Breadcrumb
- Federal Resources
Federal Resources
Share with Youth: Advice to Young Adults from Young Adults: Helpful Hints for Policy Change in the Mental Health System
This resource (PDF, 8 pages) can guide youth- and young adult-led organizations that want to make policy changes in the mental health system. Developed bythe Research and Training Center for Pathways to Positive Futures and Portland State University, it contains recommendations and quotes from a series of interviews with young adult leaders from advocacy groups that focus on mental health challenges or living in foster care.
Resource: Understanding Neurobiology of Psychological Trauma: Tips for Working with Transition-Age Youth
This resource (PDF, 8 pages), developed by Pathways Research and Training Center, introduces service providers to scientifically-informed findings about brain development and trauma specific to young adults, and describes the implications for trauma-informed interventions and trauma-informed engagement of young people in services.
Share with Youth: Changing the Rules: A Guide for Youth and Young Adults with Mental Health Conditions Who Want to Change Policy
This policy guide, developed by Pathways RTC (Research and Training Center), is written for youth- and young adult-led groups and organizations that want to make changes in policies related to mental health and other human services that affect them and other transition-age youth. The guide is intended for use by youth and young adults working together within a group or organization to make specific change, usually in partnership with other agencies, groups, or organizations.
ChooseMyPlate.gov
Choose my Plate offers personalized eating plans, interactive tools to help you plan and assess your food choices, and advice to help you make better choices.'
Stay Healthy at College With MyPlate On Campus
The MyPlate On Campus Initiative aims to spread healthy eating messages to college students to empower them to improve their eating and exercise habits and encourage their peers to do the same. MyPlate On Campus offers tools, such as a tracker that develops personalized nutrition and activity plans for users, and tip sheets on topics such as choosing healthy snacks and creative ways to exercise. Students interested in promoting wellness at their schools can become MyPlate On Campus Ambassadors and gain leadership experience while hosting fitness and healthy eating activities for their fellow students.
Resource: 2015 Behavior Risk Factor Surveillance Survey (BRFSS) Data
This resource includes 2015 BRFSS data and related information. The BRFSS is a state-based surveillance system that uses survey phone calls to collect information on risk behaviors, clinical preventive health practices, and health care access for adults 18 and older.
Report: Expenditures on Children by Families, 2015
This report presents the most recent estimates of expenditures by families on children annually across childhood and adolescence. The report indicates that a middle-income married-couple family will spend between $12,350 and $13,900 annually, or $233,610 from birth through age 17, on child-rearing expenses.
Children's Bureau
The Children's Bureau (CB) is one of two bureaus within the Administration on Children, Youth and Families, Administration for Children and Families, of the Department of Health and Human Services. The Children's Bureau seeks to improve the safety, permanency and well-being of children through leadership, support for necessary services, and productive partnerships with states, tribes, and communities. It has the primary responsibility for administering federal programs that support state child welfare services.
Upcoming Event: November is National Adoption Month
This observance aims to increase national awareness of the need for permanent families for children and youth in the foster care system. This year’s theme, “We Never Outgrow the Need for Family—Just Ask Us,” reflects a focus on the importance of identifying permanent families for the thousands of 15- to 18-year-olds in foster care who are currently less likely to be adopted or who may age out of the system without a stable home. A new tip sheet, Talking with Older Youth About Adoption (PDF, 2 pages) provides child welfare professionals with a framework for how to talk with older youth about permanency and includes suggestions for how to make these conversations more effective.
Report: Child Maltreatment 2015
This report from the Child Welfare Information Gateway provides state-level data from the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System on reports of abuse and neglect made to child protective services (CPS) agencies, the children involved, types of maltreatment, CPS responses, child and caregiver risk factors, services, and perpetrators.
Resource: Engaging Youth in Foster Care
This podcast shares the perspective of a youth formerly in foster care. It provides tips to caseworkers for engaging youth in developing their case plans and identifying supportive adults in their lives. This resource can help caseworkers as they work with youth who are in foster care or preparing to transition to adulthood.
Share with Youth: Being an Engaged and Involved Teen in Foster Care
This webpage provides information to teens in foster care about their permanency options, tools to help them transition to adulthood, and how to find support from other teens who have been in foster care.
Supporting Families Impacted by Incarceration — A Dialogue with Experts
This report, developed by the National Child Abuse and Neglect Technical Assistance and Strategic Dissemination Center, is the outcome of a meeting that convened national child welfare experts on families impacted by incarceration. It features key issues around this topic for practitioners and identifies needed resources and tools to support the workforce and families, along with a practical framework of intervention points from arrest to release.
John H. Chafee Foster Care Program for Successful Transition to Adulthood
The John H. Chafee Foster Care Program for Successful Transition to Adulthood (the Chafee program) provides funding to support youth/ young adults in or formerly in foster care in their transition to adulthood. The program is funded through formula grants awarded to child welfare agencies in States (including the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands) and participating Tribes. Chafee funds are used to assist youth/ young adults in a wide variety of areas designed to support a successful transition to adulthood. Activities and programs include, but are not limited to, help with education, employment, financial management, housing, emotional support and assured connections to caring adults. Specific services and supports are determined by the child welfare agency, vary by State, locality and agency, and are often based on the individual needs of the young person. Many State or local agencies contract with private organizations to deliver services to young people.
Passport in Time
Passport in Time (PIT) is a volunteer archaeology and historic preservation program of the USDA Forest Service (FS). PIT volunteers work with professional FS archaeologists and historians on national forests throughout the U.S. on such diverse activities as archaeological survey and excavation, rock art restoration, survey, archival research, historic structure restoration, oral history gathering, and analysis and curation of artifacts. FS professional staff of archaeologists and historians serve as hosts, guides, and co-workers.
A Parent's Guide to Using the Internet
This booklet from the Department of Education helps parents, regardless of their level of technological expertise, use the on-line world as an important educational tool.
Healthy Homes Program Brochure
The Healthy Homes program provides homeowners and rental property owners with practical information about how to prevent health and safety hazards. Specific problems such as asthma, allergies and mold are discussed.
Healthy Homes Website
The Healthy Homes program provides homeowners and rental property owners with practical information about how to prevent health and safety hazards. Specific problems such as asthma, allergies and mold are discussed.
Office of Healthy Homes and Lead Hazard Control
In 1991, Congress established HUD's Office of Healthy Homes and Lead Hazard Control to eliminate lead-based paint hazards in America's privately-owned and low-income housing. The OHHLHC provides funds to state and local governments to develop cost-effective ways to reduce lead-based paint hazards. In addition, the office enforces HUD’s lead-based paint regulations, provides public outreach and technical assistance, and conducts technical studies to help protect children and their families from health and safety hazards in the home
Seven Steps to a Healthy Home
The Healthy Homes program offers seven steps to having a healthy home, providing homeowners and rental property owners with practical information about how to prevent health and safety hazards. These steps include the importance of keeping your home pest- and contaminant-free, as well as dry, clean, well-ventilated and well-maintained.
Enhancing Cultural Competence in Social Service Agencies: A Promising Approach to Serving Diverse Children and Families
This brief from HHS's Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation summarizes the state of the field on cultural competence in social services and provides service providers and administrators with concrete strategies for ongoing self-reflection and development. The brief also includes links and references for additional relevant resources, tools, and information.
Interim Report for the Department of Labor Youth Offender Demonstration Project: Process Evaluation
The U.S. Departments of Labor and Justice funded 14 local demonstration projects designed to assist youth at risk of criminal involvement, youth offenders, and gang members ages 14 through 24 into long-term employment . This process evaluation provides an interim assessment of the implementation process undertaken by each project and determines the extent to which each was effective in building upon existing programs and systems to serve targeted youth.
The Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP): Launching a Nationwide Adolescent Pregnancy Prevention Effort
Authorized by Congress through the Affordable Care Act, PREP was designed to reduce teen pregnancies and their negative consequences. State PREP grantees had discretion to design their programs, but were expected to be evidence-based, provide education on both abstinence and contraceptive use, and educate youth on at least three of six adulthood preparation topics. States are also encouraged to target their programming to high-risk populations. This report illustrates states’ program decisions, using data gathered through telephone interviews with state grantee officials. Learn more (PDF, 92 pages).
Adolescent Literacy Research Network
The Adolescent Literacy Research Network is a partnership of The National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) and the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Vocational and Adult Education (OVAE), and Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS), designed to support each agency's effort to enhance literacy and employment skills of young American adults.
Rural Education Resource Center
The Rural Education Resource Center is designed to disseminate information regarding research and practice to stakeholders on a wide range of topics of particular importance to schools and communities in rural America and to bring renewed attention to the problems and issues of students in rural schools.