Authored by the Institute for Research on Poverty, this resource provides information on how the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) improves infant health. Data show that WIC has modest effects on fetal growth, but there is no relationship between WIC and smoking habits.

Mathematica authored this resource on vouchers and gives an overview of how vouchers are used in public programs. Information is provided on the design and implementation of voucher programs and outcomes associated with existing voucher programs, specifically regarding the Child Care and Development Fund and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families programs.

This resource is from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), Office of Inspector General (OIG), and provides information on OIG’s initiatives from the last 30 years. OIG has continued to work in audit, investigative, and evaluative oversight of Medicare, Medicaid, and the group of public health agencies that comprise HHS. The Office is also confronting new issues in public health under the recent Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003, the Deficit Reduction Act of 2005, emergency preparedness and response and health information technology initiatives.

This brief is from the National Alliance to End Homelessness and provides information on chronic homelessness in the United States. Authors summarize the interaction between emergency shelters, health care systems, and criminal justice and chronic homelessness, and conclude with the benefits and cost effectiveness of permanent supportive housing.

In this policy brief from the National Poverty Center at the University of Michigan, authors examine the relationship between education and health. The findings include evidence that better educated people have lower morbidity rates from the most common diseases in the United States. Authors conclude that education policy has the potential to improve the overall health in our country.

The National Resource Center for Foster Care and Permanency Planning authored this toolkit on kinship care as a strategy to promote permanency for children and families in the child welfare system. Kinship care has grown among families in the United States, and researchers have found that placements with relatives tend to last longer than non-relative placements.

Utilizing the National Center for Children in Poverty’s Family Resource Simulator, this article reviews policies in Illinois that support work and self-sufficiency among families. It was found that Illinois is successful in providing adequate family resources, but rewarding progress in the workforce is still a challenge. The Simulator showed that full-time, low-wage workers in Illinois cannot afford basic family necessities—including housing, food, health care, child care, and transportation—without the help of public work supports.

This is a fact sheet on the Quality Improvement Center on Non-resident Fathers, which was designed to promote additional knowledge development regarding the engagement of non-resident fathers and their children who are involved in the child welfare system. The project will determine what impact non-residential father involvement has on child welfare outcomes.

From the Urban Institute, this report reviews historical and current funding trends of 100 federal programs, including TANF, Supplemental Security Income, Food Stamps, Section 8 Low-Income Housing Assistance and Low Income Home Energy Assistance, Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program. Through the data, authors offer insight into how children fare in the Federal Budget for 2007.

This bulletin addresses the specific challenges of permanency planning with older youth and highlights successful strategies and programs from across the country. From the Child Welfare Information Gateway, recommendations include making kinship care a priority to improve permanency among older youth.