When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March 2020, researchers were already conducting a text message survey of service workers who had children. With the start of lockdowns and business closures, the researchers pivoted to start asking these workers about job and income loss, challenges that stemmed from school and childcare shifts, their mental health, and whether they were able to access government benefits. This podcast presents an overview of survey findings and discusses how what researchers learned fits within the larger context of low-wage work in the United States. The podcast is hosted by Anna Gassman Pines, Duke University, and reflects research that she and Elizabeth Ananat, Barnard College, conducted.

Many workers in hourly front-line retail and food service jobs have been subject to low pay and few benefits for decades. More recently, these workers' challenges have been compounded by increasingly unstable and unpredictable work schedules due to shifts cancelled or shortened with little notice, inconsistent days or times of day they are expected to work, little advance notice when schedules are posted, or having to be on-call without a guarantee of being paid. This policy brief illustrates how schedule unpredictability has a direct connection to how often workers struggle to provide adequate food, housing, and medical care for themselves and their families. The brief also notes how instability can also affect workers' ability to access social safety net programs.

NPR, The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and Harvard University’s T.H. Chan School of Public Health conducted a survey poll between August 2 and September 7, 2021 to identify the extent that the delta variant of the COVID-19 outbreak in the United States has continued to cause problems for many households, including severe financial and health impacts for households already in crisis. This report presents survey findings of the most serious problems, including finances, healthcare, racial/ethnic discrimination, education, caregiving, work, health and healthcare, and overall well-being. The poll was conducted before federal pandemic unemployment benefits ended and at the time housing eviction protections expired.

COVID-19 has amplified health inequities in American Indian communities because of underfunded and under-resourced health systems, limited access to health services, poor infrastructure, and underlying health disparities. These new data maps track the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact across more than 100 Tribal Nations, streamline data collection efforts, and provide visualizations to display the pandemic’s disparate impact in areas not typically monitored by mainstream media sources. The depictions of the Tribal Nations are limited to federally recognized Tribal nations in the continental United States and Alaska Village lands.

This Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation brief describes the experiences of six employment programs participating in the Next Generation of Enhanced Employment Strategies (NextGen) Project. The brief presents key takeaways from their efforts to maintain and develop new connections with employers during the COVID-19 pandemic. Four of the programs serve people with mental illness; one serves TANF participants with disabilities or who care for dependents with disabilities; and one serves young adults with disabilities who are transitioning from school to work. The brief offers lessons for other employment programs about promising strategies for working with employers that might endure beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.

This blogpost references a Generations United report’s policy and practice recommendations on how to better support grandfamilies. Included in the report are findings from the first nationwide survey of grandfamilies during COVID-19, which revealed heightened needs related to housing, food insecurity, and alternative care plans. The report contains policy and practice recommendations that would provide better support to these families, such as increases in TANF funding for monthly child-only grants to mirror foster care maintenance payments and improved access to TANF child-only grants through a simplified application process and expanded community outreach. The report also depicts racial overrepresentation in grandfamilies, and the blogpost highlights the benefits of kin caregiving.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Office of Family Assistance (OFA) conducted the 2021 National TANF Directors’ Meeting from September 20 - 24, 2021. During this concurrent workshop, speakers from two projects funded by the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation presented research and on-the-ground experiences from programs that adapted service provision to maintain and develop new connections with employers during the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as respond to job seekers’ health, substance use, and recovery needs.

This report is an evaluation of Warren County, Ohio’s Child Assessment and Response Evaluation (CARE) project, a 24/7 rapid-response intervention for children at the scene of an overdose of a parent or loved one. It describes how CARE improved perceptions of children services and strengthened the existing foundation of cross-agency collaboration. The evaluation draws upon surveys and interviews with first responders, emergency dispatch, children services officials, and families affected by substance use disorders.

This case study profiles Kentucky’s Targeted Assessment Program (TAP), which provides comprehensive assessment and intensive case management for parents in the state’s child welfare and TANF systems. The program’s goals are to support participants in overcoming barriers to self-sufficiency and family safety with a focus on mental health, substance use, intimate partner violence, and learning disabilities or deficits in 35 counties statewide. The case study also notes services provided by TAP; how the program manages staffing, communication, and funding; and how program participation and outcomes are measured. The case study also highlights TAP’s promising approaches, challenges, and future plans.

(See also Resources on "domestic violence" in the Resource Library)

This case study profiles Solutions for Change (Solutions), which supports families experiencing homelessness in San Diego County. The Solutions model progresses through a highly structured, three-phase, 1,000-day program. The sequence includes dedicated case management; onsite mental health services; 12-step support groups; unpaid work experience; parenting; employment readiness training classes; and a series of life skills. The case study notes where the Solutions model operates, its background and approach, and whom it serves; what services are provided; how it is organized, staffed, and funded; and how it measures participant progress. The case study also discusses the model’s accomplishments and challenges.