“WE can try to change the students, but if we don’t get them to understand their thought processes and review how they see themselves, the change is going to be just for a while, and they will return to their former selves,” says Dean of Discipline Kenroy Rowe. “However, once they are educated about how they can approach challenging situations [in a positive manner], then this will be a tool for them to use for life.”

Rowe was up to recently dean of Haile Selassie High School, and explains that cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is “a great tool” for empowering young Jamaicans at risk of, or already involved with, crime and violence. CBT is an intervention in which trained specialists help people to examine and improve the way they think, encouraging healthy decision-making and behaviour.

Rowe, now dean of discipline at Clan Carthy High School, played a key role in The MultiCare Youth Foundation’s (MYF) recent related workshop for vulnerable male students at Haile Selassie High School. Involving 21 sessions between May 17 and July 18, this was the first time the Jamaican model of this intervention tool had been presented in a local high school. Sixteen students who were assessed to be of medium to high risk during screening were recommended for the workshop, 13 of whom completed the sessions. Their ages ranged from 13 to 20 years.

The use of this model of CBT as an effective strategy, specifically for reducing crime and violence among youth, was explored at an April 2021 workshop hosted by the USAID-funded Local Partner Development (LPD) programme being implemented by FHI 360. The LPD programme also contracted independent clinical psychologist Dr Kai Morgan to design and supervise the implementation of the Jamaican model and hosted the May 2022 workshop, where MYF’s Project Manager Taneshia Stoney Dryden and Mentorship and Counselling Officer Janike Banton Morris were trained to facilitate the workshops for Jamaican youth.

The local model of CBT, which the MYF used in its Haile Selassie intervention, has been dubbed the Transforming Our Perspective or TOP model. It is based on the Mexican ROLE model produced by the Mexican NGO ProSociedad and used with positive results there and in North and South America. Use of the TOP CBT model represents a critical expansion of the MYF’s current focus on the 15-29-year-olds, especially males, who are most at risk of becoming involved with crime and violence.

While statistics show that members of this age cohort represent most of the perpetrators as well as the victims of violent crimes, the figures are less likely to catalogue the serious challenges facing young Jamaicans in inner-city and other underserved communities. Asked about these, Rowe noted: “The influence of gangs and gang recruitment is a serious challenge; lack of parental support is another – most of these youngsters live in single parent homes or their parents are not in their lives at all. In the latter case they live with relatives, some live on their own, some have jobs while attending school. Quite a few are actually in gangs, some already have criminal records.”

Janike Banton Morris, who served as lead facilitator of MYF’s TOP CBT project component, said CBT is a very useful approach to help young people, especially those at risk, reduce their propensity for crime and violence.

“It involves getting into the minds of these young people and trying to transform their perspective from negative to positive. In doing so, we look at how they react automatically to situations. We look at identity, observing themselves. A lot of these young people never get a chance to stop and reflect, to do self-observation and to learn about themselves. So within this curriculum we teach them how to do that.”

Pre- and post-test findings showed that 82 per cent of the 13 participants who were tested indicated a reduction in their aggression levels and 73 per cent had a reduction in their impulsivity.