Brief
Policies and practices that support young men of color in their teen years can help put them on the path to lead healthy and productive lives. Young men of color face more obstacles in education, employment, and health than their white peers. In order to improve health and success of middle- and high school-aged young men of color, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) launched Forward Promise in 2011.To inform this new initiative and better understand the issues at work, RWJF engaged the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) to conduct roundtable discussions, online surveys, and telephone…
Brief
This brief provides an overview of the evidence supporting the interrelatedness of employment, healthy relationships, family well-being, and recidivism. It also gives the perspectives of expert program practitioners who are successfully integrating programming related to employment, prison reentry, healthy relationships, and responsible fatherhood. (Author abstract)
Brief
This brief highlights programs that are re-thinking services for children and families based on the science of early childhood development and understanding of the consequences of adverse early experiences and toxic stress. Efforts by Acelero Learning in New York City, the Westside Infant-Family Network in Los Angeles, and Catholic Community Services of the Mid-Willamette Valley and Central Cost in Oregon are described.
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This brief reviews current research on the unique experiences of blended families and suggests practices to improve effective coparenting. (Author abstract)
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This research brief shares findings from an evaluation of the Responsible Fatherhood, Marriage and Family Strengthening Grants for Incarcerated and Reentering Fathers and Their Partners (MFS-IP), a program that funded services to support families in which one parent was incarcerated or recently released. The Office of Family Assistance (OFA) within the Administration for Children and Families of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services provided up to $500,000 per year for five years to twelve grantees. OFA's family strengthening initiative required grantees to work with both…
Brief
Many programs for low-income fathers involve partnerships with multiple agencies to help recruit and serve more fathers, offer a broader array of services, and even gain access to new funding streams. In this brief, we summarize findings from the Strengthening Families Evidence Review (SFER) on forming and maintaining such partnerships. The SFER, a systematic review of family-strengthening programs serving low-income fathers or couples, was conducted by Mathematica Policy Research under contract to the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation within the Administration for Children and…
Brief
This research brief discusses some of the fundamentals of quality program implementation that have been identified through research and practice and that may be useful for practitioners and researchers alike. The brief defines quality program implementation, and highlights the importance of a high quality implementation, identifies 23 factors that affect implementation, discusses 14 steps in achieving quality implementation (10 of which need to occur before a program starts), and notes that responsibility for quality implementation is shared by key stakeholders. The factors that can affect…
