The Santa Clara County Children's Health Initiative (CHI) is an outreach program to expand children's health insurance. The goal of the effort is to make certain that children enroll for all the programs that they are eligible. Overall, parents consistently reported positive feedback about the application process and outreach efforts.

The National Assembly's Family Strengthening Policy Center released this brief on the role that community health workers can play with helping families manage health. Community health workers are trained paraprofessionals who serve as health and human service resource persons in their communities. The brief includes recommendations to help these people become an effective component of health and human services and serving low-income families.

One out of five uninsured American is a child, which equates to 9 million uninsured children in the United States. This report, from the Children's Health Campaign, examines the demographics of uninsured children and consequences for these children for the future.

In the past 10 years, the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) and State Medicaid programs have increased the number of insured children. However, almost 9 million children remain uninsured -- 6 million are low-income children who are eligible for coverage but not enrolled. This article reviews the research and provides information on the benefits of health insurance for children.

This article, from the Kaiser Commission on Medicaid and the Uninsured, reviews the evidence relating to health insurance with the prevalence of uninsured Americans, which reached 46.1 million in 2005. Due to the high costs of private insurance, many low-income families cannot afford health insurance. The following report reviews the policy debate on health insurance coverage for the low-income population.

While the poverty rate has increased in the United States since 2000, this study examined the depth of poverty experienced. Severe poverty can have significant public health concern, and between 2000 and 2004, severe poverty increased dramatically. Health effects include chronic illnesses, more frequent and acute disease complications, and increased costs for health services.

This Web site offers information from the Child Welfare League of America on increasing effective kinship programs in States and explores the role of kinship care in family preservation.

Since the establishment of TANF, welfare cases declined by 52 percent nationally. However, child-only cases declined by only 25 percent. Half of the child-only are currently residing with a relative. There is little information on these children and if they are receiving benefits. This publication explores this population and gives information on the well-being of these children and their needs.

Mentoring programs have a positive affect on improving outcomes for youth; however, there are few programs available for youth with disabilities. This article outlines the benefits of mentoring and reviews accommodations that can be made to existing mentoring programs to include youth with disabilities.

In 2002, 2.3 million youth were arrested for committing crimes. Specifically, low-income urban neighborhoods experience higher rates of juvenile delinquency. These high-risk youth experiences problems in school, in the workforce, and developing healthy relationships. To reduce the impact of delinquency on youth, this article reviews mentoring as a deterrent to high-risk youth engaging in risky behaviors.