Building Research Capacity in a Child Mental Health Agency: Collaborative Strategies for Integration and Transformation by James K. Whittaker, ACSW, LICSW, Ph.D., Professor, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, Derenda Schubert, Ph.D., Chief Operating Officer and Michele Solloway, Ph.D., Director Center for Applied Research and Evaluation, Trillium Family Services, Portland, OR

This workshop describes a team effort to identify and implement a linked set of activities, designed to address the present "science-to-service" gap in evidence-based practice, from the perspective of the non-profit child mental health agency. "Lessons learned" include the potential for the service agency to be both consumer and generator of child mental health research; the potential for building agency-centered research capacity as both an integrative and transformative force and future implications for contributing high quality, science-based information to child mental health services, singly and through the future development of a national network of experimenting child mental health agencies.