Brief
As part of our six-year effort to build research, practice, and policy in the fatherhood field, the FRPN developed a statewide planning initiative to support states in developing long-term plans to enhance father inclusion. This brief describes FRPN’s State Planning Grant Initiative and the activities that funded states pursued to begin the process of achieving systemic change aimed at father inclusion. It also describes the challenges they encountered, their early accomplishments, and the next steps that they plan to take.
Brief
In October 2019, FRPN released a Request for Proposal inviting states to apply for small planning grants to develop long-term plans to enhance father inclusion in state programs and policies. Twenty states applied for a nine-month FRPN planning grant and in January 2019, FRPN made awards of $10,000 to 11 states: Colorado, Connecticut, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Washington, and Wyoming. FRPN funders/researchers supported the statewide planning teams by: preparing a logic model for each planning site highlighting their proposed…
Brief
The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services promotes the economic and social well-being of families, children, individuals, and communities. Many ACF programs interact with and serve fathers in an effort to promote economic self-sufficiency and social well-being for them and their families. Across ACF, we are implementing rigorous research and evaluation projects to better understand how to serve fathers and their families. This brief describes ongoing research and evaluation projects related to 1) ACF’s Responsible Fatherhood…
Brief
The Learn, Innovate, Improve (LI2) process is a systematic, evidence-informed approach to program improvement. LI2 involves a series of analytic and replicable activities, supported by collaboration between practitioners and applied researchers, to help human services programs design, implement, and iteratively test programmatic changes. As a continuous improvement process, LI2 is intended to build practitioners’ capacity for better using and producing high-quality evidence; ultimately, this process can be institutionalized within the program environment.Human services programs (such as…
Brief
This brief addresses the problem of low attendance in programs for low-income fathers. We review approaches to measuring attendance, rates of attendance reported by programs, influences on attendance, the effects of attendance on fathers’ outcomes, and future directions for improving attendance and studying it. (Author abstract)
Other, Fact Sheet
This toolkit is intended as an online tool for programs, states, and tribes where promising practices, programs, and resources are made available on family engagement, described in current research literature as a series of intentional interventions that work together in an integrated way to promote safety, permanency and well being for children, youth, and families. The toolkit can provide an opportunity to connect with colleagues and share program successes and challenges. For this toolkit, we have chosen a few examples and recognize that they are by no means the only programs using some of…
Brief
Since the 1970s, Americans’ household incomes have become more volatile, fluctuating year-to-year and week-to-week. Increased income volatility is particularly prominent among low-income families, many of whom are served by the U.S. system of means-tested income support programs. These programs provide income, goods, and services to families who prove that their income (and sometimes assets) are low enough to qualify for a particular program and meet other program requirements. At initial application, during benefit receipt, and at recertification periods, each income support program has…
Brief
To better understand the challenges federal grantees face in sustaining their programs, and to learn from the successful efforts of former grantees, the Office of Adolescent Health (OAH) launched a sustainability study. OAH’s sustainability study examines whether—and in what form—programs first funded in 2010 to support expectant and parenting youth and families have continued operating beyond the federal grant, and the types of strategies and resources they found useful in attempting to sustain their programs. This brief presents the first set of findings from the sustainability study. It…
Brief
Programs designed specifically to support fathers in their role as parents are relatively new to the policy landscape. Originally emerging as an outgrowth of welfare reform and stronger child support enforcement in the 1990s, fatherhood programs ahve since evolved from a narrow focus on financial stability and support to a more balanced agenda that emphasizes healthy relationships, parenting skills, and father involvement. Accompanying these changes has been a growing interest among researchers in studying the role that fathers play in the lives of their children. In this brief, we…
Brief
This research snapshot from the Behavioral Interventions to Advance Self-Sufficiency (BIAS) project presents findings from the Cuyahoga tests, which demonstrate that low-cost, low-effort behavioral interventions can improve child support outcomes. However, interventions that are more intensive may be necessary to increase overall child support collection amounts, perhaps because some parents have a limited ability to pay. (Author abstract modified)
