This brief examines the Accelerating Opportunity initiative that began in 2011, which helps adults with low basic skills obtain well-paying jobs through increasing their credentials. It reviews the implementation, impact, and cost benefits evaluations of the program in Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, and Louisiana. It showed promising gains for low-skilled adults in the area of education, but earnings impacts were mixed.

This series from MDRC explores what networks of organizations can accomplish in communities. The researchers are focusing on nine Chicago neighborhoods, combining social network analysis with in-depth interviews to see how community organizations can collaborate with one another on local improvement projects. Specifically, the researchers are studying how networks affect the power of individual community groups, how networks promote effective partnerships, how those partnerships can unite people from diverse communities, and how those networks change over time. The first two parts of the series provide an introduction to social network analysis and illustrate the power in networks of community organizations.

Employment is crucial for preventing and ending youth homelessness, and programs need to be well-designed and implemented to help these youth find and keep jobs. The Heartland Alliance is hosting this webinar to share policy approaches, program models, and best practices aimed at helping youth experiencing homelessness find employment. Speakers will include representatives from the National Alliance to End Homelessness, A Way Home America, and Heartland Alliance’s National Initiatives, as well as practitioners from New Moms/Bright Endeavors in Chicago and Daybreak Dayton/Lindy & Company in Dayton. The webinar will take place on Wednesday, September 27th from 2:30 to 4:00 PM EST.

This report by the Urban Institute describes findings of the Work Support Strategies (WSS) initiative, which helps states improve their service delivery, run programs more effectively, and modernize. Through technical assistance, grants, and peer learning, WSS aids state programs in Colorado, Idaho, Illinois, North Carolina, Rhode Island, and South Carolina. This report discusses business process redesign efforts undertaken by these states and the outcomes of these efforts.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Office of Family Assistance (OFA), Regions IV, V, VI, VII, and VIII hosted the Tribal Technical Assistance Meeting on May 3‐5, 2016 at the Hilton Minneapolis/St. Paul Airport Mall of America Hotel in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The meeting brought together Tribal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) and Native Employment Works (NEW) stakeholders to discuss innovative strategies and collaborations to promote economic and social well‐being for individuals, families, and tribal communities. During the meeting, tribal representatives engaged in talking circles and listening sessions, shared best practices, and participated in workshops and action planning in order to more successfully serve the program participants in their communities.

This resource from CLASP presents 12 key lessons from the Work Support Strategies (WSS) initiative, which provided grant funds and technical assistance to help six states (Rhode Island, North Carolina, South Carolina, Illinois, Colorado, and Idaho) analyze their service delivery systems and implement improvements to ensure that more families get the full package of work support benefits for which they are eligible. The information can help leaders and advocates in other states review programs and streamline processes to ensure that low-income working families can access and keep benefits for as long as they are eligible.

This report documents the use of probabilistic record linkage methods to calculate participation in the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) program.

The innovative approach undertaken in this effort matched National Survey of Early Care and Education (NSECE) household records with CCDF administrative data from the State of Illinois to form a combined database of survey and administrative data. This unified database resembles one from a cross-sectional survey that, by asking retrospective questions, identifies households’ participation in social programs — in this case, the CCDF.

The report includes methodological challenges encountered, as well as lessons learned in linking NSECE households across the two datasets, and in defining CCDF subsidy participation. In order to illustrate how to employ the unified database in applied research, it concludes with an exploratory study of the associations between selected household characteristics and CCDF program participation. (author abstract)

The Joyce Foundation launched Shifting Gears in 2007 to assist six Midwest states to increase the number of low-skilled adults with the education and skills they need to succeed in the 21st century economy. The Joyce Foundation extended Shifting Gears funding from 2012 – 2014 in Illinois, Minnesota, and Wisconsin. These states had committed to expanding adult education bridge programs to increase the number of students transitioning into postsecondary education. This report examines the progress made in each state from 2012 – 2014, and also briefly reviews how the Shifting Gears work influenced the national discourse on increasing skills and credentials for adult learners.

Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program stakeholders and their human services partners increasingly understand the importance of meaningfully engaging noncustodial parents while also holding them accountable for the economic and social growth of their children. A noncustodial parent does not have primary care, custody, or control of the child and may have an obligation to pay child support. It is important to note that many noncustodial parents pay child support and are actively engaged in their children’s lives. However, barriers such as unemployment, underemployment, or incarceration can hinder noncustodial parents from providing for their children, even when many want to do so. Some TANF agencies and their partners have built programs to provide the necessary supports and connections for these individuals to help them achieve self-sufficiency/

The OFA PeerTA Network hosted a webinar on June 9, 2015 at 1:30 PM Eastern, titled Strategies for Building and Maintaining Noncustodial Parent Programs to share strategies for building and sustaining programs to engage and serve noncustodial parents. While previous webinars have focused on strategies to engage noncustodial parents, this webinar focused on the nuts and bolts of program development; it introduced several programs that have supported noncustodial parents for at least 10 years and explored how these sustainable programs were planned and initiated.

At the end of this webinar, participants were able to:

• be aware of three models of TANF programs and their partners creating programs to serve noncustodial parents
• understand how these programs began, including justifying the need for a program serving noncustodial parents, mapping available assets, and identifying a champion; and
• be ready to identify some next steps that they could take within their agencies to start a program that would work for their communities.
Featured presenters:

Ann Marie Winter, Chief Operating Officer, and Margie McGranahan, Employment Services Director, Gulf Coast Jewish Family and Community Services. Established in 1996, Florida’s Noncustodial Parent Employment Program aims to help unemployed or underemployed noncustodial parents establish a pattern of regular child support payments by obtaining and maintaining employment. It is operated through a series of partnerships between organizations such as CareerSource Pinellas and the Gulf Coast Jewish Family and Community Services.

Juan G. Valdez, Parent Support Services Manager, Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services. The Parent Support Services program in Illinois was established in April 1994 to provide noncustodial parents with a way to address their needs and concerns to support their children. TANF dollars are used to provide specific services to qualified noncustodial parents.

Mike Roberts, Human Services Program Specialist for Districts 2, 3 and 6, Alabama Department of Child Abuse and Neglect Prevention. The Alabama Fatherhood Initiative is a joint effort of the Department of Human Resources Family Assistance and Child Support divisions, developed in 2002 to further the welfare reform goal of strengthening families, enhancing child support collections, and addressing other needs of children who are growing up without the involvement of natural fathers in their lives.

The Administration for Children and Families' Office of Family Assistance (OFA) Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII hosted a webinar, "Grandparents Raising Grandchildren and Other Child-Only Issues" on Wednesday, August 20, 2014 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. EDT. This webinar was the second in the 2014 Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII Tribal TANF webinar series "Addressing the Needs of Children." The Webinar provided strategies for addressing the needs of the growing population of grandparents who are raising their grandchildren, particularly those with child-only, TANF-eligible grandchildren. The speakers provided strategies and resources that were relevant to both social service providers and grandparents.