The Family Strengthening Policy Center serves as a focal point for research, information dissemination, and advocacy on place-based, practice-driven family strengthening practices, programs, and policy.  

A central information tool of the Center are policy briefs. These practice-driven policy briefs highlight emerging, promising, and proven practices in the field of family strengthening.   Developed in close collaboration with human service practitioners, advocates, community builders and researchers, these briefs are intended to serve as a tool for advancing the family strengthening approach as a model that works and produces meaningful results for families and communities.

Quick Links to Policy Briefs by Core Area

Click on the title to view the brief in PDF format.  You will need Adobe Acrobat Reader. 

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Summaries & Links to Policy Briefs

NEW BRIEFS

Brief No. 24: Family Strengthening Writ Large: On Becoming a Nation That Promotes Strong Families and Successful Youth [Download PDF Document]

This new brief from the Family Strengthening Policy Center suggests “macro” strategies for changing the culture, from one that may “value” family but which has practices and policies that do not reflect that value.  Family Strengthening Writ Large is intended as a high-level synthesis of what we have learned through researching a variety of specific topics.  Further, it is intended to spark discussion and from that to move us to focusing on how we can, individually and collectively, and in partnership with low-income families, help make the family fundamentals a strong reality for the vast majority of families.

Brief No. 23: Home Visiting: Strengthening Families by Promoting Parenting Success [Download PDF Document]

Childhood success begins with parenting at its best.  Home visiting can strengthen families facing parenting and child-rearing challenges.  As an early childhood intervention, home visiting aims to enhance parenting, link at-risk families to community resources, and help prepare young children for kindergarten.  Several home visiting models can produce considerable positive effects and net savings over the long term.  To enable home visiting programs to consistently deliver services with the highest quality, governments, the research community, and other community sectors must increase their support.  In return, home visiting agencies must take steps to strengthen outcomes.

PREVIOUS BRIEFS

Brief No. 1:  Introduction to Family Strengthening [Download PDF document]

Summary:

The Annie E Casey Foundation defines family strengthening as a deliberate process of giving parents the necessary opportunities, relationships, networks, and supports to raise their children successfully, which includes involving parents as decision-makers in how their communities meet family needs. The family strengthening approach is a framework for serving children and families that is rooted in the following principles: Family is the most fundamental factor influencing the lives and outcomes of children & Families are strong when they are supported by safe and thriving neighborhoods.  While family strengthening programs, interventions and services vary common characteristics that can be found across all human services: Family-Centered; Place-based; Collaborative; Focused on Family Self Sufficiency; Accountable to Families: and Preventative and Promotional.

Brief No. 2: Connecting Families, Schools and Community Resources [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

In many communities, schools are often the only public resource that can serve as a public space for convening community members. Situated in the heart of communities, schools have the opportunity to serve the broader needs of families and communities by connecting families with needed resources, supports, and services. This brief reviews the use of schools as a year-round hub for human service agencies offering a range of supports and opportunities for families as well as what it would take to make school-linked services more available in a greater number of communities.

Brief No. 3: Parental Involvement in Education [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

Family and community involvement that is linked to student learning has a greater effect on achievement than more general forms of involvement. This brief seeks to describe the role parental involvement in education has on child well being in low income communities.  While the focus is on parental involvement in education, lessons learned can and should be applied to other fields serving children and families.

Brief No. 4:  Mentoring as a Family Strengthening Strategy [Download PDF Document]

Summary:               

Mentoring programs are based on the idea that all children need caring adults in their lives.  This brief examines the following two questions: Can greater family engagement in traditional youth mentoring programs lead to better outcomes for mentored youth?  Can mentoring principles be applied to help connect isolated families to valuable resources and supports to achieve stability and self-sufficiency? The Center’s analysis is based on Q & A’s with youth and family-serving professionals and case studies of programs that apply principles of mentoring to serve vulnerable families and youth, It suggests that youth mentoring that involves parents or caregivers and emerging family mentoring approaches hold significant promise for strengthening disadvantaged families with minor children.

Brief No. 5:  Community Violence Prevention as a Family Strengthening Strategy [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

The Family Strengthening Policy Center asserts that families are strong when they are supported by safe and thriving neighborhoods and that building socially, economically and environmentally vibrant communities is a key to reducing crime and enabling children and families to feel safe at home, at school, and in public. With that as context, this brief examines community led violence prevention initiatives which seek to engage diverse community stakeholders.  Programs are highlighted that seek to define community assets as well as their challenges; root causes of violence and prevention strategies. 

Brief No. 6:  Family Strengthening in Youth Development [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

Out-of-school youth development programming is ripe with opportunities to strengthen families and engage families as equal partners with youth development staff.  This brief

assesses how youth-serving programs involve parents as decision-makers in strengthening families and communities as well as presents strategies for how national organizations and initiatives serving youth can empower parents as partners in their work.

Brief No. 7: Increasing Access to Needed Benefits: The New Technologies [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

One critical way human service organizations can strengthen families is by helping them access income-support benefit programs.  This brief looks at the impact of automated systems on how families can access a wide range of economic benefits as well as examines effective models and suggests strategies and recommendations for harnessing these tools for public benefit.

Brief No. 8:  Supporting Families with Incarcerated Parents [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

Our nation’s high rate of incarceration takes a heavy toll socially and economically on children, their families and communities. Supports are needed because they make communities more resilient to the effects of incarceration and serve to prevent negative outcomes for prisoners and their children.  This brief examines risk and protective factors of children of incarcerated parents; intervention models, as well as state and federal initiatives to address this vulnerable and often invisible population.

Brief No. 9:  Family-Centered Community Building [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

One strategy for transforming tough environments into family-strengthening neighborhoods is family-centered community building. Family-centered community building is the process of engaging family residents and other stakeholders in sustained collaborative efforts to strengthen and improve conditions for families with children in an identified geographic area (Adapted from the United Way of America, with a family-centered focus).  This brief suggests strategies for using FCCB to seek wholesale change by directly involving families in low-income communities instead of imposing external solutions.

Brief No. 10: Curtailing Predatory Lending: Helping Families Grow Economic Assets [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

By draining the economic assets of low-income families, predatory lending erodes their ability to raise children and become self-sufficient. Unnecessarily high interest rates and abusive loan-fee structures divert family income from basic necessities and fuel repeat borrowing. This brief discusses the impact and cost of predatory lending on low-income families, as well as relates predatory lending to limited access to mainstream financial services in low-income communities. Finally, it identifies ways to increase affordable and fair credit alternatives.

Brief No. 11: Individual Development Accounts: A Tool for Achieving Family Economic Success [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

All families need adequate income with which to support themselves, but income alone is not enough to raise many families out of poverty.  One of the most promising approaches for asset building, Individual Development Accounts, operates from the premise that low-income families can save and accumulate financial assets if the proper supports are in place. This brief looks at the latest research on IDAs and how owning assets gives people a stake in society and a sense of connectedness to their communities.

Brief No. 12: Marriage and Relationship Education: Will It Reduce Poverty and Strengthen Families? [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

Data indicates a correlation – but not necessarily a cause-and-effect relationship – between child wellbeing, poverty and two-parent families with healthy relationships.  This brief reviews the emerging practice known as “marriage and relationship education” (MRE) and advocates for making family services available to all low-income families with children, regardless of marital status.  In this context, MRE programs would be part of a comprehensive approach to family-strengthening.

Brief No. 13: Sustaining and Growing Father Involvement for Low-Income Children [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

This brief highlights father-involvement programs that seek to sustain and grow low-income,
nonresidential fathers’ emotional and financial involvement in their children’s lives.  It calls on policy makers to address disadvantaged fathers’ urgent needs, especially for employment-related services and a child support system that offers more than sanctions. 

Brief No. 14:  Community Health Workers: Closing Gaps in Families’ Health Resources [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

Low-income families face multiple barriers to accessing timely, quality services necessary to protect their health.  A wide variety of organizations have found community health workers can play a critical role in helping families manage their health. 

Brief No. 15:  Work-Plus: Boosting the Bottom Line for Low-Wage Working Parents [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

To provide for their families, low-wage working parents need good jobs.  “Work-plus” is the most promising avenue to helping parents obtain family-sustaining jobs.  This approach can benefit both low-wage working families and employers by upgrading workers’ skills, improving job retention and helping parents access work supports.

Brief No. 16: State and Local Government Family Strengthening Initiatives [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

Welfare reform and the need for efficiency in a tight fiscal environment have led state and local governments across the country to develop infrastructure and initiatives that provide crucial support for low-income families.  This brief highlights examples of family strengthening initiatives implemented by state and local policymakers to foster interagency coordination, level the economic playing field for families, focus government resources, and foster cross-sector collaboration.

Brief No. 17: Family Volunteering: Nurturing Families, Building Community [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

Family volunteering is an emerging strategy for strengthening low-income families with children.  Participating together in community service enables parents and children to develop close relationships, learn together and improve neighborhoods. The brief includes case studies and recommended practices for engaging low-income families in volunteering.

Brief No. 18: Family Strengthening at the Tipping Point: Emerging Transformation in the Human Services Field [Download Executive Summary] [Download Entire Brief]

Summary:

A major transformation in the human services community is underway.  At both the national and community levels, human services organizations are integrating place-based, family-strengthening approaches into their policies, programs, and practices.  This brief describes these advances using the results of a 2006 study conducted by the Family Strengthening Policy Center. 

Brief No. 19: Family Literacy [Download PDF document]

Summary:

Parent involvement in literacy instruction has a significant, positive impact on children's reading acquisition that is equivalent to a 10-point score gain on literacy tests.  In addition, 43 percent of adults were employed after participating in family literacy programs, compared with 14 percent prior to enrolling.  This brief explores the promises and challenges faced by family literacy programs, and the policy priorities that will enable these programs to continue their work strengthening low-income families with children.

Brief No. 20: Strengthening Grandfamilies through Respite Care [Download PDF document]

Summary:

Children do well when raised by grandparents and other relatives, especially when these caregivers can receive temporary relief, or respite services.  Respite care is an essential part of strengthening “grandfamilies.”  Together with other support services, respite contributes to the long-term stability and wellbeing of all members of grandfamilies.  This brief from the Family Strengthening Policy Center provides information on existing respite care systems and gaps, outlines promising practices, and suggests recommendations for federal and state policy makers and the human services community.

Brief No. 21: Youth Service-Learning: A Family-Strengthening Strategy [Download PDF Document]

Summary:

Service-learning.  It prepares youth for college, work, and adult responsibilities.  It strengthens families and communities, too.  A new brief from the Family Strengthening Policy Center explores how service-learning develops the capacity of youth as a core asset in their families and communities.  What are the challenges of expanding service-learning so it reaches the very youth and families with the greatest needs?  How can human services leaders play a role?

Brief No. 22: The Parenting Imperative [Download PDF Document]

Parents are one of the most important influences in positive child and youth development, yet too many caregivers lack the support they need.  By strengthening parents and their connections to resources, communities can help children thrive. To inform policy, practice, and civic initiatives, the brief explains what a “parenting success” strategy looks like and how it can strengthen families and communities. Community groups and family-serving agencies will find best practices and recommendations for how to maximize impact.  For funding agencies and policy makers, this brief focuses on creating conditions for communities to respond to the parenting imperative.