Wisconsin’s Youth Apprenticeship program is the oldest and largest ongoing youth apprenticeship (YA) program in the U.S. As youth apprenticeship has reemerged as an attractive option for preparing young people for careers, Wisconsin’s YA program offers interesting insights to policymakers and practitioners. The state funds the program in a way that emphasizes local control, administration, and outreach to high school students and employers. This Urban Institute brief highlights the program’s history, recent growth, and structure and draws on perspectives from state officials, local program directors, and employers.

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.

This Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation brief describes the experiences of three organizations that adapted existing interventions to provide remote work readiness activities or education and training services during the COVID-19 pandemic. It summarizes common challenges that made it difficult for participants to engage in remote services, adaptations made by the organizations, and considerations for remote service delivery after the pandemic. The brief draws upon information gathered from an Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training (I-BEST) site in Des Moines, Washington, Project Quality Employment Through Skills Training (QUEST) in San Antonio, Texas, and a Wisconsin Regional Training Partnerships (WRTP) site in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

The Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin at Madison hosted a webinar on November 4, 2021 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. CT, which explored ways that fathers’ roles and responsibilities shifted during the pandemic. Topics included father involvement in childcare and support for virtual learning, how the pandemic heightened existing challenges for low-income and noncustodial fathers, insights from practice and research, and supports that fathers may need to maintain positive changes or recover from negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. Representatives from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, the City of Milwaukee, the University of Michigan, and the 4Dad Fatherhood Initiative in Kalamazoo, Michigan made presentations.

The University of Wisconsin’s Institute for Research on Poverty will host a webinar on September 15, 2021 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. ET to explore approaches to better serve children with an incarcerated parent. Presentations will examine the costs of children being separated from their parents due to incarceration, research on how to improve outcomes for children and their parents, and efforts made by law enforcement agencies and their partners to serve these families more effectively. Speakers include Julie Poehlmann-Tynan and Pajarita Charles, both from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, and Dane County (Wisconsin) Sheriff Kalvin Barrett.

The Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin at Madison hosted a webinar on December 2, 2020, which covered father-specific parenting programs targeting expectant and new fathers and young, low-income, and unmarried fathers. Presenters highlighted peer-to-peer programming for new fathers led by the African American Breastfeeding Network; a Dads Matters effort that brings fathers into perinatal home visiting programs; and the work of the Milwaukee Fatherhood Initiative that offers father-focused legal, health, and education services and parenting support.

The Urban Institute will host a webinar on November 13, 2020 from 1:00 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. ET to discuss apprenticeship policies and practices and ways to utilize apprenticeship programs in the future. Speakers include representatives from the Urban Institute, the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development, Oberg Industries, CareerWise Colorado, the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development, the House Committee on Education and Labor, New America, and Jobs for the Future.

This research-to-practice brief summarizes interview findings from juvenile justice system administrators in communities that are moving away from youth prisons and toward investing in community-based solutions. The interviews from these agency administrators identified four key lessons: maximize windows of opportunity to establish a continuum of community care; develop strategic partnerships with advocates to prioritize relevant issues for juvenile justice reform; collaborate with youth, families, and community members who interact with juvenile ex-offenders; and use data and research to make the case for closing youth prisons. Interviews were conducted with juvenile justice administrators in Louisiana, Wisconsin, New York, and the District of Columbia.

This Centers for Disease Control and Prevention set of resources identifies three case studies of how states have utilized research on adverse childhood experiences to inform child abuse and neglect prevention. The case studies reflect research to practice implications for service delivery in Alaska, Oklahoma, Washington State, and Wisconsin.

The Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin at Madison will host a webinar on February 19, 2020 from 1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m. CT to discuss ways that a father’s health and behaviors impact their children’s well-being. Researchers will present findings about fathers’ experiences in prenatal and pediatric care settings and strategies for promoting fathers’ physical and mental health; also presented will be findings on how to support fathers in modeling positive health behaviors for their children.