In addition to the current third-party annual assessment required of all Friends of the Children chapters, the National Office is spearheading a national long-term evaluation of our program. This longitudinal study will involve collecting data on 250 children regarding social, educational, and developmental milestones. We will randomly assign half of these youth to the program and half to a control group. By comparing the results of these two groups over five years, the study will be able to demonstrate the impact that Friends of the Children has on the lives of extremely at-risk children.