Improving the Effectiveness of Juvenile Justice Programs – To demonstrate the need for a new approach, contemplate this scenario and whether it sounds familiar. A juvenile justice director is delighted to identify a number of “gold standard” programs that could be used to benefit his or her clients, whether found in the Blueprints for Violence Prevention developed by Dr. Delbert Elliott, or in OJJDP’s Model Programs Guide, or in the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration’s National Registry of Evidence-based Programs and Practices. The new programs are implemented with as much fidelity as possible in light of budget constraints and workforce limitations, while at the same time local programs that do not have rigorous evidence of success are diminished.