[3] McDonald was co-principal researcher of a $2.9 million National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA) five-year grant to study the application of FAST within ethnically specific groups.
McDonald was previously the principal researcher of a five-year $1.4 million grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Center for Substance Abuse Prevention.
Grants from the DeWitt Wallace Reader's Digest Foundation and the Kraft Corporation have helped to disseminate FAST nationally.
[5] The program was set up to help to build multiple layers of protective factors around at-risk children - including intensive parental involvement - and also promotes students' resilience in adversity and reduction of long-term negative outcomes.
[7] FAST appears to have dramatically increased parental involvement in children's educational success in 25 states, and across diverse ethnic and socio-economic groups, although predominantly in low-income families.