On June 18, 2020 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. EDT, this webinar hosted by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine will review research on current programs and policies. The discussion is in conjunction with the project entitled Building an Agenda to Reduce the Number of Children in Poverty by Half in 10 Years.

The featured speakers include: Jeff Madrick, director of the Bernard L. Schwartz Rediscovering Government Initiative; Greg Duncan, distinguished professor of education, University of California, Irvine; Christine James-Brown, president and chief executive officer, Child Welfare League of America; Dolores Acevedo-Garcia, Gingold professor of human development and social policy and director of the Institute for Child, Youth and Family Policy at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management, Brandeis University; and Cara Baldari, vice president of family economics, First Focus on Children.

On June 10, 2020 from 4:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. EDT, this interactive webinar presented by The Dibble Institute will focus on the roles of state and community-based responsible fatherhood programming, the necessity of addressing trauma in program planning, and providing working solutions to fatherhood program challenges. The featured presenters are Kimberly Dent, Executive Director, The Ohio Commission on Fatherhood, and Avis Files, Director of Pathway, Inc., Toledo, Ohio.

The webinar is free, and organizations that include fathers in their programs are encouraged to attend, as well as fatherhood program managers, front-line program staff, evaluation staff, State and County Department Directors serving fathers and families, and Responsible Fatherhood grantees (current and future).

In this June 10, 2020 opening session scheduled from 10:45 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. hosted by the National Partnership for Community Leadership during the online 22nd Annual International Fatherhood Conference, presenters will discuss programs supporting responsible fatherhood, effective parenting approaches, and strengthening family dynamics in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. This virtual Fatherhood Conference brings together parents, policy makers, researchers, and practitioners working with low-income parents and youth to empower them and provide strategies and resources to strengthen family supports. (Please note that registration fees are required to attend the Conference.)

Featured speakers include: Scott M. Lekan, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary and the Acting Commissioner of the Office of Child Support Enforcement in the Administration for Children and Families (ACF); Clarence H. Carter, Director of the Office of Family Assistance and the Acting Director of the Office of Community Services in ACF; Kimberly Dent, Executive Director of the Ohio Commission on Fatherhood/Ohio Department of Job and Family Services; Ronald Mincy, Professor of Social Policy and Social Work Practice and Director of the Center for Research on Fathers, Children, and Family Well-Being; Debra Pontisso, Chair of the National Responsible Fatherhood Roundtable and Visiting Scholar with the Strong Families Commission, Inc. of Pennsylvania; and Jeffrey Johnson, President and CEO of the National Partnership for Community Leadership.

The National Association of Workforce Boards will host its annual conference as a virtual forum from June 29, 2020 to July 2, 2020. The forum will feature issue sessions, industry roundtables, workshops, and intensive technical assistance sessions with representatives from the U.S. Department of Labor and other partner Federal agencies. (Please note that registration fees are required to attend the Forum.)

This brief assesses the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on kinship care; it also defines kinship care and the role that kinship caregivers play in their respective families. Ways to support kinship caregivers are illustrated, including increased funding support and temporary changes in licensing requirements.

The U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration has compiled a set of resources to guide stakeholders in understanding the components of apprenticeship and creating and running a successful apprenticeship program. The resources include: Introduction to Apprenticeship: A Five-Part Toolkit; Building Registered Apprenticeship Programs: A Quick-Start Toolkit; Registered Apprenticeship 101 (a webinar series); Five Elements of Apprenticeship Expansion (includes lessons learned from state apprenticeship expansion); Registering Apprenticeship Programs: The Basics, Challenges, and Solutions; and Apprenticeship On-the-Job Learning FAQ Sheet.

This Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation report assesses services offered by the National Domestic Violence Hotline and loveisrespect (a help line targeting young people). The report identifies immediate outcomes for individuals who contacted these organizations and then two weeks after the initial contact. The report’s findings can be used to support efforts for monitoring and improving services for those affected by domestic violence and intimate partner violence.

This report highlights the MyGoals for Employment Success demonstration, an employment coaching program where participants are empowered to set and achieve goals by focusing on executive skills, which are the mental skills used to conduct tasks. These skills include stress tolerance, emotional control, time management, organization, perseverance, and mental flexibility. The use of executive skills affects how participants can navigate the labor market, acquire credentials, and work performance. The report presents findings on how the MyGoals model was operationalized and implemented among participants living in public housing in Baltimore, Maryland and Houston, Texas.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has created three websites that provide training on various Executive Function Skills Concepts and Models: EF Works Library, which houses curated resources for human services programs to learn about and implement an Executive Function-informed approach to service delivery, with a focus on services to adults; Goal, Plan, Do, Review/Revise Online Training Course, a practical research-based framework for setting and achieving goals that draws on insights about executive skills, as well as other aspects of brain and behavioral science; and Wish, Outcome, Obstacle, Plan (WOOP), a science-based mental strategy to find and fulfill wishes, set preferences, and change behavior.

In honor of May’s National Foster Care Month, the Associate Commissioner of the Children’s Bureau writes in this blogpost that incorporating family voice into the permanency-planning process and encouraging collaboration between parents and resource parents can help the community, the courts, and related professionals inform a highly supportive child welfare agency culture. The blogpost provides a link to the updated National Foster Care Month website, which includes new resources and outreach tools showing how partnerships between parents and children, agencies, community organizations, and the courts can help support reunification and strengthen family and community connections.