The Administration for Children and Families' Office of Family Assistance (OFA) Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII hosted a webinar, "Grandparents Raising Grandchildren and Other Child-Only Issues" on Wednesday, August 20, 2014 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. EDT. This webinar was the second in the 2014 Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII Tribal TANF webinar series "Addressing the Needs of Children." The Webinar provided strategies for addressing the needs of the growing population of grandparents who are raising their grandchildren, particularly those with child-only, TANF-eligible grandchildren. The speakers provided strategies and resources that were relevant to both social service providers and grandparents.

The Administration for Children and Families' Office of Family Assistance (OFA) Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII hosted a webinar, "TANF Children Endangered by Drug Use" on Tuesday, August 12, 2014 from 2:00 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. EDT. This webinar was the first in the 2014 Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII Tribal TANF webinar series: "Addressing the Needs of Children." It addressed the growing issue of protecting children in environments of increasing drug use. Key topics included: identifying when a child is exposed to drug use in his/her home; implementing processes for addressing the needs of drug endangered children; and strategies for keeping a child's life stable when his/her family is unstable.

The Region VI State TANF Meeting: Building a Path to Family Stability, convened by the Administration for Children and Families, Office of Family Assistance, took place on September 23 - 25, 2014 in Dallas, Texas. The meeting brought together TANF program directors, stakeholders, and State administrators to learn strategies, engage in dialogue, and build linkages with peers to improve program outcomes and promote economic and social well-being for individuals, children, and families. Specific topics covered during the meeting included: moving towards evidence-based practices; engaging non-custodial parents to improve child and family outcomes; improving effective programming for families facing homelessness; working with victims of family violence; and addressing the needs of rural TANF participants.

The OFA Regions VI & VIII TANF Webinar Series: TANF Data Reporting and Analysis Webinar # 3: Using Research to Inform Practice: ACF's Family Self-Sufficiency and Stability Research Consortium (FSSRC), was held on September 12, 2013. The webinar, sponsored by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Regions VI & VIII, featured Mr. Brendan Kelly, a Senior Social Science Research Analyst and the Dissemination Team Leader in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation (OPRE); Dr. Michelle Derr, a Senior Researcher at Mathematica Policy Research; and Ms. Kinsey Dinan, the Deputy Director of the New York City Human Resources Administration's Office of Evaluation and Research. Speakers provided an overview of the structure of and opportunities available through the three components of ACF, OPRE, FSSRC including the Scholar's Network, Data Center, and Project AWESOME. The webinar also included a discussion of how State and local program administrators can work with in-house researchers to gain insight into the impact of their programming.

The second webinar in the 2013 Regions VI & VIII TANF Webinar Series: TANF Data Reporting and Analysis was held on August 1, 2013. The webinar, sponsored by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Regions VI and VIII, was open to all Region VI and VIII State TANF Directors and staff, local TANF agencies, and contractors and highlighted Julie Siegel as the featured speaker. Ms. Siegel is a Program Specialist at ACF's Office of Family Assistance who works in the TANF State Policy Division, focusing primarily on policy relating to work activities, work participation rates, and caseload reduction credits. During her presentation, Ms. Siegel focused on the important role that the caseload reduction credit plays in the TANF work participation rate process, including how the credit is calculated, how eligibility changes affect the credit, and how the excess maintenance of effort spending affects the state's work participation rate. Ms. Siegel was joined during the presentation by her colleague Peter Germanis, Senior Policy Advisor/National Expert at ACF's Office of Family Assistance.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families (ACF), Office of Family Assistance (OFA), Division of Tribal TANF Management hosted the first national Tribal TANF Summit to Improve Program Performance and Strengthen Native Families on August 12-14, 2013 in Denver, Colorado. The workshop focused on Tribal TANF program administration and participant engagement. Experts from the field shared information on a variety of topics including: career pathways and subsidized employment, TANF policies and procedures, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, opportunities for economic development, and effective prevention and treatment programs for substance abuse and co-occurring disorders.

The Administration for Children and Families, Office of Family Assistance, Region VI hosted a hands-on and interactive training for TANF programs on September 11-13, 2012. The 2012 Fiscal and Data Management Workshop in Dallas, Texas covered topics from caseload reduction credits and maintenance of effort (MOE) to cost allocation, audits, and penalties and provided TANF program representatives with the most comprehensive and hands-on training on managing TANF programs available. The workshop brought together State TANF directors and fiscal staff to strategize on ways to manage TANF dollars, collect, analyze, and report TANF participant and program data. Attendees learned strategies for maximizing TANF dollars and local partnerships and worked with peers to understand promising strategies for improving program performance and participant outcomes.

On August 14 and 15, 2012, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Administration for Children and Families (ACF) Office of Family Assistance (OFA) Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII convened the 2012 Regions V, VI, VII, and VIII Tribal TANF Workshop in St. Paul, Minnesota. Designed to bring together Tribal TANF program directors and other key stakeholders, this workshop focused on the dual issues of effectively providing services to Tribal families in a recovering economy and helping TANF participants achieve self-sufficiency. Workshop attendees were provided with opportunities to strategically engage with their peers in order to share promising practices and the latest research, as well as to plan ways to improve TANF programming for low-income families. Over the course of the day and a half workshop a number of specific topics were covered including: Dialogue with the OFA Division of Tribal TANF Management; Youth Programming and Summer Youth Employment; Subsidized Employment Programs and Employer Engagement; Use of Skill-Building Activities; Audits, Financial and Grants Management, and Data Reporting; Collaboration with Child Support Enforcement and Child Welfare; and Financial Literacy and Asset Building. The wide reach of the workshop was evident with 24 Tribes represented from four OFA Regions. During the workshop, Tribal TANF program representatives also spent time networking and dialoguing on their program strengths, challenges, partnerships, and program policies/integrity, to garner new and innovative ideas from others for serving their TANF participants.

On October 18, 2011, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Family Assistance (OFA) convened an orientation meeting in Washington, D.C. for the Promising Pathways Initiative. The three primary meeting goals of the Promising Pathways All-Site Orientation Meeting were to orient site representatives to the Promising Pathways Initiative, provide hands-on, interactive training for site coordinators on how to define and document their practice using logic models, and plan the first intensive full team site visit. Participants included one or two representatives from each of the ten selected Promising Pathways sites, OFA staff, and ICF International site coaches and team staff. This executive summary describes the proceedings of the All-Site Orientation Meeting and includes the meeting agenda, participant list, and materials as appendices.