The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) has released an early childhood and family homelessness resource list in order to reinforce the importance of access to quality early childhood services for young homeless children and their families. The resources listed clarify policy options for State Administrators of Child Care and Head Start Directors to ensure that more young children and their families are served in child care and Head Start programs.

The Accredited Online Colleges Web site posted an article providing Veterans with information on the utilization of funds awarded to them by the GI Bill towards a university education. This article addresses what kinds of education the post 9/11 GI Bill will pay for, any issues or barriers that may stem from this bill, as well as reasons for attending an accredited college. Lastly, this article provides a link to each State's Veterans Affairs Department.

The Institute of Research on Poverty (IRP) hosted Mr. Bryan Sykes, a sociologist at DePaul University, to talk about some of the barriers that former inmates encounter when trying to find work, as well as how the costs of incarceration disproportionately affect young African American men. He also talks about his work on off-the-books labor and how former inmates still face heavy discrimination to the informal economy.

CLASP released an article discussing the new changes that will occur in 2014 to the General Equivalency Degree (GED) test. This change will impact roughly 25.7 million people between the ages 18 and 64 who are without a high school diploma. A major change includes a redesign of the subject-matter tests to incorporate more college readiness standards, as well as moving the test to a computerized-only format. The new GED test will also consider five primary issues that have implications on the youth and young adults participating in the test. These include: test preparation and instruction costs; transitioning to a computerized version; availability of testing centers; and testing content and impact on current GED programs. While there is still controversy about the value of a GED versus a high school diploma, in high poverty communities, the GED may be the only viable option available for individuals like disconnected youth to access employment.

The United States Department of Labor (DOL) released an article addressing the steady gains that have occurred across different sectors of the economy for the past three years. The Jobs Report marks 34 straight months of private sector job growth, which have added close to 5.8 million jobs to the economy. To close off 2012, December finished a strong year of consistent growth with an average increase of around 160,000 private sector jobs per month.

The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities released a report discussing the relationship between SNAP and work among low-income households. The success of the core goals of SNAP in increasing the food purchasing power of eligible low-income households to improve their nutrition and alleviate hunger continues to be well documented. This report discusses previous documentations and addresses labor force participation among SNAP recipients, as well as how SNAP supports work.

This report describes work in Connecticut, Indiana, South Carolina, and Wisconsin to link Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) with other administrative data for operational and research purposes. The report describes the agencies and organizations involved, each state’s planning process, goals, and achievements, and the Urban Institute’s role as technical assistance contractor. All four states proposed linkages with the National Directory of New Hires (NDNH), but two states dropped these plans after learning of costs and limitations of the NDNH. The report concludes with recommendations for supporting future state efforts and for facilitating research use of the NDNH. (author abstract)

The U.S. Department of Labor's Campaign for Disability Employment Policy released a new video public service announcement (PSA) titled "Because." This PSA features real people with disabilities who are pursuing their goals and passions, and intends to replace myths and misperceptions about disability employment with new views of what people with disabilities can do. This campaign aims to serve as an outreach effort to promote the hiring, retention and the advancement of people with disabilities.

The Employment and Training Administration (ETA) issued Training and Employment Notice (TEN) No. 14-12, "Receiving Ticket to Work Payments as an Employment Network." The purpose of this TEN is to announce a streamlined process for the American Job Centers, State workforce agencies, and workforce investment boards to become Employment Networks (ENs) under the Social Security Administration's (SSA) Ticket to Work (TTW) Program. The following are a few highlights from the EN Payment Agreement: 1) it simplifies and reduces paperwork for public workforce entities to become EN's, 2) it permits the use of an Individual Employment Plan to receive payment as EN's, 3) it provides two options for payments, and 4) it permits the use of electronic tools.

Mathematica conducted an exploratory study for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), Food and Nutrition Service, to determine existing measures for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) modernization initiatives. These initiatives included call centers, online systems, document imaging, kiosks, partnering, waiving the face-to-face interview, shortened interviews, and online expedited applications. An integrated report summarizes findings on initiatives across the 45 States participating in the study, including how they monitor and measure performance. It also includes suggestions for performance measures and standards to consider.