Families on limited incomes can struggle to navigate low-wage jobs or education and training programs while also searching for quality early care and education for their children. Some programs provide integrated services to parents and their children in an effort to solve this problem. This practice is sometimes called a two-generation or whole-family approach. This report provides: (1) key findings from a literature review, an environmental scan, and field work to identify and describe existing program models; (2) development of a conceptual framework to inform program design and research;…
The evaluation of the Community-Centered Responsible Fatherhood Ex-Prisoner Reentry Pilot Projects (“Fatherhood Reentry”) documented the implementation of six programs designed to help stabilize fathers and their families, help move fathers toward economic self-sufficiency, and reduce recidivism. This report presents the findings from the evaluation and provides an overview of the activities implemented by the programs, describes their various approaches to implementation, and identifies the implementation challenges they faced and the solutions they used to overcome those challenges. We…
This report describes in detail how researchers, policymakers, and program administrators can recognize opportunities for experiments and carry them out. Specifically, the report focuses on opportunistic experiments, defined as randomized controlled trials (RCTs) that study the effects of initiatives, program changes, or policy actions that agencies or programs plan or intend to implement – as opposed to studying an intervention or policy action that is developed and implemented specifically for a research study. (Author abstract)
The WorkAdvance program model integrates the most promising features of two especially important areas of workforce policy: "sectoral" strategies, which seek to meet the needs of both workers and employers by preparing individuals for quality jobs in specific high-demand industries or occupational clusters. WorkAdvance additionally integrates job retention and career advancement strategies, which seek to improve workers' prospects for sustained employment and upward mobility. Specifically, the WorkAdvance model offers the following sequence of sector-focused program components to participants…
The following executive summary outlines current research gaps and future opportunity for study of fathers' ability to support themselves and their families economically. (Author abstract)
According to this paper, the parenting gap is a big factor in the opportunity gap. The chances of upward social mobility are lower for children with parents struggling to do a good job -- in terms of creating a supportive and stimulating home environment. Children lucky enough to have strong parents are more likely to succeed at all the critical life stages, which means policies to help weaker parents do a better job can be investments in opportunity, and equality. Key findings indicate: 1) The quality of U.S. parenting, as measured on the HOME scale, strongly varies by income, family…
Until communities offer multiple pathways to connect with ladders of opportunity, many young families headed by out-of-school and out-of-work (OSOW) youth will be unable to achieve financial independence. To break the cycle of poverty, many human service organizations use two-generation approaches with "young families" (that is, families with children in which the parent is an OSOW young person ages 15-24 years). One hallmark of these two-generation approaches is the use of strategies that address the developmental needs of the young parents, their children, and the families as a whole. The…
This report presents findings from the demonstration-phase implementation of the Parents' Fair Share program, and early impacts on fathers' earnings and child support payments. In exchange for current and future cooperation with the child support system, a partnership of local organizations offered fathers services designed to help them find better jobs, pay child support, and assume a more paternal role. (Author abstract)
This final report describes the Partners in Achieving Life Skills project, a cost effective model to prevent child abuse and neglect by teenage parents. The project consisted of 3 tiers: a community health nurse who assesses the child and family; paraprofessionals who serve as case managers; and community volunteers who assist the adolescent in achieving life skills. The project helped adolescents to increase knowledge in child development, knowledge of parenting issues, and levels of support systems.Document scanned.
Part of a series of fact sheets that discuss how and why the child support program provides innovative services to families across six interrelated areas to assure that parents have the tools and resources they need to support their children and be positively involved in raising them, this fact sheet discusses the dependence of reliable child support payments upon noncustodial parents having stable income. The child support program can increase regular child support payments by helping noncustodial parents find and keep work, and connecting custodial and noncustodial parents to resources that…
