While a wide range of factors contributes to an individual’s economic mobility or movement up and down the economic ladder, the ties between food insecurity and economic inequality are demonstrated. Individuals who experience a lack of food security face mental and physical health consequences that can directly impact their employment status, use of the health care system, and other factors that impact upward mobility. Jurisdictions are working to improve the food security of residents by integrating local efforts and working with key community partners to enhance food production, transportation, and distribution. The National Association of Counties and National League of Cities held a webinar in June 2022 that featured an expert overview of the state of food insecurity in the United States as well as example solutions from Franklin County, Ohio and Dane County, Wisconsin.

The U.S. Department of Labor’s Employment and Training Administration, Division of Youth Services, will host a webinar on October 6, 2021 from 1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m. ET to showcase success stories of youth work experience providers and lessons learned from implementing their programs during the COVID-19 pandemic. Videos covered in the webinar include Early Childhood Resource Center, an Ohio-based child care work experience provider; Kalamazoo Regional Educational Service Agency, which offers summer youth employment; New Hampshire Jobs for America's Graduates (JAG), which connects youth with health care providers; and the Virginia WIOA Youth Summer Program. The webinar will allow participants to interact with Division of Youth Services staff to learn more about work experience requirements.

In observance of National Adult Education and Family Literacy Week, September 19-25, this compendium highlights nine practices that represent holistic approaches to delivering adult education programs. These programs represent approaches for modeling effective integrated education and training (IET) programs—transitioning adult learners from adult basic education to postsecondary education or training, and increasing access to adult education services. The practices are drawn from programs in Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Kentucky, Massachusetts, North Carolina, Ohio, and Texas.

The third of a three-part series, this April 27, 2021 webinar from the Center for Health Care Strategies examines the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic reducing young children’s access to in-person early childhood and learning programs. Presentations covered approaches that states and communities might use to address development and learning needs as the children reenter early childhood and learning settings. Speakers included representatives from the Ohio Department of Education, the North Carolina Department of Health Benefits (Medicaid), and the Office of Head Start.

The Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Family-Centered Community Change (FCCC) is a two-generation effort in Buffalo, New York; Columbus, Ohio; and San Antonio, Texas. This report estimates the staff labor costs for two-generation coordination and integration in these three communities, which may assist other localities and nonprofit service providers in budget planning, specifically for partnership development and coordinated service delivery.

This report assesses the Families Forward Demonstration (FFD), which aimed to integrate employment and training within child support programs. The FFD program included free occupational skills training, employment services, and wraparound supports. FFD emphasized “responsive” child support services that helped parents understand their support obligations, and suspended some enforcement actions as parents participated in the program. FFD was implemented in five jurisdictions: Cuyahoga County, Ohio; Franklin County, Ohio; Calhoun and Jackson Counties, Michigan; Benton, Franklin, and Walla Walla Counties, Washington; and New York City.

This brief is a case study that reviews the relational factors between two Cleveland-based employment training programs–Youth Opportunities Unlimited and Towards Employment–as they came together to develop a Youth Adult Resource Center (YRC). It discusses how YRC incorporated positive youth development approaches at the staff level, and presents how these approaches helped to improve YRC’s ability to meet the needs of Cleveland’s youth and young adults.

This report covers the results of a study completed by the United States Government Accountability Office on challenges facing grandparents and other older kin becoming primary caregivers. The report examines the numbers of grandparents and other kin serving as primary caregivers for children and reasons for that care. It also notes challenges kinship caregivers face and how they are addressed, and the extent to which the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services supports states’ efforts to use relevant programs and initiatives. The report highlights kinship care in four selected communities in New Mexico, New York, Mississippi, and Ohio.

The Annie E. Casey Foundation’s Family-Centered Community Change® initiative used a two-generation approach to support parents and their children in three high-poverty communities. On April 29, 2021 from 12:00 p.m. to 1:15 p.m. ET, the Foundation will host a webinar with a panel discussion of practitioners and evaluators from the Urban Institute on how two-generation approaches influenced the practitioners’ work and how the approaches evolved during the initiative. Panelists also include representatives of the United Way of San Antonio and Bexar County, Community Properties of Ohio Impact Corporation, and Buffalo Promise Neighborhood.

This blogpost illustrates how Jewish Family Services (JFS) of Columbus (Franklin County, Ohio) transitioned operations and adapted its practices as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. The blogpost focuses on the JFS Journey program; Journey assists low-income individuals engaged with the Franklin County child support agency in obtaining new or better jobs, which helps them meet their support obligations. The discussion covers how JFS worked with local employers in the distribution industry to create placement opportunities for its clients, how JFS transitioned its group employment services digitally, and how new forms of staff and client engagement and procedures may be retained in a post-pandemic environment.