Research and Outreach

Project Child Hands

The Virginia Office of Early Childhood Development, in collaboration with the Virginia Departments of Social Services and Education and researchers Aaron Schroeder and Isabel Bradburn, has received funding from the Administration of Children and Families to build a state-wide, interactive, web-based data system for the developing comprehensive early childhood system of care and education.  The three-year grant focuses primarily on developing the technological infrastructure to examine policy and evaluation questions pertaining to child care quality for low-income children as it relates to demographic information and pre-kindergarten and kindergarten outcomes.  Additional information regarding health and related variables, at all income levels, will be added as available. The goal of the project is the build a system that is flexible and helpful to localities as well as to state policymakers and developmental, health and education researchers.  Please visit the Project Child HANDS website: http://www.fivehokies.com/childhands/

The central aim of Project Child HANDS (Child Care Subsidy, Health and Early Education: Helping Analyze Needed Data Securely)  is to build an integrated, web-based data system for Virginia child care initiatives aimed at low-income families, to guide program evaluation and policy decisions. Virginia is highly decentralized, with 120 semi-autonomous local departments of social services and 132 school divisions.  The project aims to integrate data from agencies at both the state and local levels, to address questions regarding child care quality in relation to the child care subsidy program, family demographics, parental choice, and how these factors relate to children’s outcomes in kindergarten.  Initial questions concern (1) What types of and what is the quality of child care being used by families in the assistance and TANF programs?  (2) Does this vary by locality and family factors, such as ethnicity? (3) How are these children faring in kindergarten? The reliability and usefulness of data that are collected, as well as gaps in data collection, are also being quantified to help evaluate what and how to best collect and use information to inform child care quality decisions. 

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Generations United Report: Intergenerational Shared Sites Save Money

Funded by a grant from MetLife Foundation, Dr. Shannon Jarrott from Virginia Tech’s Department for Human Development and Dr. Aaron Schroeder and Owen Perkins from VTIPG just completed an exploratory study for Generations United which shows that intergenerational shared site programs can save money through sharing expenses.  These findings are a result of the first national analysis of cost-savings in intergenerational shared site programs.

Generations United (GU) is the national membership organization focused solely on improving the lives of children, youth, and older people through intergenerational strategies, programs, and public policies. GU represents more than 100 national, state, and local organizations and individuals representing more than 70 million Americans. Since 1986 GU has served as a resource for educating policymakers and the public about the economic, social, and personal imperatives of intergenerational cooperation. GU acts as a catalyst for stimulating collaboration between aging, children, and youth organizations, providing a forum to explore areas of common ground while celebrating the richness of each generation.

For more on Generations United visit www.gu.org/. For the full report Intergenerational Shared Sites: Saving Dollars While Making Sense visit www.gu.org/documents/A0/Shared_Site_Cost_Savings_Final.pdf

Evaluation of Virginia's Child Protective Services Program

In 2008, under the principal investigation of Dr. Renee Loeffler, VTIPG will conduct an evaluation of Virginia’s child protective services program under a contract with the Virginia Department of Social Services.  This work is a continuation of a multi-year project to assess the effects of the Differential Response System, a new approach to child protection adopted by the state in 2002. 

VTIPG will use statewide data on all child protective services cases in 2007 to assess outcomes and to analyze trends in key program variables.  A topic for special study in 2008 will be the activities of Virginia’s local departments of social services in providing services to families to treat or prevent child abuse or neglect.  This project will culminate in a report to the 2009 General Assembly. 

VTIPG will also provide a separate report to each of Virginia’s 120 local departments of social services.  The local agency reports include local, regional and state data for key CPS program variables so that each local department can compare itself to regional neighbors and the state as a whole.

Partnership for the Advancement of Competitive Employment — PACE

Guided by Mary Beth Dunkenberger and David Moore, VTIPG and five Local Departments of Social Services (LDSS) in the New River Valley, collectively known as the Partners for Self-Sufficiency (PSS), have worked to redesign our current PACE model to emphasize proven strategies and to meet gaps resulting from TANF policy and program changes. The PACE program provides wrap around services to address clients’ employment barriers and service needs in an individualized manner. The existing partnership expands the network of community partners that represent both employers and human service providers with an emphasis on intensive vocational case management through referral to Vocational Specialists.  In addition the PACE program utilizes a Community Liaison and Disability Specialist to expand employer resources and address the full range of needs presented by VIEW participants.

The overarching goal of our regional employment placement, retention, and advancement model is to expedite preparation of Virginia Initiative for Employment Not Welfare (VIEW) participants for entry-level positions with employers who offer benefit packages, greater job security, and some potential for upgrading skills and to provide a strong focus on job retention.

The services provided are 1) the integration of our intensive job readiness program, job development activities, and concentrated vocational case management activities; 2) continued development and refinement of community resources that facilitate employment of TANF recipients; 3) an SSI/SSDI application support service that helps local agencies better evaluate disabled TANF recipients and helps provide access to additional resources to assist them; and 4) focused job retention efforts coordinated with employers. Over the ten-month project period, the PACE program expects to serve a total of 594 clients.

SSI Advocacy for Employment Options (SAFE)

Mary Beth Dunkenberger and Nancy White are leading the SSI Advocacy for Employment Options (SAFE) initiative to develop and deliver a training and technical assistance model for disability assessment and SSI advocacy for the TANF and VIEW programs.  The training and technical assistance will be delivered to local departments of social services (LDSS) staff throughout the Commonwealth.  

This program focuses on the identification and assessment of disabilities in persons who are participating in the TANF program with an emphasis on the Social Security Administration (SSA) definition of disability as related to Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI).  Building this capacity will enable LDSS staff in the assessment process to determine if persons with disabilities may be served with accommodations in moving toward employment or if the disability appears so severe that a referral to the SSI program would be more appropriate. 

The determination of a disability by LDSS staff as early in the assessment process as possible will allow for a more efficient use of time sensitive recourses and will enable LDSS staff to inform TANF participants of the procedures, policies, and timeframes related to SSA determination of disability.  Local agencies will be able to structure a disability program that best meets the unique needs of the locality and participant population. The ultimate goal is that after the initial collaborative period, LDSS will have the capacity and organizational knowledge to assess TANF participant disabilities and provide ongoing SSI Advocacy services to TANF and VIEW participants as appropriate under policy and to meet the needs of the participant.

Fairfax County Federal Reimbursement Unit (FRU)

The FRU has ongoing responsibilities to facilitate the collection of centralized processes to secure child support from non-custodial parents on behalf of the children in foster care, to access Federal funds on behalf of children in foster care, and to pursue Medicaid funding for certain Medicaid eligible services for CSA funded youth placed out of their homes.

Under the guidance of Melony Price-Rhodes, the FRU reviews records of children in foster care and supports the process for reimbursements for those children. The reimbursement of local expenditures via federal funds reduces the local costs (expended by the Department of Family Services and through the Comprehensive Services Act (CSA)) of providing services to children in foster care.   

The FRU continues to refine the process so that, where possible, fewer County tax dollars are spent to support children who are in foster care and in receipt of CSA pool funds.  More funds will be reimbursed from the Federal Government and parent(s) of the children.  Funds accessed for reimbursement, based upon each child’s eligibility, include Title IV-E, Title II and XVI – Supplemental Security Income (SSI) Benefits, Survivors’ Benefits (SSA), Title XIX – Medicaid benefits and Title IV-D – Child Support.

Loudoun County, VA Comprehensive Services Act Program

Melony Price-Rhodes, Project Associate at VTIPG facilitated case reviews of foster care children in Loudoun County, Virginia for the purpose of identifying a group of funds for 70 to 100 foster care cases for children that are in foster care in Loudoun County, Virginia. The groups of funds include, Title IV-E, Supplemental Security Income, Social Security Benefits and Child Support. The case reviews will assess the efficacy of the current efforts by Loudoun County staff to maximize revenues for children in foster care.

Federal Reimbursement Unit (FRU)

VTIPG contracted with the VDSS to provide individual reviews of each local DSS agency to evaluate Title IV-E eligibility compliance and its subsequent effects on Virginia's access rate. This project resulted in a significant increase in the access rate with a corresponding increase in federal reimbursement to the Commonwealth for foster care children. The current contract will expire in November of 2004 and we are currently negotiating a two year extension of this contract with a significant expansion of funding and personnel.

The contract will focus efforts of development of a statewide SSI implementation project and increasing efforts to increase federal financial participation through administrative cost recoveries under the Matrix program. Additionally, the project will now include a team devoted to validating 4,000 eligible Title-IV E cases as part of the Program Improvement Plan. Virginia Tech staff will be developing an automated eligibility system for VDSS and will also be working with the Claims Integrity Unit of VDSS to expand administrative cost recoveries to Medicaid, Food Stamps and Child Support Enforcement.

Child and Family Services Review

VTIPG contracted with VDSS in May of this year to conduct a two year program improvement plan for the Child and Family Services Review. IPG will deploy a nine member team that includes two graduate research assistants to review approximately 1700 foster care and child protective services cases. The results of each case review will be included in agency specific reports and recommendations for each locality and be assembled into a statewide assessment of the aggregate data to meet 14 federally mandated performance goals. This is a 2 year contract that will cost approximately $2 million.