The RRM Foundation proposes a five-year, independently evaluated study of an established mother-daughter body-literacy program, generating the first modern rigorous evidence in a category federal policy has prioritized and the evidence base has not yet reached.
This year's federal Teen Pregnancy Prevention program was rewritten around two priorities: body literacy, the ability to understand and interpret one's own reproductive physiology, and transparency with parents, including advance notice, review, and opt-out. Alongside the evaluation tier, $63.4 million was appropriated this cycle to replicate programs that already hold rigorous evidence.
Yet the federal evidence list contains no body-literacy program. The category's foundational trials are two decades old and fall outside the review's timeliness window; contemporary programs have formative and community evidence but no modern impact study. Replication funding cannot reach the category until someone produces the evidence.
That is precisely the purpose of Tier 2: rigorous, independent evaluation of promising interventions with formative support. This project exists to close that gap.
Developed and delivered by Pearl & Thistle since 2018: staged body-literacy education for girls ages 8–18, taught through parishes, Catholic schools, and diocesan partners, with existing train-the-trainer materials and a trained facilitator bench. Diocesan adoption and a national innovation-award shortlist evidence its community support.
The program is mother-daughter delivered. Parents are not merely notified of content; they are participants in the room from the first session. Parental transparency is not a compliance layer added for this application. It is the program's architecture.
Girls learn to read their own biological signals as health information: cycle physiology, hormonal patterns, and what is and is not normal, taught age-appropriately across two program stages.
Advance review of all materials, voluntary enrollment, and a parent physically present throughout. The proposal operationalizes the notice-review-opt-out standard by design rather than by procedure.
The adolescent fertility-awareness literature establishes that this class of intervention can move the behavioral outcomes this program measures. These studies are cited as the category's proof-of-concept for the theory of change, not as the intervention's own results; the intervention's record is formative and community evidence, which is the evidence tier this funding opportunity exists to build upon.
| Study | Design | N | Key finding |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cabezón et al., J Adolesc Health 2005 | Randomized controlled trial, classroom-assigned | 1,259 | Teen pregnancy 3.3% vs 18.9% (RR 0.176–0.195), four-year follow-up |
| Vigil et al., Rev Med Chil 2005 | Quasi-experimental, comparison group | 740 | Sexual initiation 6.5% vs 15% vs standard curriculum |
| Klaus et al., Int J Adolesc Med Health 1987 | Multisite pilot | 235 | Parental involvement associated with postponement of sexual activity |
The program-specific formative exhibit (participation counts, diocesan adoptions, and documented parent and participant feedback) is draft: compiling with developer. A formative evaluation manuscript with the developer as first author is in preparation independent of this application.
Matched-pair cluster quasi-experimental design as the primary approach, with staggered-start comparison groups drawn from enrolled sites; a cluster-randomized upgrade path is specified where site logistics permit. Intent-to-treat as the primary analysis; attrition handled against What Works Clearinghouse standards; minimum detectable effects powered for a modest, defensible first rigorous test rather than anchored to historical effect sizes.
The evaluation is designed and conducted by a university team with no role in the curriculum evaluator confirmation pending. IRB approval within 12 months of award; public study registration within 15 months; performance measures reported semi-annually through the federal TPP system; final analysis and reporting in the closing project phase.
Families opt in, exactly as they do for the program today. Some enrolled groups begin immediately and some begin later; the not-yet-started groups provide the fair comparison. Three short survey waves (baseline, program exit, and follow-up) measure behavioral outcomes alongside body-literacy knowledge, self-efficacy, and the parent-child relationship. All instruments are reviewed in advance by parents and approved by a university ethics board.
Refine and manualize. Produce the study edition of the curriculum with documented end-user feedback from parent and participant focus groups by the end of Year 1.
Build delivery capacity. Train a facilitator cohort through the developer's train-the-trainer model and activate 2–3 delivery sites for the 2027 school year. sites: draft
Deliver with fidelity. Implement successive program cohorts across the delivery sites with fidelity monitoring throughout, per the plan finalized in Year 1.
Measure behavioral outcomes. Collect baseline, exit, and follow-up waves on delayed initiation and related behavioral domains with attrition within federal evidence standards.
Measure intermediate outcomes. Track body-literacy knowledge, self-efficacy, and parent-child communication as specified intermediate domains.
Report and disseminate. Registered study, final impact analysis, an implementation-ready program package delivered to the funder, and peer-reviewed publication.
Numeric targets and denominators finalize with the evaluator's power analysis pending; the full objective set with measures appears in the application logic model.
| Deadline | Funder-mandated deliverable |
|---|---|
| Month 6 | Executed formal agreements with all partners and subrecipients |
| Month 10 | Pilot test of intervention materials complete |
| Month 12 | Final materials · data collection plan · evaluation design · IRB approval · staff trained |
| Month 15 | Public study registration |
| Year 3 | Analysis plan finalized |
| Close | Final analysis, reporting, and implementation-ready program package to OPA |
501(c)(3) education and research foundation (EIN 93-4594315). Grants management, IRB liaison, study registration, data infrastructure, and dissemination through its 3,000+ study research library and national education platform. Independent-majority board; written conflict-of-interest policy aligned to federal award standards.
Program developer and standard-keeper: curriculum authority, facilitator training, and fidelity support. The developer retains ownership of the program and the study edition; the project holds a study license. Compensation and scope finalize in the post-award agreement.
A university evaluation team with reproductive-health methods depth designs and conducts the study end to end: power analysis, IRB, registration, and intent-to-treat analysis, with no role in curriculum and documented independence from the developer.
Delivery separated from measurement; measurement separated from coordination. Each criterion of the review maps to the partner built to own it.
Annual request within the published $650K–$1.25M band; first budget period detailed line-item with justification, subsequent periods summarized per the announcement's budget instructions. All partner compensation is documented, auditable, and set by written agreement.