This resource from the Administration for Children and Families provides information about recognizing the signs of teen dating violence in teenagers for professionals, parents, and other caring adults to prepare them for discussing dating violence with teens in their life. It highlights the signs of dating abuse, how to talk to a teen dealing with an abusive relationship, and how to connect them to services. The site also links to many resources, including the Hanging Out or Hooking Up: Teen Safety Card so teens can evaluate their own relationships for signs of abuse.

This Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) website helps readers get familiar with the issue of Teen Dating Violence. It provides background information, tips for addressing the issue by focusing on healthy relationships, and links to useful tools and important prevention initiatives such as Dating Matters^®: Strategies to Promote Healthy Teen Relationships. This violence prevention training, created and distributed by the CDC, focuses on 11- to 14-year-olds in high-risk communities. The initiative is evidence-based and includes examples of programs across the U.S.

A virtual roundtable was held on November 30, 2017 from 1:00-5:00 p.m. EST, co-presented by the Office of Family Assistance, the Office of Child Support Enforcement, and the Family and Youth Services Bureau. Via plenaries and breakout sessions, the roundtable  defined family violence, explained good cause, and highlighted examples of excellence across the nation.

The Opening Plenary Session was titled, "Family Violence and Accessing and Applying for Public Benefits and Work Supports: Challenges and Solutions," and was led by Dr. Janet Mickish, Lead Trainer and Manager of Staff Development, Colorado Department of Human Services and Krista Del Gallo, Public Policy Manager, Texas Council on Family Violence (TCFV).

The Plenary was followed by 4 breakout sessions to include:

• Breakout Session #1: Discussion Around Building Good Relationships with DV Coalitions and Programs
• Breakout Session #2: Promoting Disclosure and Safety for Victims Accessing Child Support
• Breakout Session #3: Establishing Good Cause
• Breakout Session #4: Family Violence with Native American Populations

The roundtable closed with a plenary titled, "State and Local TANF/Child Support Programs of Excellence," led by Meghan McCann, National Conference of State Legislatures; Amber Harchuk, Temporary Assistance to Domestic Violence Survivor’s (TA-DVS) Policy Analyst and DHS Domestic Violence Co-Located Advocates Program Coordinator; Belit Burke, Self-Sufficiency Program Administrator, Oregon Department of Human Services; and Traci Underwood, Program Coordinator, Economic Justice Project, Washington State Coalition Against Domestic Violence. 

This bulletin discusses the second National Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence (NatSCEV II), which was conducted in 2011 as a followup to the original NatSCEV I survey. The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) sponsored both surveys. The Crimes against Children Research Center of the University of New Hampshire conducted the NatSCEV I survey between January and May 2008. NatSCEV I represented the first comprehensive national survey of children’s past-year and lifetime exposure to violence, crime, and abuse in the home, school, and community across children and youth from ages 1 month to 17 years. (For more information on NatSCEV I, see “History of the National Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence”). (author introduction)

In recognition of October as Domestic Violence Awareness Month, Administration for Children & Families (ACF) program offices have released a series of Information Memoranda (IM) and other guidance discussing the importance of addressing domestic violence situations and providing resources and support for victims and their families.

Domestic violence is a leading cause of homelessness among families with children. This blog post from the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH) describes how communities can use the 2017 Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Continuum of Care (CoC) competition to increase access to housing for domestic violence survivors. There are four key ways that CoC leaders, homelessness service and housing providers, and domestic violence providers can strengthen their collaboration and partnerships. They can make sure they include victim services advocates as voting members on the CoC board, provide cross-training on trauma-informed care and other topics relevant to domestic violence, analyze data on the prevalence of domestic violence among people experiencing homelessness, and integrate safety planning into assessment procedures.

Domestic violence is a leading cause of homelessness among families with children. This blog post from the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH) describes how communities can use the 2017 Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Continuum of Care (CoC) competition to increase access to housing for domestic violence survivors. There are four key ways that CoC leaders, homelessness service and housing providers, and domestic violence providers can strengthen their collaboration and partnerships. They can make sure they include victim services advocates as voting members on the CoC board, provide cross-training on trauma-informed care and other topics relevant to domestic violence, analyze data on the prevalence of domestic violence among people experiencing homelessness, and integrate safety planning into assessment procedures.

Domestic violence survivors often face challenges when trying to secure safe and affordable housing. This special collection from VAWnet provides resources to help providers of services pertaining to sexual assault, homelessness, and housing serve the housing needs of domestic violence survivors. The collection starts by describing the intersection between domestic violence and homelessness, especially for survivors of color. Next, the collection provides case studies illustrating partnerships between domestic violence organizations and affordable housing providers, and supplies four key strategies for helping addressing survivors’ barriers to safe housing. The collection also includes relevant public policies and statistics on the intersection between domestic and sexual violence, housing, and homelessness.

Children who are exposed to violence can experience negative effects throughout their lives, regardless of whether it is violence in the community or domestic violence or abuse at home. This RAND report, sponsored by the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, details the Safe Start project, which evaluated evidence-based programs aimed at mitigating the negative impact of violence on children. Safe Start consisted of two phases: the first phase was a demonstration of promising practices to address children’s exposure to violence and the second phase implemented those promising practices in 15 cities across the country. All sites were able to implement their programs, but families received fewer services than planned. The report includes these implementation challenges and offers recommendations for future programs serving children who have been exposed to violence.

There is currently limited evidence on the effectiveness of domestic violence program services. To fill this gap, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation contracted with the Center for Policy Research and the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence to identify where the evidence base could be stronger for domestic violence programs. This report summarizes the current evidence on domestic violence and highlights innovative and concrete areas of opportunity for building the evidence base. While domestic violence programs do show some evidence of contributing to survivor well-being, the research is limited and often has methodological issues. The researchers found multiple opportunities for strengthening the evidence base, such as supporting researcher-practitioner partnerships, supporting culturally-relevant research, building on the current theory of change, and developing and validating new measures of program components and outcomes.