This fact sheet profiles the Parents as Teachers program, an evidence-based home visiting approach that builds strong families and promotes positive parent-child interaction so children are healthy, safe, and ready to learn. Findings from a 2004 study on the benefits and costs of prevention and early intervention programs are shared and indicate Parents as Teachers had the largest benefit per dollar of cost ($1.23) of all reviewed pre-kindergarten education programs for children up to age 3. Goals of the Parent as Teachers program are explained and include: enhance parent knowledge of child…
Other, Fact Sheet
This webpage describes the Home Instruction for Parents of Preschool Youngsters program (HIPPY), a home-based early intervention program that helps parents teach skills important to school readiness and success to their 3 to 5-year-old children. This free service is delivered by HIPPY home visitors who live in targeted high-need communities. It explains that all HIPPY programs around the world follow the HIPPY model: a developmentally appropriate curriculum, role play as the method of teaching, a staff composed of home visitors from the community and supervised by a professional coordinator,…
Designed for marriage practitioners, this brief explains the importance of trust in relationships and offers strategies for teaching the value of trust to couples. The keys to trust are explained and include investing time in each other, reliability, understanding, sacrifice, and thankfulness.
Marriage and relationship education (MRE) andresponsible fatherhood (RF) programs share the goalof improving the lives of children by strengtheningthe interpersonal skills of their parents. The origins of these program areas are distinct: MRE beganprimarily as a way to prepare couples for marriagewhereas RF was originally designed to prepareunmarried fathers to reconnect with their childrenand families. However, a common purpose has emerged between the two fields. According to the U.S. Census, more than 2.5 million children areraised in families without their biological father. This statistic…
The nation's Child Support Enforcement (CSE) program is a federal/state/tribal/local partnership to promote family self-sufficiency and child well-being. In most states, approximately half of all child support orders are established and enforced by a federal and state financed child support enforcement entity known as the IV-D program (from Title IV-D of the Social Security Act). About one-third of all children in the United States will receive some assistance from CSE and approximately 58 percent of CSE cases involve never-married parents. Services are available to a parent with custody of a…
This InfoSheet presents research findings from the 2006 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services study, What About the Dads? Child Welfare Agencies' Efforts to Identify, Locate, and Involve Nonresident Fathers, which was conducted by the Urban Institute with the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago. Based on this research, it offers ways in which caseworkers can locate and work with fathers to get them involved with their children.
Fact Sheet, Brief
Series of one pagers designed to clarify existing federal policies that affect formerly incarcerated individuals and their families. The MythBusters cover topics critical to reentry, such as public housing, access to federal benefits, parental rights, employer incentives, and more. As the MythBusters show, some federal laws and policies are narrower than is commonly perceived, as is the case with public housing and food assistance benefits. States and localities often have broad discretion in determining how policies are applied and/or have various opt-out provisions for states (TANF and…
This fact sheet discusses findings from a KIDS COUNT report that highlights the ways in which parents are stretched thin working in low-paying jobs, the effects of inflexible employment on a parent’s ability to provide the emotional and physical care vital for early childhood development, and the detrimental effects of parental stress on children’s cognitive development. It then spotlights five two-generation polices to improve family mobility: home visiting programs, training health professionals to identify risk factors, streamline the process for accessing benefits, connect fathers to…
This fact sheet describes different types of family crises and offers tips for parents to make it through the stress of family crisis themselves and to assist children with any stress that they are experiencing as well.Note: PDF version available.
Spending positive time with both parents promotes child well-being and is associated with better child support outcomes. Unmarried parents do not have systematic access to assistance in establishing parenting time orders, so stateand local child support programs have sought to address this service gap. This fact sheet highlights states and countiesthat coordinate the establishment of child support orders and parenting time agreements. Family violence safeguardsare always a critical component when addressing parenting time. (Author abstract)
