Isabel Sawhill, of the Brookings Institution, testified before the Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support of the House Ways and Means Committee to discuss poverty reduction strategies. She cited three priorities to alleviate poverty in the United States: expanding early childhood education, reducing teen pregnancy and early, out-of-wedlock childbearing, and encouraging work.

This fact sheet, from the National Quality Improvement Center on Non-Residential Fathers, provides information on the “What about the Dads?” study. This study included research on 1,958 children who were removed from the home where the father did not reside. By engaging the fathers of children in foster care, child and father relationships can be improved, and children can gain access to additional benefits.

This is a fact sheet on the Quality Improvement Center on Non-resident Fathers, which was designed to promote additional knowledge development regarding the engagement of non-resident fathers and their children who are involved in the child welfare system. The project will determine what impact non-residential father involvement has on child welfare outcomes.

The Institute for Research on Poverty authored this discussion paper on the impact of policies, such as child support orders, divorce policies, custody regulations, on the wellbeing of children and families. Authors use information on the marital status of parents to assess how children are affected by a change in status.

This Fragile Families Brief, from the Center for Research on Child Wellbeing at Princeton University, focuses on how fathers’ risk factors are related to father involvement and relationship status among unmarried couples. Risk factors identified include physical abuse, substance abuse, and incarceration. Authors use qualitative and quantitative data on these risk factors to examine child involvement and the relationships among unmarried couples.

The number of children living in poverty has increased by a half million in one year. With recent work requirements for low-income parents, this study seeks to identify how much time children in low-income families spend with their parents and if the lack of time contributes to behavioral problems for these children.

From the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation, this research brief provides an overview of the Oklahoma Marriage Initiative. Since 1999, Oklahoma's Initiative has been in place and successful due to the large public and private collaboration in the State. This brief is the first in a series to define promising strategies from Oklahoma.

From the National Center for Children in Poverty, this article highlights effective programs, policy opportunities, and other strategies to improve educational outcomes for children. This brief is to inform policymakers and other stakeholders on strategies to promote the healthy educational development of children.

The goals of the meeting were to bring together State, Tribal, and Federal officials working in TANF and/or Child Care programs, to highlight best practice models of TANF/Child Care coordination, to explore how the combination of TANF and CCDF subsidies can contribute to self-sufficiency and improve families, and to provide information on federal programs that help strengthen families.

This report details the three day Leadership Conference of ACF's West Central Hub. Topics discussed include fatherhood, healthy marriages, faith-based and community initiatives, and positive youth development.