This resource from the Office of Family Assistance's Online Work Readiness Assessment (OWRA) aims to help connect case managers to information and resources that they need to help their clients prepare for the workforce. Information is included about various assessments (e.g. for English language needs or learning disabilities) as well as other information and resources such as labor market information.

This Treatment Improvement Protocol from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) explains how an organization can practice trauma-informed care. It discusses what trauma and trauma-informed care are and explains the practical application of this knowledge in service work. The resource also includes a section on what trauma-informed organizations do to improve their practice and how they educate their staff.

The Office of Family Assistance held a Webinar on Integrating Two-Generation Strategies into TANF Programs on Thursday, April 28, 2016 from 1:00-2:30 p.m. EDT. The two-generation approach to serving low-income or disadvantaged families has seen renewed interest in recent years, with models focused on combining comprehensive, career-focused employment and training opportunities for parents with educational and enrichment opportunities for their children. However, state, territory, and tribal TANF program leadership and staff have suggested a need for more targeted TA and information around two-generation approaches and TANF integration and implementation strategies. In this facilitated webinar, presenters provided an overview of the policy components of an intentional two-generation approach and offered tools and resources that may be applicable to the audience’s TANF programs, wherever they lie on the two-generation continuum. Through a “Town Hall” format, presenters also provided planning, policy, and implementation strategies and lessons learned from their own experiences with two-generation integration.

Presenters included Dr. Monica Barczak, Senior Advisor, Administration for Children and Families; Peter Palermino, Program Manager, Economic Security Unit, State of Connecticut Department of Social Services; Elaine Zimmerman, Executive Director, Connecticut Commission on Children; Sisifo Taatiti, TANF Program Manager, Utah Department of Workforce Services; Tracy Gruber, Director of the Office of Child Care and Senior Advisor of the Intergenerational Poverty Initiative, Utah Department of Workforce Services; and Dr. Sharon McGroder, Program Director, Economic, Human Services & Workforce Division, Center for Best Practices, National Governors Association.

From the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, this guide features a collection of resources for TANF administrators and other practitioners on career exploration and assessment, career pathways and sector strategies, and labor market information. These resources may be helpful for those working with TANF recipients and low-income families in connecting their clients to jobs with wages that support self-sufficiency. There are four types of resources included in the guide: 

• Research Studies
• Technical Assistance Resources
• Client Assessments
• Data Sets Related To Education And Employment. (author abstract)

This bill, passed by the General Assembly of the State of Colorado and signed into law by the Governor on June 5, 2015, details the child-support pass through as it relates to the Colorado Works program.

This kit, developed by IDEO, provides tools to help programs engage in human-centered design. Human-centered design is a creative approach to problem solving that starts by learning directly from the people you’re designing for in order to build empathy for them and a deep understanding of their needs to ensure that your solutions suit their needs. The kit includes a field guide, facilitators guide, and case studies. IDEO also offers courses in human-centered design.

These resources collected by the Systems to Family Stability National Policy Academy discuss various tools for assessing family functioning in welfare or healthcare settings. Some of the measures that are used to assess family functioning and relationships by practitioners are also discussed. Additional information is provided about agencies that are using whole-family assessments to take a family-focused approach to service delivery.

This resource from ASCEND at the Aspen Institute discusses the parent engagement part of two-generation programming. Research shows that children engaged with both parents, custodial or not, experience better outcomes in life than children who are only engaged with one parent. This resource, focusing on father involvement, includes an overview of the topic and suggestions for how organizations can take two-generation action to help fathers and families.

This resource from the Duke Initiative on Survey Methodology at the Social Science Research Institute deals with two issues that come up for researchers when asking people sensitive questions: 1) social desirability bias (where respondents answer in the way they know to be socially favorable) and 2) privacy (where respondents don't want to answer a question because they think it's too personal). The tipsheet describes techniques that researchers can use to combat sensitivity to these issues and increase the reliability of surveys.

This 2012 training module from the Washington State Department of Early Learning provides an overview of executive functioning skills, what they are, how they affect children and provides tips to child care workers.