Special Improvement Project Grants (SIP) Awarded in FY 2005

This grant responded to 2005 priority Area 5: Improving Local Collaboration Strategies between Child Support and Community Agencies. The project was undertaken to improve collaboration between sister agencies (child support and child welfare) in multiple jurisdictions. The project sought to promote collaboration by bringing together top-level managers and other key representatives of child welfare and child support agencies in targeted jurisdictions to discuss shared concerns and engage in the development of plans to improve the handling of cases jointly held by both agencies.

The jurisdictions that participated in the project were: Camden County, New Jersey; Clackamas County, Oregon; Davidson County, Tennessee; Hampden and Worcester counties, Massachusetts; Hennepin County, Minnesota; Los Angeles County, California; Milwaukee County, Wisconsin; and Oklahoma County, Oklahoma. Representatives of these jurisdictions participated in one of two, two-day meetings that were held in Washington, D.C., in July 2006 and July 2007. The major topics they considered were ways of locating fathers for adoption and placement purposes, improving paternity establishment in foster care cases, referring appropriate cases to child support agencies for collection purposes and avoiding inappropriate referrals that might impede reunification goals, and communicating about changes in custodial arrangements so that child support is distributed appropriately. Representatives of both agencies also wanted administrators and line staff to better understand the key goals and pressures that their counterparts face and the role that they each play in processing shared cases.

The conferences led to the development of site-specific action plans that itemized the steps each agency hoped to take to achieve shared objectives dealing with communication and collaboration. These were developed and amended over time as the conference representatives returned to their agencies and began to work on implementation. The Center for Policy Research monitored the progress that participating jurisdictions made through a series of site-specific and cross-site conference calls.

A review of the action plans developed by participating jurisdictions reveals that all areas of concern received at least some attention. Six of the eight chose to focus on cross-agency training, two chose to focus on policies and practices that govern the referral of child welfare cases to the child support agency, four made communication between child support and child welfare a focal point of the action plan and developed liaisons and work groups to achieve this goal, and two designated specialized child support staff to handle foster care cases and improve coordination with child welfare agencies. Subsequent to these collaboration meetings, the CSE Data Safeguarding final rule was published, new legislative authority for permanency planning was enacted related to child welfare and OCSE and Children?s Bureau have met to facilitate the appropriate exchange of locate information between the two agencies. The two Federal agencies issued guidance on appropriate referrals from state child welfare to State CSE agencies. IM -07-06

Project Findings

Questionnaires completed by 28 conference attendees, or 70 percent of participants who still hold positions with child support or child welfare agencies, showed that the conferences were viewed extremely favorably, with nearly all participants reporting continued activity on the action plan following the conference and progress in each of the areas targeted for improvement. In addition, conference participants said that they learned a lot about the operations of their sister agency as well as their own, and that they gained insights on how to improve ways of processing joint cases and conduct pilot projects to test out new ideas. Virtually all participants in both types of agencies view future conferences with additional jurisdictions as a very or somewhat helpful way to create further impetus for collaboration.

The Child Support and Child Welfare Project was an effective way of promoting coordination. Participants in every jurisdiction credited the project with moving the needle on interagency collaboration. Although many had developed relationships with sister agencies and had expressed prior interest in furthering collaboration, these liaisons had occurred only at the highest levels of agency management and efforts to coordinate had typically stalled after some initial planning sessions. The project provided the framework and timelines that busy people need to set aside some time and energy for a discretionary, future-looking activity like interagency collaboration. The Washington, D.C., conferences allowed participants the physical separation from their regular duties and pressures to concentrate on collaboration issues. The conferences also afforded participants exposure to their counterparts in other geographical settings and to national experts, conditions that helped stimulate thinking about new ways of doing things and about importing and exploring promising practices. Finally, the process of developing an action plan ensured that each jurisdiction left the conference with a blueprint for future action, along with a specific set of intermediate steps, a tight timeline, and a division of labor.

While the project was an effective, external source of coordination, the experiences of the eight jurisdictions in implementing their action plan suggests that other factors come into play in making change. The following are some more general lessons on how to further interagency coordination and collaboration that perhaps apply to other settings and agency pairs.

Lessons Learned

Effective Collaboration Requires a Push from the Top. Collaboration efforts take extra time and energy. In the short-term, these efforts may appear to detract from the performance objectives of individual agencies. Making collaboration a priority requires a push from the top. The project involved the participation of top-level managers from both the child support and child welfare agencies. These leaders provided the impetus for the collaboration effort and the momentum to sustain it. In one jurisdiction, resolve at the top was fueled by a lawsuit brought by a long-separated father and daughter against the child welfare agency that illustrated the dangers of failing to collaborate. In other settings, managers realized that their performance objectives could not be met without collaborative efforts.

Effective Collaboration Requires Tenacity. Directives from the top do not immediately translate into reality without a lot of persistence and follow-through. One agency tends to assume a lead role, and the manager of that entity needs to stay on top of the effort. It requires constant reinforcement. As one administrator put it, We sent reminder after reminder about meetings or things we had agreed to do. It involves a lot of cajoling and constant follow up.

Effective Collaboration Requires Realistic Expectations. Collaboration is not everyones top priority. Successful efforts require that participants have perspective and realistic expectations about what partner agencies will do and their time frames for performance. Partner agencies have other important goals and deadlines. Managers say that it is important to acknowledge these diffuse and conflicting pressures and cut other participants some slack.

Effective Collaboration Requires Focus on a Few Key Objectives. The 2006 and 2007 conferences resulted in the generation of a long list of proposed interventions that were subsequently pared back to a manageable list. In most jurisdictions, collaboration between child support and the child welfare agency wound up involving the conduct of cross-agency training programs and the development and improvement of communication techniques, including interagency liaisons. Other more elaborate plans that involved new staffing or technological innovations were dropped or postponed pending implementation of top-ranked interventions that could be accomplished more quickly.

Effective Collaboration Requires Building and Maintaining Relationships. Ultimately, cooperation across agencies requires building relationships with individuals in sister agencies. Managers emphasize the importance of connecting with their responsive counterparts in sister agencies, cultivating these ties, and reinforcing them over time. These individuals are then equipped to sell ideas to others in their agencies. While technology and geography definitely feature in promoting or hindering collaboration, the consensus is that positive collaborative efforts across agencies are still rooted in human relationships and that attention should be paid to their cultivation.

Project Plan

This two-year grant responds to 2005 Priority Area 2: Improving Judicial/Administrative Child Support Enforcement Processes. NCJFCJ was to provide State court judges and other judicial officers with practical, easy-to-use tools to aid them in fashioning realistic and enforceable child support orders. The overarching goal of the project was to help judges in the establishment of child support orders that more appropriately addressed the financial circumstances of both parents, thereby reducing arrearages and creating a culture of compliance within which parents are more likely to support their children.

The judiciary plays a critical role in creating a culture of compliance where the obligor perceives that justice is being done. To that end, NCJFCJ convened a Project Advisory Group of national experts to develop several informative and practical resources in order to provide needed information to judges dealing with child support issues. This Project Advisory Group consisted of family court judges and Title IV-D directors from around the country who work with child support matters on a daily basis. With the aid of that group, NCJFCJ developed three practice-based and user-friendly tools, including two technical assistance bulletins and a set of benchcards. In order to evaluate their usefulness and practicality, in late 2007 the tools were pilot tested in courts around the country as well as presented at several national conferences and trainings.

Project Findings (from the final report)

One of the grant's objectives was to provide judges with practical information about utilizing problem-solving court principles in their child support docket. To meet this objective, NCJFCJ developed a technical assistance bulletin, "Integrating Problem-Solving Court Practices Into the Child Support Docket." By presenting practical examples of how judges can improve practice in child support cases by applying a problem-solving approach, this tool shows how problem-solving principles can help build a culture of compliance in which parents will support their children voluntarily and reliably.

Another goal was to provide judges with a practice-based tool to improve court practice in the challenging area of setting medical child support orders. In order to ensure that a support order accurately and realistically reflects the resources of the parents, NCJFCJ developed a second technical assistance bulletin entitled "Why Medical Child Support Is Important-and Complex." The bulletin contains historical perspectives, Federal statutes and regulations on medical support orders, checklists and guidance for setting medical support orders.

The final tool focused on improving court practice regarding process service and default orders. NCJFCJ produced a set of judicial benchcards, "A Practice Guide: Making Child Support Orders Realistic and Enforceable," which also offer assistance on retroactive support orders and guidelines for determining income, along with worksheets and checklists.

The tools produced under this grant were disseminated nationally by NCJFCJ and are also available to download on NCJFCJ's website at www.ncjfcj.org . An estimated 10,000 hard copies of the judicial tools were distributed nationally and additional copies were copied from the website making the products some of the most popular and widely used products of that kind.

Lessons Learned

The convening of a Project Advisory Group of national court/judicial and IV-D experts to develop the tools identified under the grant was a positive and practical way to address common issues from the perspective of both communities. It facilitated the development and ultimate usefulness of the products produced. One of the proposed deliverables, the drafting of a model order regarding medical support was problematic. The consensus was that there are too many ways in which state courts can order the provision of medical support to sustain one universal template. As a consequence, a more generic technical assistance bulletin was developed instead. Unfortunately, due to changes in Federal regulations, the medical support bulletin that was produced had a limited 'shelf life' but based on its popularity and level of interest with the judiciary consideration may be appropriate for revision and further dissemination. This would likely require a separate project. The original proposal stated that NCJFCJ would select 40 pilot sites to test the usefulness of the publications produced under this project but that proved to be difficult as well. Although many judges were using the tools on the bench and reviewing the documents they did not believe they had the time to complete the testing. Collection of feedback from 'peer review' and presentations at multiple regional and national training events within both the IV-D and judicial communities proved to be a suitable alternative.

Ultimately, the tools and the project itself received universal praise from the field for being user friendly and incredibly practical in terms of improving outcomes for children and families. It also resulted in the creation of a Child Support web page on the NCJFCJ website. This is in no small part because of the effective collaboration that took place between the judiciary and members of IV-D communities.

This three-year grant responds to 2005 Priority Area 3: Improving Child Support and Marriage Education Services for Ethnic and Culturally Diverse Populations. In an effort to promote desirable child support outcomes and better the chances for Alabama children's healthy development, the Alabama Children's Trust Fund (CTF), in direct partnership with the Alabama Child Support Enforcement Division (CSED), Alabama A & M University's Family Life Center in Huntsville (FLC), Auburn University, and the Alabama Healthy Marriage Initiative (AHMI) will support the further development of the "Family Connections in Alabama" (FCA) Special Improvement Project. The FCA project is utilizing the Family Life Center to target Huntsville (Madison County), Alabama due to the high need for improvement in child support outcomes in Madison County, the strong interest of the Child Support Staff in the county for this project, and the capacity of the FLC to successfully implement the project design.

The project will build on lessons learned from previous work in the state of Alabama around issues related to healthy marriages, family stability, and greater child well-being. This project will specifically target African-American and Latino non-married parents who are IV-D clients and who have a youngest child age 2 or younger. An innovative, multi-pronged recruitment and retention strategy will be utilized. Male/female teams and couple mentors from within the target communities will manage the program participation and delivery of the child support services information and marriage education (ME) services. Child support workers will provide educational sessions on child support services and will partner with project personnel to track objective measures of child support outcomes. In the first year 48 participants are expected to complete the program and 96 new participants are expected to complete the program in each of the following two years.

ME services include the newly-developed, research-based "Loving Couples, Loving Children" (LCLC) curriculum, appropriate for an ethnically diverse fragile family population and available in English and in Spanish. The Alabama Coalition Against Domestic Violence (ACADV) will provide training and continued support in the domestic violence protocol to be used in the project to ensure a "do no harm" policy. A rigorous evaluation methodology, involving a comparison group, will be used to examine the implementation process and project success in meeting the primary goals: effective delivery of child support enforcement services and healthy marriage education services. The grantee expects that lessons learned from the SIP grant will inform their efforts to develop a model program for Alabama and other states that serve to eliminate barriers that make it harder for ethnic and culturally diverse populations to seek child support assistance, establish paternity, and to form and sustain healthy marriages and families.

This seventeen-month grant responded to 2005 Priority Area 1: Customizing Approaches for Improved Customer Service. In order to be more responsive to families, mostly Hispanic migrant workers, residing in remote areas and facing multiple barriers to obtaining child support services, the Monterey County Department of Child Support Service created a Mobile Service Unit (MSU).

The mobile office provided comprehensive child support services by expert bilingual specialists. Staff were trained to be Notaries and administer genetic DNA tests in order to offer these additional services, as needed. The approach not only provided the personalized assistance needed by disadvantaged persons to navigate a process foreign to them, but alleviated the clients' fear of going to a government office. The project was designed to improve performance of the local child support agency, decrease default judgments, increase the support collected and avoid arrears buildup.

Services were advertised via flyers in various public facilities and markets with schedules of visits to the various sites. Staff attended service provider coalition meetings and gave other service providers their schedules and information about services offered.

Project Findings (from the Final Report)

The MSU was effective in providing a full range of services specifically tailored for the targeted population and in the client's language with full explanation of the forms and process involved. Most clients did not have access to transportation or time to take off from work to go to a local child support office, which was not conveniently located. The mobile unit helped address these problems.

A pre/post evaluation was conducted. Output data were collected for clients served by the MSU and clients served in the office. Here are several findings:

Customer contacts were increased as desired over the year prior to the project implementation and the MSU served 532 clients (295 custodial parents; 237 noncustodial parents). Increases were reported for Compromise of Arrears Program, Modifications, Stipulations, Service of Summons and Complaints and Genetic Testing.

Collections on current support orders obtained by the MSU were higher than for the main office (64 percent versus 55 percent). There were no significant differences in measures between the MSU and the main office in time elapsed to service of process, time to order, paternity established, or arrears payments. Cases with orders were lower for the MSU.

Customer service is another area in which it was clear that the MSU was valuable, from the total contacts and services provided, to the anecdotal evidence and testimonials. Project staff was very successful in collaborating with partners to utilize space convenient for the clients.

Due to the dire needs and constraints of the population served, completing and processing the paperwork required more time and effort than anticipated. Lengthy explanations and assistance were necessary for most clients. Fifty-five percent of the clients needed services in Spanish. Even though the MSU staff obtained Language Line services to provide interpreters for other languages, the services were not needed. Fewer clients were seen than projected.

Technical issues occurred causing some implementation delays. Fortunately, they were resolved by the information technology crew. The in-house selection of compassionate and competent bilingual staff was very important to put clients at ease and be able to communicate with them.

Expanding relationships with the community and other related programs, including law enforcement, benefited the project. Various services were provided for parolees by The Police and Corrections Team, which is a collaboration of local law enforcement jurisdictions and the State Parole Office. Staff from the MSU met with recent parolees to provide services as they transitioned back to the community. Office space was obtained by partnering with county libraries, Head Start, the Department of Social and Employment Services, county courthouse and county water district.

Despite the successes, the project was discontinued due to staff shortages and budget constraints.

This two-year project responded to 2005 Priority Area 5: Improving Local Collaboration Strategies between Child Support Enforcement and Community Agencies. The Georgia State University Research Foundation proposed to facilitate a collaboration of interested partners to address the problems related to issues of unmarried teen parents between the ages of 17 and 20. The partners included several churches and faith-based organizations, representatives of the Administrative Office of the Courts (AOC), Juvenile Courts and Court support staff and associates in DeKalb and Fulton counties along with Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) personnel.

This Coalition imported the successful Parenting and Paternity Awareness (PAPA) project from the State of Texas. The AOC, OCSE, GSU law students and other associated legal professionals provided the technical assistance involved in adjusting the Texas PAPA curriculum to fit Georgia State laws and requirements. Two new Georgia laws related to Child Support were incorporated into the curriculum revision. The new laws included changing the method of setting guidelines for child support from a gross income model to a shared income model; the second law allowed fathers to legitimate their children by voluntary acknowledgement made contemporaneously with the acknowledgement of paternity.

This project had a goal of conducting a minimum of two training sessions each month for a total of 24 sessions. It was anticipated that 10 teen parents would be served in each session for a total of 240 participants. The program evaluation was to be based on data collected by several partner providers and from records of the Office of Child Support.

The program was to measure success using the following indicators: participants who 1) opened an OCSE case (who did not have a case previously); 2) established paternity; 3) established child support obligations; 4) increased amount and frequency of child support payments; 5) entered the Georgia Fatherhood Program; 6) entered the Georgia Child Access and Visitation Services program; 7) legitimated their child; 8) become engaged or married.

Project Findings (from the Final Report)

There were difficulties with the project implementation. The project seemed to change focus: 45 individuals from 29 agencies and community programs were trained as trainers for the PAPA curriculum while the plan had been to train teen parents, not partners. Two hundred fifty (250) participants were enrolled. However, it is not clear who trained whom or where the training sites were. There also were issues with the evaluation which was incomplete: no statistics were provided on how the program measured success for the indicators listed above for these 250 enrollees. The report indicated that in one class 8 of 12 fathers reported establishing paternity and legitimating their children.

This seventeen-month project responded to 2005 Priority Area 1: Customizing Approaches for Improved Customer Service. Episcopal Social Services (ESS), Wichita, Kansas Reliable Income for Kids Coalition (RIK) tested two proactive interventions, pro se legal facilitation and a customized system of arrears forgiveness, separately and in tandem. The chief goal was to make child support a reliable source of income by helping noncustodial parents comply with child support orders which they have been reluctant or unable to pay.

During 1995 through 2005, ESS operated a Support for Children Program designed to increase the amount of child support which reached families. As a court referral program, the Support for Children Program assisted noncustodial parents in overcoming the barriers preventing them from paying support. Funding for the Support for Children Program came from ESS operating funds raised from the community and from United Way. During 2004, the Program Director examined additional strategies for overcoming barriers, which included pro se legal facilitation and debt forgiveness as an incentive for regular and consistent payments by NCPs. The demonstration project, which began in October 2005, involved the application of these two new incentive strategies, in addition to the services of the ESS Support for Children Program provided using funds from the United Way, to the cases of IV-D noncustodial parents referred to the RIK project

The purpose of pro se facilitation was to provide education and empower a participant to address and resolve their child support issues. Services consisted of legal education provided through one-on-one meetings with a licensed attorney on contract with the Project for up to two and a half hours per participant. A variety of subjects was covered and participants were instructed on how to file motions and represent themselves in court on child support modifications, parenting time and custody issues.

The purpose of debt forgiveness was to establish a pattern of compliance and also give the noncustodial parent an opportunity to see financial benefit from making payments. Debt forgiveness was given in steps to provide continuing encouragement to make payments. Arrears forgiveness allowed participants to earn partial forgiveness of up to 30% of debt owed to the State of Kansas for in full and on time payment of the ordered amount for specified periods of time starting at 3 months of payment earning 5% forgiveness.

The RIK partnership, consisting of ESS, the local IV-D agency, the State District Court and Kansas Workforce Development cooperated to manage referrals, payment incentives, and outcomes. RIK offered free pro-se facilitation and legal education aimed at resolving a variety of child support legal issues and barriers coupled with arrears forgiveness incentives provided by the Kansas IV-D agency in exchange for consistent payment of support to a targeted group of IV-D noncustodial parents who were found in contempt of court. The purpose was to determine if providing these incentives, pro se facilitation and arrears forgiveness, affect the rate of payment. The approach included the establishment of four experimental groups to test the effect of each intervention separately, and in tandem, against the results from a control group. Participants were randomly assigned to one of the four groups at the time of RIK enrollment. Signed case plans were developed for each participant and progress was tracked.

It is important to note that in addition to these two new interventions, all participants in all four groups, even those in the control group, were provided services through the ESS Support for Children Program funded by the United Way. Those services included Focus Classes on Cooperative Parenting, Life Skills, Budgeting and Money Management, and Kansas Family Law; access to the ESS job search lab and Employment Counseling; the assistance of a family support case manager to monitor job search activities and assist in removing barriers that may prevent employment.

Project Findings (from the Final Report):

An external evaluation of the RIK Project was performed by Mr. Robert Hull, Vice President for Research at the Cerebral Palsy Research Foundation of Kansas. His report describes results that are encouraging and statistically significant. Data collected from November 2005 through April 2007, indicated that 207 participants who enrolled remained active in the RIK project.

Because the goal of the project was to make child support a reliable source of income, it is important to note that all statistics reported for this project, including total collections and rates of payment, are compiled only from the cases of IV-D noncustodial parents who paid their full monthly obligation amount in the month it was due. Of the 50 Group A participants who received pro se facilitation, 61% paid their full child support ordered amount; of the 50 participants assigned to Group B who received the opportunity to earn arrears forgiveness, 54% paid in full; of the 54 Group C participants who received both the pro se facilitation and the arrears forgiveness opportunity, 62% paid in full; and of the 53 control group participants who received neither pro se facilitation nor the arrears forgiveness opportunity, 51% paid in full. It should also be pointed out that a significant number of other participants made partial payments toward their child support obligations. Noncustodial parents who paid in full in all four experimental groups in the RIK project paid a total of $491,762 in child support during the project. Even though payment statistics for these participants before their RIK involvement was not gathered, it is reasonable to conclude that they had been paying little or no support prior to their RIK involvement since participants were referred to the RIK project because they had been found in contempt of court for failure to pay support.

The 104 participants in Groups B and C were able to earn forgiveness of State debt. Twenty-eight participants earned debt forgiveness of 5% of their State debt owed for consistent payment for 3 months; 7 participants earned 10% debt forgiveness for 6 months of consistent payment; 7 earned 20% for 12 months of payments; and 2 earned 30% debt forgiveness for 17 months of consistent payment. State debt forgiven during the project totaled $27,506.

The pro se facilitation and legal education process resulted in increased parenting time for the NCP and allowed the NCP to resolve other legal issues. Of the 104 participants in the two groups eligible for pro se facilitation, 54 individuals sought information and met with the facilitator. Of these, 17 filed motions with the court. Three filed motions to modify child support and two qualified for lower payments. Six individuals filed motions to change legal custody and all six motions were granted. Four filed motions to terminate current child support because of custody changes and all four were granted. Three of the four participants who filed motions for parenting time were granted specific parenting time with their children, while one case was referred for mediation.

Other notable results attributed to the RIK Project as a whole include:

• 74% of participants resumed or commenced paying child support payments within 90 days of enrollment;
• 66% of those unemployed upon entering RIK obtained employment within 90 days of enrollment; and
• 46% of participants seeking help with visitation problems (19 of 41) reported increased contact with their children.

Lessons Learned:

When comparing the payment rates from all four groups, the two groups that received pro-se facilitation either alone or in combination with arrears forgiveness had notably higher rates of payment over the control group and the group who received arrears forgiveness only.

This triangular interdisciplinary methodology consisting of a partnership among a faith-based organization, the local IV-D agency, and an enforcement contractor (in this case a District Court Trustee) showed itself to be a highly effective means of organizing more efficient customer service in the context of an incentives program.

Originally, the RIK project was designed to serve recently released felons as an additional pilot group, in addition to the NCPs who were referred by the Court Trustee, to study the affect of the interventions on prisoner reentry issues experienced by that targeted population. Although ESS established a relationship with the Inner Change Freedom Initiative, a Christian faith-based, pre-release prison program, to refer program participants, there were too few recently released felons to refer to properly constitute a pilot group and test the affect of these payment incentives. Several attempts were made by the grantee to increase referrals; however, they were not able to enroll a sufficient number of recently released felon NCPs.

RIK instituted for the first time in the State of Kansas a program of pro se facilitation for NCPs. RIK developed a checklist of NCP concerns which was used to compile a profile of barriers which concerned each NCP. This profile is useful in developing recommendations for use in programs which might want to replicate RIK services.

The Project Coordinator recommends that in advance of enrollment, NCPs should be screened in order that program case managers may learn which incentives are likely to be most effective for each individual. For example:

• pro se checklists indicated 35% of NCPs had visitation issues that they considered important legal barriers to payment, and 24% desired information on child support guidelines because they may possibly want to modify their orders. These NCPs may be best served by directing them immediately upon enrollment to a pro se facilitator.
• Though not originally identified as an evaluation element, the Project Coordinator noticed that noncustodial parents were not equally motivated by the prospect of earning arrears forgiveness. Only a few NCPs in the project with debt between $20,000 and $52,000 earned any arrears forgiveness while NCPs with arrears under $20,000 were much more likely to earn arrears forgiveness. The Project Coordinator observed NCPs in RIK who were earning wages slightly above the minimum wage who had high arrears as well as other debts. Through discussions with them and their case manager the Coordinator concluded that earning partial debt forgiveness was not as meaningful to these NCPs because they could not envision themselves ever paying off their debt. More investigation is needed into how debt forgiveness can be more effective for NCPs owing higher balances perhaps offering higher percentages of forgiveness would supply the needed motivation, or studying how much a noncustodial parent owes to the State and how much to the custodial parent when applying this incentive to determine its effectiveness.

The Project Coordinator documented many instances in which a NCP received pro se facilitation but did not follow through with the filing of any motion to modify a support order or visitation schedule, or to enforce a visitation schedule. ESS highly recommends that future programs offering pro se facilitation obtain the cooperation of Judges to waive filing fees in order to encourage NCPs to participate in the legal process rather than continue to avoid payment as a response to these perceived legal burdens and barriers.

This project is responsive to 2005 Priority Area 3: Improving Child Support and Marriage Education Services for Ethnic and Culturally Diverse Populations. The South Baton Rouge Christian Children's Foundation, Refined By Fire Ministries, Inc., Dixon Correctional Institute and the Louisiana Department of Support Enforcement Services are collaborating on a three-year project that will provide healthy marriage education and child support services to underserved ethnically diverse non-married, custodial and non-custodial parents. The overall goal of the project is to ensure that the children of these prisoners receive the support necessary for healthy development by strengthening the relationship between their parents and increasing the emotional and financial involvement of custodial and non-custodial parents in the lives of their children. The target audience is 90-120 inmates in Dixon Correctional's re-entry program who have less than a year before release. The program addresses barriers for unwed parents such as: a lack of knowledge about the importance of family stability, marriage and child support to child well-being; lack of healthy relationship and parenting skills and access to programs that promote family formation; and the child support obligations that do not stop when a parent becomes incarcerated. To address these problems, the project will focus on educating the inmates on the importance of family stability, marriage and child support and how they affect child wellbeing, increasing the skills of inmates in healthy relationship and parenting skills training before and after release, and assisting the inmate in establishing a relationship with Support Enforcement and taking responsibility for child support payments so that their families have a chance for healthy involvement after the inmate is released.

This two-year SIP grant responds to 2005 Priority Area 4: Health Care Coverage in Child Support Cases. This project is designed to reduce the number of uninsured children in Michigan. This will be done by automating the process of identifying child support orders that include healthcare coverage of the child and collecting data to enable state workers to assess the options available. Pertinent information (vital records, Medicaid eligibility, child support enforcement) that resides as unconnected data in the data warehouse will be cleansed and integrated. The grantee will also assist in securing the best option for healthcare coverage for the children. Once the at-risk children are identified, child support orders will be cross-checked with other state agency information to provide a complete health insurance profile of the family. This process will assist local enforcement agencies in targeting the non-custodial parents to provide the health care coverage required by court order. The grantee will utilize current technology and existing data as a foundation on which it could build a file-sharing system that makes use of state computing equipment and systems that are already in place. Utilizing data systems currently in place to enhance effectiveness and communication between agencies could be replicated in other states. The evaluation plan will focus on how many children gain healthcare coverage or improve their coverage as a direct result of the new process. The grantee will work with the Michigan Department of Human Services Office of Child support.

Project Plan

This two-year grant responded to 2005 Priority Area 2: Improving Judicial/Administrative Child Support Enforcement Processes. The project sought to assure that child support orders more appropriately address the circumstances of both parents by:

• improving service of process procedures;
• use of voluntary agreements to establish paternity and support; and
• improving access to the courts by using more culturally sensitive documents and by overcoming perceived obstacles to procedural justice.

The projects title, "Reducing Paternity Defaults with Es," emphasized three initiatives to improve paternity establishment by reducing the number of defaults:

• explaining the process to fathers;
• educating them on the importance of participation and the consequences of non-participation; and
• encouraging future participation.

These initiatives were implemented via a customer service liaison unit and by training process servers to be sensitive to the needs and fears of men on whom they serve papers. During the second year, the project performed a statistical analysis and conducted the final evaluation. The goal was to produce a gradual improvement that increased the number of answers to paternity complaints filed, thereby reducing default orders.

Background

Most paternity orders, approximately two-thirds, are entered by default because the men fail to appear in court on their cases. The hypothesis was that failure to appear resulted from lack of understanding the court process, and/or fear of the legal process. Default paternity orders might result in paternity being established when the man is not the biological father; default support orders, based on little or no information, may result in an amount that may be more than the father can pay, leading to large arrears that may never be fully paid.

The basic approach to reducing the number of default orders was to talk with alleged fathers two times early on:

• When the alleged father was served with paternity papers, the contractual, private process server would attempt to EXPLAIN the paternity process to them, EDUCATE them on the importance of appearing in court, and ENCOURAGE them to participate in their case. A one-page "Answer" form was handed to the man to admit being the father or request a genetic test. It also asked for personal information about the man. Additionally, a project brochure and "Hotline" calling card were provided.
• Within two weeks, one of two contractual "Hotline" representatives would call the alleged father by phone in order to further explain, educate and encourage. Additionally, these "Hotline" representatives collected relevant data from experimental and control cases for evaluation purposes.

The service-of-process and "Hotline" operation took place basically during the first year. The second year focused on identifying and reviewing case data and compliance data in control cases, and compliance data in experimental cases. These data were: paternity established or excluded; default or non-default; type of service of process; plaintiff present or absent; helpful support information; income withholding information; support information on both parties; consent; mediation.

Methodology

The methodology for this project included, among other things, identifying and selecting experimental and control cases and their orders.

• Experimental cases were those tracked during the first year of the project when the process servers and "Hot Line" representatives tried to explain, educate, and encourage. The total pool of experimental cases was 5,206. This number was reduced to 3,483 cases where paternity was established and processed to a final order during the first year of the project.
• Control cases were those processed before the project was initiated in May 2006 and represented the standards for case data and order compliance for paternity cases filed in 2004 and 2005. A pool of 3,101 cases was identified. The actual control cases were randomly selected from this total population, keeping in mind the proportion of service types (personal service or alternate service). This number was reduced to 1,285. At about two-thirds, the proportion of personally served vs. alternately served control cases was equivalent to the corresponding ratio for experimental cases.

Project Findings

• Experimental cases paid 48% of current support; control cases paid 32%.
• Non-default men in experimental cases paid 61% of their support; non-default men in control cases paid 48%.
• Defaulted men in experimental cases paid 32% of their support while defaulted men in control cases paid only 18%.
• The overall non-default rate was 53%, a number significantly higher than the traditional one-third (2,749 non-default orders entered out of 5,206 total orders).
• A total of 481 men in the experimental group were excluded from being the father via genetic testing, which is 9.2%. There were no comparable data on men in the control group, because by definition the control group included only cases where paternity orders had been established.
• There were 1,383 out of 1,749 non-default orders when phone contact was made. The conclusion was that speaking with defendants via the "Hotline" greatly increased the likelihood that they will appear with the resultant reduction in paternity defaults. And most of the phone conversations (67%) were initiated by men calling the "Hotline," which demonstrates that giving the "Hotline" calling card to the men was very instrumental in establishing phone contacts.
• Experimental orders had average support amounts consistently lower than the average control orders. Thus, the more appropriate and affordable support orders were entered in the experimental cases, which in turn led to better payment.

Lessons Learned

• Barriers to contacting the men by phone
  • Did not have his phone number.
  • Had wrong phone number.
  • Man never answered/had no voice mail.
  • Man never called back after leaving him a message.
  • Man was never home.
  • Man had cell phone only with limited minutes.
• Talking to men early on - explaining, educating and encouraging - the men will take the opportunity to:
  • Better understand their rights and responsibilities.
  • Be excluded as legal fathers via genetic testing.
  • Participate in the process.
  • Show their true income and ability to pay child support.
  • Discuss issues about the child with the court/mother.
  • Discuss custody and parenting time.
  • Understand that mediation is available to help work out any differences about how to raise the child.
  • Better realize the importance of supporting their children.
  • Get off to a better start with their support obligation.
• Main components to replicate this project:
  • A trained process server to get the mans attention, provide a one-page information sheet, a one-page "Answer" form, and a special phone number for the man to call for more information.
  • A dedicated phone line with voice mail.
  • A paternity expert to give the man the knowledge he needs to understand the process and why he should appear for his hearing.
  • A script as part of the training.

This SIP grant responded to 2005 Priority Area: Improving Child Support and Marriage Education Services for Ethnic and Culturally Diverse Populations. Michigan State University (MSU) Extensions Together We Can: Creating a Healthy Future for Our Family project was designed to improve child support and marriage education services for unmarried, low-income parents. To reach these outcomes, the project had three principal objectives.

Objective 1: Investigate the challenges and needs of unmarried new parents in forming and sustaining a healthy marriage and the efficacy of integrating healthy marriage content into Family Support and Education (FSE) programs

MSU Extension began their investigation by conducting an extensive literature review of supports and barriers for healthy marriages within low-income families. The literature review can be found in the formative research report at http://www.togetherwecan.fcs.msue.msu.edu/. The literature review examined such topics as the importance of child support for low-income mothers and the impact of child support enforcement efforts, co-parenting and fragile families.

MSU Extension also conducted focus groups with community partners and unmarried parents of African American, Latino and Caucasian descent in two counties to assess their interest in healthy marriage education, barriers to building a high-quality couple relationship and the meaning of marriage. There were three groups conducted with the community partners (two in Oakland County and one in Saginaw County, with a total of 19 provider participants) from human and social service agencies dealing with domestic violence/sexual assault, parenting, mental health, etc. Forty-five parents participated in the seven focus groups, four with mothers and three with fathers. Participants in all focus groups were asked to review a list of topics that might be included in a curriculum for unmarried parents including child development, fatherhood/motherhood, effective parenting strategies, etc.

Objective 2: Develop and test an educational curriculum for unmarried parents

The project pilot tested the curriculum in two Michigan counties: Oakland and Saginaw counties. Pilot testing was conducted between January 1, 2007 and March 1, 2008. The project exceeded its goal of 100 participants by reaching 144 participants. Eighty percent of the parents completed the entire 8-part Together We Can series and graduated from the program. Word-of-mouth was the most effective means for recruiting parents (i.e., 39% of participants were recruited this way). Approximately one-third of the participants were male (32%) and the other two-thirds were female (68%).

Married individuals had more positive attitudes and levels of satisfaction on the co-parenting scale and on the marital attitudes scale than those who were not married. Co-parenting adults who lived together in the same household (whether married or not) with the child reported the highest co-parenting satisfaction and sense of parenting competence.

Objective 3: Disseminate project materials

The third objective was to disseminate project materials statewide and nationally to make them available to community educators. Project materials have been placed on MSU website at www.togetherwecan.fcs.msue.msu.edu . This project has also been showcased at various national conferences, including Smart Marriages.

(NOTE: these activities are not eligible for title IV-D program Federal financial participation.)

Lessons Learned/Recommendations:

• To overcome the cultural barriers for involving men in the program, several important implications emerged. Male facilitators need to be hired and trained to recruit participants and facilitate the educational sessions with a female staff member. In addition, men who have participated in the program can play an important role in recruitment by reaching out to other men to encourage their participation in the program.
• Recruitment efforts should be targeted to parents with young children. The results of the community survey showed that the sense of parenting warmth disappeared after age five.
• Many of these unmarried parents did not have a good co-parenting relationship prior to entering the course. Consequently, it was difficult to get them to attend as couples. Recruitment was much more successful when they educated one parent and then had that parent recruit their partner to attend a later class.
• * Facilitators need training on family composition issues (i.e., extended family issues) and should encourage communication among all family members and not just the primary co-parenting partner, when delivering the program. Fathers should be encouraged by all family members to stay in close proximity to the child in order to increase both parents co-parenting satisfaction and parenting sense of competence.
• Men in the focus groups reported a reluctance to ask for help. As a result, male participants will be most comfortable in the program if there is a male facilitator and other men participating in the program. Although the Healthy Marriage Initiative promotes involving couples, the evidence from this study suggests that it would be more useful to have male-only and female-only groups as well as couple groups during the first year of implementation. It was very important to have same-gender instructors teach the sessions.
• Also, delivery and content need to be gender-specific because males and females are dealing with different issues and concerns. For example, fathers were more likely to report problems associated with multiple ex-partners and current partners around parenting. They also reported more issues related to step families. Mothers reported being more worried about receiving child support and needing child care assistance to meet their children's basic needs.
• Facilitators need to convey the message that the goal of the program is to do what is best for participants children and to improve their childs well-being.
• Participants need practical supports and incentives to retain their participation in a multi-session program. Child care, meals, a comfortable program location, and financial incentives need to be provided in order to keep parents coming back week after week.
• Programs should include these CORE lessons: Module I: Goal setting (2 lessons); Module II: Parenting together and the importance of fathers and mothers; Module III: Managing my stress; and managing conflict; Module IV: What a child needs; obtaining child support; and making the most of parenting time; Module V: A healthy marriage is good for your health; and What are the barriers to a healthy marriage; and Closing Session: Planning the rest of your journey.
• The participants found the lessons on financial management to be eye-opening and meaningful. They didnt realize how much it cost to raise a child and were often unaware of how to budget their money. Another important topic for the participants was the stress management lessons. Stress and conflict were common elements in their lives and they felt great relief when they learned skills to resolve those negative emotions.
• The participants really liked the hands-on exercises (scrap-booking) part of the sessions. The scrapbooks created in the class were highly valued by both men and women and kept participants coming back week after week. On the last day the participants received their scrapbook during a completion ceremony.

This three-year grant responds to 2005 SIP Priority Area 3: Improving Child Support and Marriage Education Services for Ethnic and Culturally Diverse Populations. The project goal is to ensure that the best interests of children remain central to their parents' lives by teaching parents essential parenting and relationship skills and expectations concerning child support responsibility and providing legal and emotional support to children. The grantee will work with the St. Louis Healthy Marriage Coalition to train instructors in the Family Wellness curriculum and offer the Family Wellness program to underserved ethnic and culturally diverse never-married, divorced, or separated parents in specified St. Louis zip codes. The project will train 40 Family Wellness instructors in Year 1 and 40 in Year 2. It will serve 210 families in Year 1, 285 in Year 2, and 430 families in Year 3 in 4- to 6-week (one hour per week) workshops offered quarterly in each year. Participants will be recruited from various social service agencies (e.g., TANF office, child support, job training programs, churches). Transportation stipends and child care will be provided.

Philliber Research Associates will conduct (1) a process study that tracks recruitment and referrals, the demographic characteristics of participants, and customer satisfaction, and (2) an outcomes study that assesses whether the program meets the following goals: 80% clients referred complete Family Wellness; 80% of parents improve their commitment to meet financial obligations to children; 60% improve their ability to parent; 60% improve their relationship with the other parent; and 60% of non-custodial parents improve personal responsibility in one of four areas (employment, formal/informal child support, time spent talking with custodial parent about child(ren), time spent with child). The process study data will come from customer satisfaction surveys; outcome study will use pre- and post-surveys of participants and attendance logs.

This project responded to 2005 Priority Area 1: "Customizing Approaches for Improved Customer Service." The grantee focused on customizing child support strategies for incarcerated noncustodial parents (NCPs) with child support obligations and significant child support arrearages in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania. The project featured an innovative pre-release and post-release case management model designed to facilitate child support education, referrals and enrollment in relevant Workforce Investment and TANF programs and job readiness activities that exist both inside and outside of the county correctional institutions. The project was built upon national and local best practices in the areas of ex-offender employment strategies and low-income NCP programs and leveraged key services, technology and expertise in the community targeting this population.

The primary goal of this project was to facilitate full-time employment for ex-offender NCPs immediately upon release, in order to increase their capacity to pay child support on a regular basis. A secondary goal was to improve the coordination of services among correctional institutions, the local child support enforcement (CSE) agency, the Workforce Investment Board and community service providers.

To accomplish these goals, Goodwill Industries worked in collaboration with the Allegheny County Family Division (CSE), the Allegheny County Jail Collaborative which consists of the Allegheny County Department of Human Services, the Allegheny County Jail, the Allegheny County Health Department, and the University of Pittsburgh. The goal was to develop a service delivery model targeting incarcerated NCPs for inclusion in regional Workforce Investment Act and related supportive service programs. The Special Improvement Project (SIP) grant funded outreach, assessment, referral, case management, and child support education services for Project SCALE participants. The employment and training services provided to Project Scale participants were funded from other sources (this is not a matchable IV-D expense).

Project Findings (from the Final Report):

GOAL 1 - Screen 240 low-income and culturally diverse NCPs for program enrollment in the first three quarters of the program (10/1/05 through 6/30/06) and enroll 75 participants. The two major reasons that incarcerated participants were not enrolled involved either not having a child support obligation and/or the participant was scheduled to be incarcerated for a long period.

Screening and enrollment into Project SCALE occurred primarily during the second and third quarters of the grant (1/30/06 through 6/30/06). The project exceeded that goal by screening 347 individuals (107 more than planned). The project also exceeded the enrollment goal of 75 participants, enrolling 76 parents by the end of the 3rd quarter and adding 5 more in the 5th quarter. Overall, 81 parents were enrolled (6 more than anticipated).

GOAL 2 - Secure a substantial and significant increase in child support payments by the program participants. Prior to enrollment, 57 (70 percent) SCALE participants did not pay child support and 24 (30 percent) were partial payers of child support.

This increase was measured in two parts. The first part of the goal involved motivating 40 percent of participants not paying child support between pre-incarceration and program completion to make a child support payment. As a result of program participation, forty-four of the non-payers of child support made at least one child support payment by the conclusion of the program. This was a 78 percent payment rate which significantly exceeded the 40 percent goal.

The second part of the goal involved increasing the rate of child support collections for individuals with a history of partial payments by 20 percent over a six-month period following employment, based on the 6 months of child support history prior to incarceration.

Twenty-three of the 24 partial payers increased the amount of child support paid. For this group, the total amount collected pre-enrollment was $18,892.43 compared to $32,419.09 post enrollment. This was a 72 percent increase in the rate of child support collections, 52 percentage points higher than the initial program goal of 20 percent.

At the end of the program, the total additional child support payments by all participants was $49,103. This total increase occurred from October 2005 to April 2007.

GOAL 3 - Facilitate child health coverage through wage attachable employment of program participants.

Wage attachable employment was achieved for 63 (78 percent) of the participants. However, only 1 participant of the 63 who attained this success had an employer who provided health care benefits. The large number of positions that did not provide health benefits is due in part to the types of jobs attained and, to a larger extent, to the change in the economic structure of the Pittsburgh area where more employers are hiring temporary or contracted workers. Furthermore, 9 participants were unable to achieve wage attachable employment because they were employed in, or terminated from, non-taxable jobs and were not paying child support.

GOAL 4 - Utilize multi-media technology to provide the target population with an assessment of barriers in the areas of basic needs, housing, wellness, employment and training and with child support and custody presentations regarding obligations, options and rights related to child support and custody issues.

In the first quarter of the grant, the team created a PowerPoint presentation titled "Child Support and Custody - Questions and Answers for Incarcerated or Recently Incarcerated Individuals." This PowerPoint was presented at conferences, to all Project SCALE participants and to 91 other individuals in the Allegheny County Jail to inform them on the subjects of child support, arrears and Project SCALE. The PowerPoint presentation was also provided to other States working with incarcerated/previously incarcerated obligors.

GOAL 5 - Measure enhancements to the current service delivery system.

Project SCALE fostered many partnerships that enhanced the existing service delivery system for this population. The project initiated a participant recruitment process at the Allegheny County Jail and Goodwill Community Corrections Center. Furthermore, in conjunction with Allegheny County Family Division, Project SCALE received preliminary approval on an arrears forgiveness component from the Pennsylvania State Bureau of Child Support Enforcement.

The project also worked with the Allegheny County Family Division on the design and implementation of an early release program and began referrals for released inmates who had been placed in employment on an as-needed basis to the Fathers Collaborative Law Clinic for child support modifications, mediations and visitation matters.

Lessons Learned/Next Steps

1. Developing a program to ensure that previously incarcerated obligors will meet their child support obligation is possible. For example, 96 percent of all partial payers increased the amount of child support paid after participation in the program.
2. Many previously incarcerated obligors are eager to participate in the program. This completely voluntary program exceeded its target for participation.
3. Health care is very difficult to obtain for the type of employment obtained by the study participants.
4. Behavioral change is critical to the success of participants. The participants had to learn how to deal with frustration. For example, if a government employee does not treat the NCP with respect or fairness, NCPs are encouraged to contact the supervisor rather than "put a brick through the window."

The program has ended but the lessons learned are being incorporated into other projects managed by Goodwill Industries of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In addition, the PowerPoint presentation provided to clients "Child Support and Custody-Questions and Answers for Incarcerated or Recently Incarcerated Individuals" was shared with other Region III States including Delaware, the District of Columbia and Maryland. Please contact Michael Olack from Goodwill Industries OLACK@goodwillpitt.org to request the PowerPoint presentation.

This grant responded to 2005 Priority Area: Improving Child Support and Marriage Education Services for Ethnic and Culturally Diverse Populations. The project was designed to test collaborative intervention strategies to enhance the knowledge and understanding of unmarried, new parents concerning the importance and legal significance of paternity establishment, their legal rights and responsibilities, and the value of family stability and healthy marriage to the well-being of their children. The primary objectives of NPOP included developing and testing two methods of educational outreach to unmarried, new parents in a hospital setting and assessing the barriers and opportunities that hospital settings present for educational efforts with unmarried, new parents.

Parents who agreed to take part in the project evaluation completed a baseline survey and a consent form. These parents were randomly assigned to one of the following groups:

1. In-hospital Outreach Group - participants received a Parenting Two-gether handbook and intensive, face-to-face educational counseling from FamilyConnections Parent Educators; and
2. No In-hospital Outreach Group which was sub-divided into the following two groups:

a) Abbreviated Outreach Group - participants received a five-page NPOP educational outreach handout (NPOP letter) in-person at the birthing hospital; and
b) Control Group - participants did not receive any NPOP outreach or educational materials.

Participants in the evaluation were unmarried parents who delivered at one of five participating birthing hospital sites in Austin, Texas. Evaluation occurred between three and four months following baseline survey completion and/or service delivery.

Initially, the OAG contracted directly with two Dallas-area hospitals to conduct the educational outreach. However, due to hospital staffing and resource constraints, OAG ultimately contracted with FamilyConnections, an Austin-based community organization, to conduct the educational outreach. FamilyConnections already had contracts with five Austin-area hospitals to deliver outreach to parents following the birth of their newborn.

In total, baseline surveys were collected for 1,134 NPOP participants [Dallas (149) and Austin (985)]. The Dallas participants did not receive any educational intervention and were not assigned to any of the groups. Their baseline survey data was compared to Austin participant baseline survey data. The majority of Dallas respondents were African American (64%) while the majority of Austin respondents were Hispanic (80%).

Findings

• In general, mothers and fathers participating in this project viewed marriage and certain aspects of the fathers role differently. The evaluation final report states: The difference indicated either contrasting views (e.g., more fathers than mothers believed it is better for the child if parents are married) or discrepancies in their reporting (e.g., more fathers said that they acknowledged paternity, while more mothers said that the fathers had not done so).
• Among matching mother-father dyads, no significant within-couple differences were found among unmarried mothers and fathers in reporting their current relationship status, their predicted future relationship status, and the level of the fathers financial support of the child.
• The evaluation found no significant impact of NPOP educational outreach on parents attitudes toward and knowledge of their legal responsibilities and child support enforcement tools. From the [baseline] survey responses of the Austin parents, it seems that most already believe in the importance of financial support, paternity and marriage and therefore educational intervention would not have a significant impact on these variables.
• No significant impact was found on IV-D case establishment and paternity establishment. For example, 61% (246) of the Control Group participants filed an Acknowledgment of Paternity compared to 52 % (191) of the Abbreviated Outreach Group and 66% (319) of the In-hospital Outreach Group.

Accomplishments

• Approximately 40,000 unmarried, new parents received a letter in mail concerning NPOP educational objectives.
• 1,004 parents delivering at five Austin-area hospitals received some level of educational outreach within a few days of the birth of their child.
• Parenting Two-gether (a handbook for new parents detailing how to care for babies in their first 12 months of life as well as important information about healthy relationships and the importance of paternity establishment) was developed and is available at no charge through the OAG website.
• Prior to collaboration with the OAG, FamilyConnections Parents of Newborns did not provide in-hospital education to fathers, and Parent Educators avoided topics such as marital status, paternity establishment and child support. By the end of the project, there was a new found appreciation and enthusiasm for including information for fathers.
• FamilyConnections plans to continue its educational outreach to new parents, including fathers, about child support (without IV-D funds) as part of their continuing efforts to educate parents of newborns about health and parenting. FamilyConnections believes there will be greater impact on paternity establishment, child support and marriage by having longer-term access to both parents. They estimate reaching out to more than 7,000 parents per year in hospital settings.

Recommendations/Lessons Learned

• There are many obstacles to providing low-cost, in-hospital outreach to new parents using existing networks of hospital staff and volunteers. The obstacles experienced in this project included staff time constraints and conflicting priorities, as well as departmental staffing changes. Ultimately, NPOP found success by partnering with a local non-profit organization whose service delivery was compatible with NPOP outreach methods and goals.
• The collaboration with FamilyConnections was not without its own challenges. Even after OAG training, Parent Educators were hesitant about engaging fathers in service delivery and about broaching sensitive or personal family topics. Agencies or organizations planning to implement similar projects should consider providing multiple training opportunities to outreach workers, utilizing role play scenarios and addressing the individual concerns of project staff.
• Hospital rooms can be busy, crowded, and sometimes chaotic environments following the birth of a child. Educational outreach may prove more effective in another setting, such as prenatal or pediatric care visits, when parents may feel less overwhelmed and may be more receptive to intervention.
• Since there was no significant impact of the educational intervention on parents attitudes towards paternity, child support, and marriage, perhaps another intervention might have more success if it were to focus more directly on impacting parents skills and behaviors related to family stability, co-parenting practices, and access of child support services.

Project Plan and Background Information

This 3-year SIP grant responded to Priority Area 3 of the 2005 announcement- Improving Child Support and Marriage Education Services for Ethnic and Culturally Diverse Populations. The program, Healthy Parents, Healthy Families, Healthy Children, was implemented by a local community-based human services organization, Families Under Urban and Social Attack (FUUSA), located in Houston, Texas.

The purpose of the Healthy Parents, Healthy Families, Healthy Children Program was to improve and strengthen the stability of the African-American family by providing marriage and relationship education (MRE) to the target population. The program aimed to strengthen and create a healthy relationship between parents and their children.

The Healthy Parents, Healthy Families, Healthy Children Program targeted African-American unwed custodial and non-custodial parents, age 18 and older. The target population resided in high-risk urban communities in the Houston, Texas area.

Participants received 12 hours of MRE in a group setting. The program also provided the parents with referrals to needed social services, domestic violence counseling and refuge, healthcare referrals and child support services as needed.

The program was evaluated by an independent investigator and include findings on participant characteristics and on self-reported changes across a number of interpersonal and relationship dimensions.

Implementation Phase

FUUSA built a collaboration consisting of faith-based and other locally-based affiliations such as, public housing communities, apartments, transitional living facilities, emergency housing facilities, adoption and foster care agencies. These partner affiliations recruited and provided classroom space for group sessions featuring one of two research-based marriage education curriculum - The African-American Marriage Enrichment Program or Exploring Relationships and Marriage with Fragile Families.

Each MRE class included one session that discussed financial management and an overview of the purpose and services offered by the local child support enforcement (CSE) agency. Where scheduling permitted, this basic overview of child support enforcement was presented by a representative from the local child support agency.

The frequency and duration of group sessions were determined by participant cohorts and typically met once a week for a two-hour session over a 6-week period.

Program Evaluation

The final results included a quantitative and quantitative analysis based on intake forms, pre/post comparison testing, and a series of 6-month follow up focus groups.

The program surpassed its objective of providing Marriage and Relationship Education (MRE) to 300 individual single parents. The project period was for a three-year term from August 2005 through September 2008.

A total of 413 individuals enrolled in MRE classes over the 3-year period and 75%, or 309 individuals, completed 80% or more of the class sessions. At the time of enrollment, 70% of the participants indicated that they had a child support case or had recently applied. Unfortunately, a data match with the CSE agency was not part of the demonstration project and therefore any comparison analysis of pre- and post-intervention regarding child support outcomes such as number of paternities established, court orders established or amount of current support paid is not available. However, based on anecdotal data and feedback, the general consensus expressed by many of the 413 enrolled participants was suggestive of a growing positive attitude and understanding of how the collection of child support helps to strengthen families.

• Program demographics- The MRE participants attended classes exclusively as single parents- of those reporting marital status, 55% were single and 40% reported being married at one time or another. There were 4 times more females than males and the vast majority of participants appear to be low income to poor- 60% of the individuals reporting, noted an annual income of less than $10,000 and a total of 179 individuals reported to be unemployed and 104 individuals reported employment of some regularity. Additionally, the median reported age of individual parent participants was within the age range of 31 – 40 years old.
• Findings - Of the total 413 single parents participating in the program, approximately 220 reported currently being in a romantic relationship. In terms of communication skills with their romantic partner, both male and female participants alike identified it as being a significant and ongoing area of concern. Most respondents indicated a need to communicate more effectively with their partner, often disagreed with their partner and had difficulty in resolving the underlying conflict. Nearly 60% of participants reported that intimacy was a major issue within their relationship. Females reported this as a problem more than the males. Further analyses demonstrated that the participants who were in relationships for more than 6 years reported communication and intimacy as less of an issue. There were markedly different responses by gender in terms of overall satisfaction with their current relationship. In general, single female participants viewed their relationship with their partner in a more negative and disappointing manner compared to reports by the single male participants. The difference in satisfaction levels could be indicative of underlying communication problems and intimacy factors. Also, this more negative view of their romantic relationship as reported by single female participants is consistent with the lower levels of trust they have with their partner as compared to trust in their partner as reported by the single male participants.
• Focus Group Findings - Attendance at the focus group was based on self-selection by eligible program participants and represented a 6-month follow up (focus groups comprised approximately 20% of total number of participants completing MRE classes). In summary, the recurring message emerging from the various focus groups was that many of the participants (single male and single female alike) had no clue of the tools needed to maintain a healthy relationship (let alone a marriage). The male participants, in particular, reported a belief that communication and intimacy was more of a private issue and should not be shown in the public. They felt that females were too emotional and required almost constant attention. In comparison, the single female participants generally reported less satisfaction in their current romantic relationship than the single male participants. After their participation in the MRE classes, the participants (male and female alike) generally felt better prepared to address relationship issues with their romantic partners. Thus, the overall view reported by focus group respondents was positive and one of satisfaction with taking the MRE class.

Lessons Learned

Three key components need to be carefully laid out in conducting healthy marriage/responsible fatherhood programming:

• Initial staffing- and planning-related issues. The scope of the outreach determines the depth of the required staffing complement. In this current project, the outreach and recruitment and outside referral efforts were tasks that essentially tapped into the well-established network already developed and in existence within the operation of the community-based FUUSA organization. Thus, the programmatic staff for the project was relatively small with one set of facilitators (male and female), an outreach/intake specialist and the project manager. In contrast, those projects which intend to develop an extensive coalition of provider partners and to saturate the community with access to a variety of choices of MRE curricula will need considerably more staffing in order to be effective in providing services.
• Flexibility in terms of scheduling classes (time of day and frequency, etc) and provision of incentives at the time of classroom presentation including, light meal and child care at site in order to meet the work-related responsibilities and family needs of program participants.
• Involve the independent evaluator in all aspects of the program design, from the outset. This provided the project with better data collection, intake and tracking procedures, and focus group procedures.