The National Center for State Courts (NCSC), Kansas Judicial Branch, and the National Center on Domestic Violence, Trauma, and Mental Health hosted a webinar where experts delved into the multifaceted challenges families often face, from mental health issues to trauma, violence, and substance use disorders.

Presenters also discussed the Well-Being in Family Court effort, which provides individual and systemic changes that help judges and staff:
· Understand the impact of stress and trauma on judges and court personnel.
· Assist families experiencing trauma and mental health conditions.
· Leverage early case interventions to improve case handling and stretch community resources.
· Navigate cases where mental health is potentially weaponized.
· Provide for child safety and well-being during family transitions.

Over 2.4 million children in the United States are living in grandfamilies. These are families where grandparents, other relatives, or close family friends are raising children because the children’s parents are unable to do so. This Generations United report aims to bring attention to the mental health and emotional wellness of grandfamilies, shed light on their resilience and challenges they face, and provide innovative solutions and resources to better support them. The report also includes policy and program recommendations for strengthening these families.

In 2022, the Center for Advancing Policy on Employment for Youth (CAPE-Youth), in collaboration with the White House Office of Public Engagement, hosted a virtual roundtable discussion on “Improving Mental Health Service Delivery for Youth and Young Adults with Marginalized Racial Identities.” The event highlighted how mental health policies can help states promote positive long-term outcomes such as higher employment rates for youth and young adults (Y&YAs), including Y&YAs with disabilities who belong to marginalized racial groups. This CAPE-Youth brief provides a summary of various ideas and strategies participants raised during the roundtable discussion, highlighting:

• Expanding culturally responsive mental health care;
• Increasing access to mental health supports; and
• Embedding mental health programs and supports into workforce systems.

This webpage presents the priorities of the Tribal Behavioral Health Agenda (TBHA), which were identified through discussions with Tribal leaders, Tribal administrators, and Tribal members. It is organized around five foundational elements: historical and intergenerational trauma, a socio-cultural-ecological approach, prevention and recovery support, behavioral health systems and support, and national awareness and visibility. It also includes cross-cutting considerations and additional considerations for collaboration. The TBHA is not an exact map but an initial step toward driving action in the same direction and along a common path.

This Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration guide focuses on the process of adapting evidence-based practices (EBPs) for under-resourced populations who experience obstacles in obtaining healthcare services because of their socio-demographic characteristics, and the research supporting such adaptations. The guide provides examples of research on adapted EBPs for mental health and substance use disorders for clients with a wide range of demographic characteristics.

The U.S. Congress temporarily expanded the Child Tax Credit (CTC) during the COVID-19 pandemic to provide economic assistance for families with children. Between July and December 2021, CTC increased the amount of money they provided per child and the eligibility criteria was expanded to reach more economically disadvantaged families. Using data from the Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey and a quasi-experimental study design, this Health Affairs article examines the effects of the expanded CTC on mental health and related outcomes among low-income adults with children, and by racial and ethnic subgroup.

The influence of welfare and family self-sufficiency programs on a range of social well-being outcomes has received limited focus in research and evaluation. Therefore, the Measuring SUCCESS project, funded by The Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation (OPRE), conducted focus groups with 44 caregivers to hear from them on how self-sufficiency programs and policies relate to families’ social well-being. This OPRE brief provides caregivers who contributed to the focus groups with a summary of how the research team incorporated their voice into the project. Several themes emerged from the caregiver focus groups, including mental health, nonfamilial families, and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families’ successes as well as challenges.

Some of the most dynamic, responsive industry partnerships are developed between rural community colleges and local employers. When colleges, employers, and communities work together to create these place-based opportunities, they can develop workforce education and training programs and career pathways that put students on a path to good jobs, meet the workforce needs of local employers, and improve the economic prosperity of rural communities. This National Skills Coalition report highlights how industry partnerships benefit rural learners and employers alike – and shines a light on the rich variety of rural contexts, state systems, investments, and policies that can help drive and sustain effective partnerships between rural community colleges and local industry.

Evaluations of employment and training programs often use state unemployment insurance (UI) wage records to measure effects on participants’ employment and earnings. However, UI wage records have some constraints, including:

• Missing earnings from certain types of work, such as self-employment, informal “off-the-books” jobs, and employment with the federal government; and
• Not capturing out-of-state work. This MDRC brief examines the implications of relying only on in-state UI wage records to evaluate programs that are designed to increase employment and earnings.

This brief builds on the work of National Evaluation of Welfare-to-Work Strategies, an assessment of a series of programs that were implemented and evaluated in the 1990s, by presenting differences between the National and Oregon-only data sets in employment rate impacts annually through Year 20. It also presents year-by-year differences in earnings impacts, comparing Oregon-only earnings data with data from a broader group of states.