Abuse, Neglect, Adoption & Foster Care View all reports on this topic

This project supports the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE) in the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, in its work with the Children’s Bureau to advance the evidence around collaborative approaches to preventing child abuse and neglect...
 

Phase I (2013-2017)

Phase I of this project provided evaluation-related technical assistance to organizations awarded planning grants for the development of interventions for youth with child welfare involvement who are most likely to experience homelessness...

OPRE’s child and family development work includes research and evaluation projects primarily concerned with child care and child welfare. This portfolio additionally examines the culturally diverse experiences of children and families served by ACF programs.

Research focuses on five major areas, including: Child Care, Head Start and Early Head Start, Child Welfare, Cultural Diversity, Cross-Cutting Early Childhood Research...

The Child Maltreatment Incidence Data Linkages (CMI Data Linkages) project will support ACF in identifying and enhancing existing administrative data linkage practices related to examining the incidence and risk of child maltreatment. Through the design and execution of a multi-site feasibility study, the CMI Data Linkages project will explore how enhancing and scaling innovative data linkage practices can improve our understanding of child maltreatment incidence and related risk and protective factors.

ACF supports the development and operation of fully integrated systems to support person-centric service delivery.  Integration implies alignment of legal, policy, program, and technology factors that impact our ability to share information.  If we are successful as a community, interoperability will drive progress in...

This project will support the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in identifying federal, state, and/or local definitions and policies related to the surveillance of child maltreatment and related risk...

The Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE) at the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) has awarded a contract to MEF Associates and its subcontractor, Child Trends, to conduct a study to better understand the range of child welfare services and benefits provided through the Unaccompanied Refugee Minors (URM) Program. The URM Program serves refugees and...

In September 2015, the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation (OPRE) in collaboration with the Children’s Bureau (CB) awarded a contract to Mathematica Policy Research to carry out the Design Options for Understanding Child Maltreatment Incidence. The purpose of this 18-month project is to develop design options for a potential future study or group of studies that would leverage existing administrative data, innovative methods, and advanced statistical techniques to...

This project will help the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) Children’s Bureau to identify and better assist children and youth served by its programs who are victims of, or are at risk of, domestic human trafficking. The project will summarize current understanding of human trafficking and resources addressing human trafficking in the child welfare population

Evidence suggests that fathers play an important role in children's development and that they can serve as a key source of emotional and financial support. In many social services, however, fathers are...

ACF’s Hispanic Research Work Group brings together experts in a wide range of content areas relevant to ACF’s mission to assist ACF/OPRE in identifying research priorities concerning low-income, Hispanic families.

This contract will produce a series of research briefs on issues related to the well-being and economic self-sufficiency of families and children experiencing homelessness. The briefs will be based on data collected as part of the U.S. Department of...

Though significant evaluative work has been carried out to improve our understanding of how human services programs meet their goals of improving family economic self-sufficiency, financial security, and overall wellbeing, there are gaps in knowledge of how programs can best serve rural communities. Rural contexts present unique opportunities and challenges for administering human services programs, and the Administration for Children & Families (ACF) seeks to better understand these contexts through several programs

This project will conduct research to answer questions identified by the Administration for Children and Families’ (ACF’s) Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation and Office on Trafficking in Persons (OTIP) that will inform the development of anti-trafficking strategies, policies, and programs to prevent and respond to human trafficking...

OPRE plays a central role in advancing understanding and disseminating knowledge about research and evaluation methods and tools that are, or could be, used to enhance knowledge about program and policy effectiveness. The purpose of the Methods Inquiries project is to organize...

The Children’s Bureau in the Administration for Children and Families has contracted with the Urban Institute and its partners—the Chapin Hall Center for Children at the University of Chicago and the National Opinion Research Center...

The National Domestic Violence Hotline (“The Hotline”) and loveisrespect (LIR; the helpline targeted towards young people) provide a confidential 24-hour national, toll-free telephone hotline as well as digital services including chats, texts and website resources to provide information and assistance to victims of family violence, domestic violence or dating violence...

In collaboration with the Children’s Bureau, the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation is conducting the Fourth National Incidence Study of Child Abuse and Neglect (NIS-4). The National Incidence Studies have been conducted approximately...

The National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-Being (NSCAW) is a nationally representative, longitudinal survey of children and families who have been the subjects of investigation by Child Protective Services. There have been two cohorts of children enrolled in the survey, which makes available data drawn from first-hand reports from children, parents, and other caregivers, as well as reports from caseworkers, teachers, and data from administrative records.

The John H. Chafee Foster Care Program for Successful Transition to Adulthood (Chafee program; formerly the John H. Chafee Foster Care Independence Program) was created following the passage of the Foster Care Independence Act (FCIA) of 1999 (Public Law 106-169). The program provides assistance to help youth currently and formerly in foster care achieve self-sufficiency by providing grants to States and eligible Tribes that submit an approvable plan.

The eighteen projects funded under the grant program for Secondary Analyses of Data on Child Care and Early Education are conducting  analyses of existing data sets  to answer critical research questions that will inform both policymakers and future research. Topics include associations between subsidy receipt and long-term child achievement, access to early care and education for low-income families, and links between subsidy rates and child care quality...

In 2013, OPRE commissioned four interrelated reports on self-regulation and toxic stress from a team at the Center for Child and Social Policy at Duke University. That team and other experts have since created multiple practice-oriented resources grounded in the initial reports. Together, these reports and resources comprise the ‘Self-Regulation and Toxic Stress Series.’ 

This project is a partnership between the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE) and the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE). It is funded by the Patient Centered Outcomes Trust Fund. A contract to support this work will be awarded in September 2019.

HHS will work with two to four states to...

OPRE has awarded a five-year contract to the Urban Institute to support the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in increasing the number of evidence-supported interventions for the child welfare population by conducting rigorous evaluations and supporting the field in moving toward rigorous evaluations...

The Title IV-E Prevention Services Clearinghouse was established by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to systematically review research on programs and services intended to provide enhanced support to children and families and prevent foster care placements. The Clearinghouse, developed in accordance with the Family First Prevention Services Act of 2018, will rate programs and services as promising, supported, and well-supported practices. These practices will include mental health and substance abuse prevention and treatment services and in-home parent skill-based programs, as well as kinship navigator services.

The goal of the Touchpoints for Addressing Substance Use Issues in Home Visiting project is to generate knowledge about how home visiting programs, including those funded through HRSA’s and ACF's Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) program, engage and support families around prevention, treatment, and recovery from substance use issues. The project will identify evidence-informed practices for working with families, supporting frontline staff, and building collaborations with referral sources. The project will also identify gaps in knowledge on preventing or addressing substance use issues within the context of home visiting.

The 2003 Reauthorization of the Runaway and Homeless Youth Act called for a study of long-term outcomes for youth who are served through the Transitional Living Program (TLP). In response, OPRE and ACF’s Family and Youth Services Bureau (FYSB) are sponsoring a study that will capture data from youth at program entry and up to 12 months...

The purpose of this project is to provide guidance and support to Tribal TANF Child Welfare Coordination Grantees that promotes excellence in performance measurement, continuous quality improvement, and grantee-led collaborations between child welfare and TANF agencies in their tribal communities. The project is intended to (1) provide guidance to grantees in revising project logic models to align project activities with intended outcomes; (2) provide support for grantees’ identification and collection of performance measures to track project activities and outcomes; (3) provide support to grantees in using data for quality assurance and continuous quality improvement; (4) provide programmatic guidance on ways to strengthen Tribal TANF and Child Welfare coordination in order to strengthen outcomes specified by grantees in their applications; and (5) document these activities and lessons learned. This project will provide universal guidance and peer learning opportunities, as well as grantee specific guidance on a variety of topics which may include identification of measurable goals and objectives, data systems and data privacy, data analysis and interpretation, continuous quality improvement, and dissemination of program successes.

Project Overview

This project will support the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE) and the Children’s Bureau (CB) in the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in developing design options...