Grantmakers for Children, Youth, and Families Conference Joseph Jones, CEO Center for Urban Families

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Grantmakers for Children, Youth, and Families
ConferenceJoseph Jones, CEOCenter for Urban
Families, Inc. (CFUF)

• Leveraging Public Dollars Lessons from the
  Healthy Relationships/Healthy Marriages and
  Responsible Fatherhood Initiatives

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History of CFUF

• Founded in 1999 -- spun out of Baltimores Health
  Department with Abell Foundation backing
• Our mission is to empower low-income families by
  enhancing the ability of men to fulfill their
  roles as fathers and of men and women to
  contribute to their families as wage earners.
• We provide services that build skills, remove
  road blocks increase confidence.
• Encouraging individuals to capitalize on their
  personal power to change.

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Components of CFUF

• Responsible Fatherhood
• Family Services
• Workforce Development
• Program Planning Evaluation
• Training Technical Assistance
• Curriculum Development Exploring Relationships
  and Marriage

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Vision and Core Values

• Vision Statement To assist individuals in
  regaining the personal power needed to benefit
  themselves, their families and their communities.
• Core Values
• Act with integrity.
• There is no us/them.
• Create a sense of family caring with
  accountability.
• Believe that everyone has innate knowledge,
  strength and ability when they walk through the
  door.

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• Progression from Responsible Fatherhood, and
  Workforce Development into Healthy Relationships
  and Marriage Programming

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Our Approach

• Met with diverse representatives from left to
  right of political spectrum
• Created internal working group
• Held community conversations
• Decided that the work could positively impact low
  income families

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Our Rationale

• Over 65 of African-American children born out of
  wedlock
• Many raised in poverty.
• Fragile Families Child Well-Being Study indicates
  around birth of child that 50 of low-income
  parents are in a romantic relationship.

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Our Rationale (continued)
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Our Rationale (continued)
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Our Rationale (continued)
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Challenges

• Healthy marriage is public policy viewed as being
  promoted primarily by conservatives
• Joes View Programming Framework Narrowly
  conceived focused did not consider economic
  support for low-income couples
• Difficulty in finding culturally sensitive and
  affordable curricula
• Domestic violence community raised important
  concerns

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Opportunities

• Annie E. Casey and CFUF partnered to engage The
  Administration for Children and Families and
  Mathematica Policy Research, Inc. for CFUF to
  become one of the seven Building Strong Families
  Healthy Marriage national demonstration sites.
• Annie E. Casey committed 800,000 over 5 years in
  order for CFUF to leverage 4.2 million dollar
  contract with Mathematica Policy Research Inc.
  over 5 years.

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Building Strong Families

• Program purposes
• Help unwed couples having a baby strengthen
  their relationship
• Support healthy marriage if couples choose to
  wed
• Ultimate goal Enhance child development
• Rigorous evaluation to test program impacts on
  relationships and children

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Program Components of BSF

• Marriage and
• Relationship
• Education and
• Skills

Family Support Services
Family Coordinators
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Program Components

• Curriculum
• Adapted Loving Couples/Loving Children curriculum
  developed by Dr. John Gottman to be used with
  low-income couples
• Curriculum cohorts run in 6 month cycles and
  include 24 weekly group session topics.
• Recruitment
• Recruit low-income new parents with a child
  between 0-3 months of age.
• To date The Baltimore Building Strong Families
  Program has enrolled 752 couples and have an
  active graduate pool of over 100 couples.
• The Baltimore Building Strong recruits clients
  from six local hospital, twenty-two community
  partners, and through street outreach .
• Domestic Violence
• Implemented appropriate safety and training
  protocols regarding domestic violence with input
  from the House of Ruth Maryland.

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BSF Multi-Site EvaluationKey Components

• Analysis of program impacts on
• Parents ability to form healthy
  relationships/marriages
• Child emotional and cognitive development
• Parents economic and personal outcomes
• Implementation Analysis
• Extent of parents participation
• Operational lessons
• What services are provided and how
• Data Collection
• Two Follow-up Surveys
• Field Observation
• MIS Data

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Program Outcomes BSF

• Total number of couples enrolled
• 2005 49 (pilot)
• 2006 294
• 2007 309
• 2008 104 (as of 9-18-08)
• Random Assignment Data
• Program 446 Control 306
• Total enrolled 756

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Program Outcomes BSF

• Average age of the couples  25 
• Average time couple has been together 3.7 years
• 61 of couples enrolled have participated in
  cohort sessions.
• 8 couples have wed.
• 64 have maintained their relationship since
  completing the program

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Partners for Success

• Formerly known as the Couples Employment Project,
  administered in partnership with Mathematica
  Policy Research, Inc.
• Designed to serve 40 couples (or 80
  individuals)/year. Grew out of lessons learned
  from BSF couples trying to merge into Workforce
  Development
• Couples-Oriented Approach
• Focuses on the following areas career planning,
  education development, budgeting, financial
  management, and family planning.
• Explores the most effective methods to assist
  fathers and mothers in active, healthy
  relationships, who have decided to face
  employment challenges together.
• Workshop results in a written plan and ties into
  related workshops

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Lessons Learned

• Healthy relationships and marriage programming is
  a strong complement to Workforce and Fatherhood
  Services
• Together, these programs weaves a holistic
  framework for Family Stability and Economic
  Success.
• Healthy Relationships and Marriage Programming is
  welcomed and needed in communities that we serve
  based on BSF enrollment numbers
• Programming by itself has minimal long term
  impacts without infusion of other supports such
  as stable employment and housing

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Leveraging Dollars Relationships

• Utilized Public Dollars to develop new
  relationships within major Hospitals,
  (capitalized on these relationships to develop
  job opportunities for clients as well as future
  research opportunities)
• Utilized public dollars to leverage major multi
  year contribution from Annie E. Casey Foundation
  (deepens long standing relationship)
• Created opportunity for Curriculum development
  opportunities around Healthy Relationships and
  Marriage (CSBG) as well as leveraged capacity
  building grant with State of Maryland to provide
  Technical assistance for other organizations to
  run healthy marriage cohorts

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Video

• Dwayne and Brenda