Alcoholics Anonymous

Instructions:  Respond by Day 5 to two colleagues in the following way: Explain whether you agree that these are important characteristics of the logic behind the program. Explain what other considerations might be important. Is the Alcoholics Anonymous program successful? Important characteristics of its underlying logic model.   Student’s response:  The article Secret of AA: After 75 Years, We Don’t Know How It Works, written by Brendan Koerner, discusses the successes and failures of Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) while providing suggestions for future programs and participants’ improvement/successes. The article explicitly states that: “AA is still far from ideal. The sad fact remains that the program’s failures vastly outnumber its success stories… upwards of 70 percent of people who pass through AA will never make it to their one-year anniversary, and relapse is common even among regular attendees” ( Koerner, 2010). Though the failures of the program outnumber its successes, we should not disregard and devalue the achievements. Success is still success regardless of how minuscule the numbers may be. It is essential to keep in mind that people, experiences, thoughts, and reasonings are all different and equate to different end results. The success or failure of a program does highly depend on the individual at hand. A logic model is a plan or a road map for a program’s development and delivery. It is foundational for program evaluation because it provides the necessary documents to ensure a program stays on course to achieve its identified outcomes (n.d). It is important to note that it is not something that occurs once; evaluations should be ongoing and recurrent as it allows for changes or improvements to be made accordingly. Logic models tend to include five key components: Identifying needs and assets, desired results (short- and long-term), indicators (short- and long-term), activities, and resources (n.d). Based on the abovementioned components, an essential characteristic of the AA logic model is how they attempt to accomplish their objectives. A large portion of the article revolves around the idea that there is no one underlying answer to why AA is successful. There are many contributing factors to its success, whether it be a group setting, therapy, activities, and medication, amongst many other factors.  AA allows space for all aspects to contribute to their short and long-term goals. References How to Use a Logic Model for Program Evaluation Build Your Own Logic Model Additional Resources How to Use a Logic Model for Program Evaluation. (n.d.). Retrieved December 13, 2020, from https://cyfar.org/how-use-logic-model-program-evaluation Koerner, B. I. (2010). Secret of AA: After 75 years, we don’t know how it works. Retrieved from