a coaching behavior framework and then analyzes actual coaching conversations between principals and coaches to illustrate how specific coaching behaviors create opportunities for principals to reflect and think critically about their leadership.

Building on theories of interpersonal learning, the authors develop a framework of coaching behaviors to distinguish coaching inquiries and assertions that facilitate critique and reflection and, therefore, activate opportunities for learning. The authors use this framework to code transcripts of 55 principal coaching sessions. The authors analyze the prevalence of certain coaching behaviors and then examine qualitative patterns in how the use of certain behaviors shapes the nature of coaching conversations.

Only about one-third of coded coaching behaviors in the analytic sample are categorized as coaching inquiries and assertions that activate opportunities for learning. In the qualitative comparisons of extracts from coaching conversations, the authors find coaches' use of these behaviors produced richer, more meaningful dialogue.

Unlike much of the past research on leadership coaching, this analysis examines what happens in conversations between coaches and principals. This framework could be applied to a broad range of coaching programs intended to promote professional learning.

This paper explores sexual health, the problems faced by women with severe and persistent mental illness (SPMI) in attaining sexual health, and concerns about sexual vulnerability. It goes on to look at the difficulties faced by women detained in a medium secure unit. It describes the development, running and evaluation of a pilot sexual health group aimed at meeting some of the needs highlighted in the literature.

The purpose of this paper is to explore perceptions and lived experiences of Sierra Leonean chartered and aspiring accountants, vis-à-vis their professional identity with a particular focus on two elements of postcolonial theory, hybridity and diaspora.

A qualitative methodological framework was employed. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 18 participants about their perceptions of their professional identity and their professional experiences both within and outside Sierra Leone.

The current professionalisation process is conceptualised as a postcolonial third space where hybrid professional accountants are constructed. Professional hybridity blurs the local/global praxis being positioned as both local and global accountants. Participants experience difficulty “fitting into” the local accountancy context as a consequence of their hybridisation. As such, a diaspora effect is induced which often culminates in emigration to advanced countries. The paper concludes that although the current model engenders emancipatory social movements for individuals through hybridity and diaspora, it is nonetheless counterproductive for Sierra Leone’s economic development and the local profession in particular.

This study has significant implications for understanding how the intervention of global professional bodies in developing countries shapes the professionalisation process as well as perceptions and lived experiences of chartered and aspiring accountants in these countries.

While extant literature implicates the legacies of colonialism/imperialism on the institutional development of accountancy (represented by recognised professional bodies), this paper employs the critical lens of postcolonial theory to conceptualise the lived experiences of individuals who are directly impacted by such institutional arrangements.