This article in the Stanford Social Innovation Review talks about how social welfare programs can better collaborate and coordinate efforts to collectively address complex social problems. The article shares a conceptual framework on how different systems and programs can best align objectives and service delivery programs toward common community goals.

This toolkit, created through Colorado’s Work Support Strategies (WSS) grant, is designed to help county and community-based organizations define, measure, and use well-being metrics to improve services and achieve outcomes. It includes a “how to” section that organizations can follow to change their practices and measure client outcomes rather than program outputs.

This early implementation report by the Institute for Research on Poverty and Mathematica Policy Research provides interim findings from the Office of Child Support Enforcement’s (OCSE) Child Support Noncustodial Parent Employment Demonstration Project (CSPED), which began in Fall 2012 and ends in September 2017. The project is tracking activity and outcomes of CSPED programs in eight states. Child Support agencies in each state are providing enhanced child support services, employment assistance, parenting education, and case management services for noncustodial parents who experience difficulty meeting their child support obligations. The report looks at the first two years of CSPED, which consisted of a planning year and one year of program operations.

The DataFinder from the Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) provides demographic information as well as administrative data on programs that affect low-income people and families. Users can create and download custom tables that present a national picture, a state picture or a comparative look at states and communities.

This report from the U.S. Department of Education highlights efforts of colleges and universities to promote access, opportunity, and success for low-income students. The good news is that many institutions are increasing college access for low income students and providing them with the aid and support they need, but the report serves as a call to action for other institutions to increase access and improve completion rates of Pell Grant recipients.

This brief from MDRC is the second in a series documenting the implementation of an economic mobility initiative by New York City’s Change Capital Fund (CCF). CCF is a consortium of New York City donors formed to invest in local nonprofits undertaking data-driven anti-poverty strategies that integrate housing, education, and employment services. This brief describes two challenges to service coordination and considers the various ways grantees have responded to those difficulties.