| June 17, 2000 | Contact: |
HHS Press Office (202) 690-6343 |
In June 1995, President Clinton challenged all federal agencies to reach out to fathers to support their positive involvement in the lives of their children. In May 1996, federal agencies came together at a conference hosted by Vice President Gore, and sponsored by the Domestic Policy Council, the National Partnership for Reinventing Government, and HHS, to share lessons learned and innovative ideas about involving fathers.
In June 1998, Vice President Gore released a new report, issued by the Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics, to identify what we know about fatherhood and what additional government research could be undertaken to increase our understanding of how fathering and family structure affect child and adult well-being. As a result of the forum's efforts, HHS is supporting six national research efforts that will increase our understanding of the roles of men and, in particular, fathers, in children lives.
HHS is promoting responsible fatherhood by improving work opportunities for low-income fathers, increasing child support collections, enhancing parenting skills, supporting access and visitation by non-custodial parents, reducing domestic violence, and involving boys and young men in preventing teenage pregnancy and early parenthood. HHS also is working with private, public, and foundation partners to ensure that both fathers and mothers are fully involved in raising their children, not just the first day, but every day of their children's lives. For example, in March 2000, the Vice President announced the Department's approval of ten state waivers for the Partners for Fragile Families Demonstration projects. Working at the community level with non-profit and faith-based partners to provide employment, health, and social services, these projects will test new approaches to involving young fathers with their children and to helping mothers and fathers build stronger parenting partnerships.
Research shows that children benefit from positive relationships not only with their mothers, but also with their fathers:
Keeping fathers connected to their children and increasing fathers' involvement in the lives of their children poses significant challenges for our nation:
While government cannot make good fathers, it can support efforts to help men become the best fathers they can be.
Improving Child Support Collections. An important part of being a responsible parent is providing financial support. Research suggests that there is a positive relationship between non-custodial fathers' involvement with their children and their payment of child support. The Clinton Administration, in partnership with states, has made a strong effort to increase child support payments from non-custodial parents — mothers as well as fathers. In fiscal year 1999, child support collections reached a record of nearly $16 billion, doubling the level of $8 billion collected in 1992.
Supporting Partners for Fragile Families. HHS has a continuing partnership with the private-sector initiative, Partners for Fragile Families (PFF). This initiative is aimed at helping fathers work with the mothers of their children in sharing the legal, financial, and emotional responsibilities of parenthood. In March 2000, HHS approved ten state waivers for the Partners for Fragile Families Demonstration projects. Working at the community level with non-profit and faith-based partners to provide employment, health, and social services, these projects will test new approaches to involving young fathers with their children and to helping mothers and fathers build stronger parenting partnerships. Project sites are located in California, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.
In related activities to help "fragile families", the Office of Child Support Enforcement has funded Fatherhood Development Workshops on effective practices for working with young unemployed and underemployed fathers; the development of a manual for workers to use in helping low-income fathers learn to interact more effectively with the child support enforcement system; and a peer learning college for child support enforcement experts to identify systemic barriers these young fathers face in becoming responsible fathers. In addition, NICHD is supporting a 20-city, multi-year study to explore the functioning of fragile families. This study, being funded through a private/public partnership, will assess the effects of father involvement on child well-being, including fathers who live apart from their children on a permanent or intermittent basis. Preliminary data from several sites indicate that 44 percent of never-married fathers are living with their partners when their baby is born, that over 80 percent of fathers are providing financial assistance to the child's mother during pregnancy, and that over 90 percent of mothers want the father to be involved in the child's life.
Promoting Employment Opportunities for Low-Income Fathers. Seven states have participated in Parents' Fair Share (PFS), a demonstration project that provides employment-related training, parenting education, peer group support, and mediation services to encourage low-income fathers to be more involved with their children and increase their payment of child support. The final reports on PFS' impact on fathers' involvement with their children and on fathers' employment and earnings will be available in August 2000. Furthermore, eight states (California, Colorado, Massachusetts, Maryland, Missouri, New Hampshire, Washington, and Wisconsin) have received Responsible Fatherhood demonstration grants or waivers through the Office of Child Support Enforcement to allow them to test comprehensive approaches to encourage more responsible fathering by non-custodial parents. Each state project is different but they all provide a range of needed services such as job search and training, access and visitation, social services or referral, case management and child support. Initial implementation findings will be available in July 2000. In addition, projects being funded through the Office of Community Services to promote employment include the Action for Bridgeport, Conn. Community Development Family Reunification Program. The program emphasizes four key areas: group counseling, training, earning a high school diploma, and reconnecting fathers with their children. The first class of 13 fathers graduated in May 2000. The graduates, with backgrounds of poverty, incarceration, and substance abuse, are all currently employed.
The Balanced Budget Act of 1997 authorized the Department of Labor to allocate $3 billion in Welfare-to-Work grants to states, tribes, and communities, which can be used to serve non-custodial parents. Amendments proposed by the Administration and enacted by Congress in 1999 will help more low-income non-custodial parents (mostly fathers) work, pay child support, and reconnect with their children. The Department of Labor estimates that over $350 million Work-to- Welfare funds are being invested into responsible fatherhood projects.
The Administration for Children and Families and the Employment and Training Administration in the Department of Labor have issued a joint guidance to state Child Support Enforcement agencies, state Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) agencies and Welfare-to-Work grantees on strategies to enhance the recruitment, referral, eligibility determination and provision of services to non-custodial parents under the welfare-to-work program, (http://www.acf.dhhs.gov/programs/cse/pol/im-00-05.htm). HHS, in conjunction with DOL, is currently conducting a descriptive study of selected welfare-to-work grantees serving non-custodial parents. This study will be completed in September 2000.
The Administration has also proposed a new "Fathers Work/Families Win" initiative through the Department of Labor to help approximately 80,000 low-income, non-custodial parents and low-income working parents work and support their children. Finally, to help more long-term welfare recipients and low-income fathers to go to work and support their families, the Administration's budget will give state, local, tribal and community- and faith-based grantees an additional two years to fully implement the Welfare-to-Work initiative.
HHS has developed a new tool to help fatherhood programs manage and assess their programs. The Responsible Fatherhood Management Information System (RFMIS) will help programs maintain information on the services needed and delivered to fathers in their programs. The system allows programs to track the progress of individual fathers and to gather data on program participants for reporting purposes. The RFMIS is available for use as a paper and pencil tracking system or as an electronic database that can be downloaded into any computer system that uses Microsoft Access. A supplementary data tool for tracking client outcomes will be available by the end of June. RFMIS is available at http://fatherhood.hhs.gov. Click on "What's New." The RFMIS is currently being used by 15 HHS fatherhood project sites and in 8 fatherhood projects funded by the Sisters of Charity Foundation of South Carolina.
HHS' Office of Child Support Enforcement publishes a monthly newsletter, Child Support Report, that often includes news and feature stories about fathers and fatherhood. Current and past issues are available on the Web at http://www.acf.dhhs.gov/programs/cse. Click on "News & Announcements."
In 1999, the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) released A Guide to Funding Services for Children and Families Through the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Program, (http://www.acf.dhhs.gov/programs/ofa/funds2.htm) which provides examples of ways states could use their TANF funds to support responsible fatherhood efforts and employment of non-custodial parents. HHS also provided funding for the National Conference of State Legislatures' guidance on fatherhood program development, Broke But Not Deadbeat: Reconnecting Low-Income Fathers and their Children. This guide is available from NCSL and on the Internet at http://www.calib.com/peerta/pdf/broken.pdf. Several states have begun to use TANF block grant or other funds for individual fatherhood projects or statewide initiatives. Thirteen states have appropriations to use TANF funds for fatherhood programs. Among these states are Florida, Georgia. Minnesota, and Ohio.
Demonstrating That Fathers Matter. U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna E. Shalala and U.S. Secretary of Education Richard W. Riley hosted a two-hour national satellite event with downlinks to over 300 sites. The broadcast offered ideas and strategies to help teachers, school administrators, child care providers, and others to successfully involve fathers in children's learning, including readiness to learn at school, at home, and in the community. This teleconference is part of a larger effort between HHS and Education to make more materials and tools available to teachers, childcare workers and other providers of children's services to help them engage fathers.
Encouraging Fathers to "Be Their Dad." In March 1999, the Office of Child Support Enforcement, in partnership with several states and the Ad Council, launched a new, nationwide public service campaign challenging fathers to remain emotionally and financially connected to their children even if they do not live with them. The campaign's tag line is, "They're your kids. Be their dad." and stresses the importance of fathers by showing the consequences for children when fathers do not have a positive role in their children's lives. The PSAs are available in English and Spanish for TV, radio, and print media.
Improving Paternity Establishment. In October 1999, the Office of Child Support Enforcement distributed to hospitals its new national video on paternity establishment, "The Power of Two: Voluntarily Acknowledging Paternity." The video encourages unwed parents to foster the development of the parent-child bond by voluntarily establishing legal paternity as soon as possible after the child is born. Copies of the video have also been disseminated to over 2,500 Head Start and Early Head Start programs to provide unwed fathers and mothers whose children are enrolled in Head Start with information on the benefits and legal rights and responsibilities of establishing paternity. In fiscal year 1998, nearly 1.5 million paternities were established, an increase of 185 percent or triple the number of 512,000 paternities established in fiscal year 1992. Of these, more than 600,000 were voluntarily acknowledged in-hospital paternities, up from 84,000 in 1994.
Engaging Fathers Early. HHS recognizes that fathers play an essential role in their children's early development. The Early Head Start program was specifically designed to ensure maximum involvement of the important men and women in very young children's lives. A special "Fathers' Study" is part of the Early Head Start research and evaluation program. This Fathers' Study is examining the contribution of poor fathers to early childhood development and how program interventions can strengthen father involvement. Information gathered as a part of this study is now being presented at Head Start and other early childhood development conferences and being used to shape new program activities. As part of the HHS commitment to involving fathers in Early Head Start, the Head Start Bureau plans to offer assistance to enable Early Head Start programs to increase their capacity to involve fathers in their children's lives. Additionally, the Head Start program continues to encourage the development of new and innovative ways to increase the parenting skills of both fathers and mothers and to engage them in program activities. Father involvement in Head Start was profiled in the March 1999 Head Start Bulletin. Copies of this bulletin have been distributed to over 31,000 programs and individuals. HHS regional offices have been instrumental in developing partnerships between Head Start programs and fraternal organizations that encourage minority fathers in their efforts to be more involved in their children's lives. HHS has also worked with the National Head Start Association and the National Center for Strategic Nonprofit Planning and Community Leadership to help develop a father-friendly assessment tool that programs can use to help them develop more inclusive programming for fathers, (See http://www.nhsa.org/parents/parents_father_intro.htm).
Promoting Parental Access and Visitation. Since fiscal year 1997, $10 million has been available each year for block grants to all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories to promote access and visitation programs to increase non-custodial parents' involvement in their children's lives. Each state has flexibility in how it designs and operates these programs and may use these funds to provide such services as voluntary or mandatory mediation, counseling, education, development of parenting plans, visitation enforcement (including monitoring, supervision, and neutral drop-off and pick-up), and development of guidelines for visitation and alternative custody arrangements. The first-year report on the access and visitation block grants indicated that nearly 20,000 clients were served in the 29 states that had reported program data and that parenting education and the development of parenting plans were the two most frequently used services. For example, in Colorado, the Colorado Foundation for Families and Children used block grant funds to produce Connecting With Your Kids: A Guide to Establishing Modifying and Enforcing Parenting Time.
PROMOTING HEALTHIER AND SAFER FAMILIES
Parenting IS Prevention. The Center for Substance Abuse Prevention in the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration has developed an initiative to raise awareness, train and engage parents at every level about the importance of building a close and positive relationship with their children. Built around the theme that parents can and do make a difference, Parenting IS Prevention (PIP) is an integral part of the HHS substance abuse prevention agenda. PIP has produced a parent-focused teleconference series, parent training for the workplace, a parent action guide, a mentoring initiatives guide, and a PIP insert in the July 1999 issue of Readers Digest. These materials were carefully designed to be appropriate for use with both mothers and fathers. PIP is currently assisting community-based parent action groups to implement sustainable parenting programs suitable to their particular communities. Four projects in Texas are developing specific programming for Latino and Anglo fathers. More information about PIP can be found on the Web at http://parentingisprevention.org.
Improving Infant Health through Father Involvement. The Healthy Start Program was designed to develop strategies at the community level to reduce infant mortality and low-birth weight babies. Several Healthy Start Demonstration Programs have developed male mentoring and fatherhood initiatives as part of their strategy to improve the health of women, children, and families. These initiatives include using male outreach workers to involve fathers, providing job training and links to substance abuse programs for fathers, furnishing transportation and child care services to increase fathers' participation, and developing rites of passage programs for adolescent boys.
Mobilizing for Fathers and Their Special Needs Children. HRSA's Maternal and Child Health Bureau continues to support fathers who have children with developmental disabilities and chronic illness, and their families, through the National Fathers' Network (NFN). Information on NFN can be found on the Web at http://www.fathersnetwork.org. In 1999, the NEN held a state "Interagency Forum on Fatherhood" in Philadelphia, which brought together male caregivers, public agency and program representatives, family advocacy groups, private organizations, and community-based groups to learn effective strategies for making programs more "father-friendly." The forum also featured the NFN's training video, "Equal Partners, African-American Fathers and Systems of Care," which has been distributed to health care providers and programs working with fathers and to the Head Start community. Other activities to support the role of fathers have been funded through HRSA's federal block grants to states. Recent efforts in Washington state, for example, included the State Early Childhood Conference and the annual "Fathers Conference."
Increasing Fathers' Involvement in Their Children's Health Care. The Health Care Financing Administration has conducted five focus groups with parents, including non-custodial fathers and custodial mothers and fathers, to determine barriers to their greater involvement in their children's health care. The focus groups were conducted in Baltimore, Maryland (urban fathers), Tennessee (rural fathers), Alaska (native Alaskan fathers), Arizona (Hispanic-Latino fathers) and California (Asian American/Pacific Islander fathers). Information from the focus groups is being used to identify and remove barriers to services. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently released several public service announcements to promote immunization for children, including a Spanish language PSA featuring Hispanic fathers and their children.
Reducing Family and Community Violence. As part of the Administration's comprehensive strategy to prevent domestic violence, HHS and the Department of Justice funded the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges to make recommendations about domestic violence interventions. The Council's report, Effective Interventions in Domestic Violence and Child Maltreatment Cases: Guidelines for Policy and Practice, includes recommendations to strengthen the programming of and funding for better intervention programs. State demonstrations have been funded to examine issues of domestic violence and custodial parents' non-cooperation with the Child Support Enforcement requirements. The report on those demonstrations will be available this fall. HHS is also coordinating a multi-year cooperative agreement with a consortium of Historically Black Colleges and Universities and other minority institutions to develop models to prevent minority male violence. The National Center for Injury Prevention and Control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention continues studies to reduce family and community violence, with an emphasis on early prevention and intervention. For more information, visit the Family and Community Violence Program Web site at http://www.fcvp.org.
Connecting Fathers to Communities through Public-Private
Partnerships
HHS and its regional offices have sponsored a variety of forums to bring
together local public and private organizations and individuals to support
fathers' involvement in their families and communities. Region I, in concert
with the Office of Child Support Enforcement and the Urban Institute, convened
a forum to discuss strategies to connect the dads who establish paternity
each year with resources to help them acquire the skills necessary to provide,
parent, and partner for the healthy development of their children. HHS in
Region IV, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Education, the state
of Georgia and others, held a one-day conference in June geared toward helping
fathers, young and old, from a variety of ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds,
to focus on mentoring parenting and fathering skills, family planning, child
support and other skills aimed at helping fathers play a stronger role in
the lives and education of their children. Regional office contacts for
fatherhood activities are listed on the HHS Fatherhood Web site.
Furthermore, HHS joined with other organizations, including the Department of Labor and the Department of Housing and Urban Development, to support the National Center for Strategic Nonprofit Planning and Community Leadership's "International Fatherhood Conference 2000: Fathers, Families and Communities," in New York City. Working with the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities and the National Practitioners Network for Fathers and Families, HHS convened a meeting of Hispanic, fatherhood, and literacy organizations for a "Dialogue on Hispanic Fathers and Family Literacy." This meeting focused on how to better support Hispanic fathers in promoting their children's educational achievements. HHS has been working with the Johns Hopkins University Center for American Indian Health to identify program and evaluation activities that could strengthen HHS services for American Indian fathers and families.
PREVENTING EARLY PARENTHOOD
Promoting Family Planning Services for Boys and Men. For the past three years, the Office of Population Affairs/Office of Family Planning (OPA/OFP) has funded programs which address family planning and reproductive health information and services for males. While research shows that young men recognize unintended pregnancy, STDs, and HIV/AIDS as serious problems, and that prevention is a joint responsibility, experience has shown that drawing them into family planning/reproductive health information and service programs requires approaches that focus on their needs. OPA/OFP projects are intended to integrate family planning service and education into programs where young males are already receiving other health, education, and social services. In 1997, OPA/OFP began an initiative to involve community-based health and social service organizations in developing, implementing and testing approaches for delivering family planning/reproductive health education and services for men. In fiscal year 1999, a total of $4.7 million was awarded to 24 community-based organizations for these projects. Through HHS regional offices, approximately 30 small grants have been awarded to Title X family planning clinics for employing high school students as interns in the clinics. This program is designed to provide information about allied health professions and job-skills training, as well as education about family planning, reproductive health, and responsible sexual behavior.
Providing a Training Center for Male Reproductive Health. In order to support the efforts of Title X grantees who provide family planning/reproductive health information services to males, OPA/OFP established the Title X Training Center for Male Reproductive Health at Morehouse Research Institute (part of Morehouse College in Atlanta, GA). Morehouse College is the only historically black all-male institution in the United States, and has a long history of research, higher education, and leadership. The Title X Training Center at MRI has four collaborating formal partners - Morehouse School of Medicine, Clark Atlanta University, Emory University, and Georgia State University. Services provided include establishment of a Web site and electronic communications system for the grantees and public on male reproductive health; training in reproductive health (male and female), Title X, organizational behavior and management, and other topics as need is identified; assessment of project activities; and provision of data on male reproductive health. Science-based information and approaches are used in all Training Center activities.
Collecting Information on Prevention Programs for Boys and Young Men. The national evaluation of Title V abstinence programs includes sites that focus on programs for both boys and girls. Preliminary results are expected in December 2001. Projects also have been funded to identify abstinence programs for boys and young men and to develop an information dissemination strategy to provide information to states and local communities on promising abstinence and contraceptive-based programs. Title V of the Social Security Act is one of the largest federal block grant programs. Title V funds support a variety of adolescent health programs in 59 states and jurisdictions, including adolescent pregnancy prevention programs, state adolescent health coordinators, family planning, technical assistance, and other prevention services. As part of the welfare reform act passed in 1996, HHS provides $50 million a year in new Title V funding for state abstinence education activities.
Increasing Knowledge about Fathers. The Federal Interagency Forum on Child and Family Statistics' report, Nurturing Fatherhood: Improving Data and Research on Male Fertility, Family Formation and Fatherhood, is available on the HHS Fatherhood Initiative Web site at http://fatherhood.hhs.gov. HHS is collaborating with other federal agencies, researchers, and private foundations to implement the recommendations of the forum's report:
In addition to the Forum activities, HHS agencies support a number of ongoing research and data collection activities. For example:
NICHD has also sponsored a number of conferences that relate to fathering and other family issues. In 1999, NICHD co-sponsored "Parenting and the Child's World: Multiple Influences on Intellectual and Social-Emotional Development." This conference assessed the state of funding and research on parenting. In October 1999, researchers met at the "Workshop on Youth Violence Interventions" to assess the state of research and research needs in the area of youth violence. In March 2000, researchers at the "Conflict and Cooperation in Families" conference discussed the problem of understanding how families cooperate and manage conflict regarding the allocation of household resources, parenting, roles and values.
Reports and other research and evaluation activities by HHS are available on the HHS Fatherhood Web site.
HHS launched the Quality of Work Life Initiative in December 1996 to help our employees balance the demands of the workplace with the needs of the family. One of the initiative's first accomplishments was the establishment in May 1997 of a Work/Life Center to serve HHS employees. The Work/Life Center routinely offers programs specially oriented toward fathers and maintains a library of information on fatherhood. Most recently the Work/Life Center has sponsored two programs specifically for fathers: "Tool Time for Dads," a three-session series for fathers focusing on building relationships with their children, and "Balancing Work and Family for Fathers."
In November 1998, the HHS Union-Management Partnership Council and the Work/Life Center sponsored the first annual Secretary's Conference on Family Friendly Work Practices, entitled "The Challenge of the Flexible Workplace: Meeting Individual and Organizational Needs." As a result of this conference, the Deputy Secretary issued a directive eliminating all policies that prohibited managers and supervisors from using flexible schedules or flexi-place arrangements otherwise available to employees. Under the leadership of the HHS Union-Management Partnership Council, a pilot program began to work with employees and their supervisors in three sites to help them simultaneously improve productivity and work/life balance-and make the business case for family friendly practices. Recommendations for changes in how work is scheduled are close to implementation and results from the pilots are expected in 2001. A second Family Friendly Work Practices conference was held in May 2000 to address the practical implications for both supervisors and employees of working in a flexible environment.
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HHS' Fatherhood
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U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
Last updated: 05/14/01