+
If you are a heavy Facebook user, you may find it convenient to keep up with what's happening at Zero to Three through their Facebook page, as with the following note from the page. -gw
From the July 2010 issue of Zero to Three, "Home Visiting: Past, Present, and Future"
Order your issue now!
THIS ISSUE AND WHY IT MATTERS
Public interest in home visiting is on the rise due to the large increase in federal funding for high quality, evidence-based home visitation to be provided through the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act signed into law on March 23, 2010. With this legislation, the federal government is making an unprecedented investment in home visiting programs that provide services to young children and their families. The law established a 5-year, $1.5 billion federal grant program for programs serving high-risk children and families, such as those in low-income families, pregnant women less than 21 years old, families with histories of abuse and neglect or substance abuse, children with developmental delays, and families in the military.
The emphasis on evidence-based programs mirrors the push over the past decade for more rigorous program evaluation demonstrating home visiting’s effectiveness. In the 1990s, home visiting was not well understood or accepted as a valuable strategy for delivering services. Funding was in short supply and program evaluations showed mixed results. The contributors to this issue of Zero to Three describe how the landscape for home visiting has changed over the last decade, with greater collaboration among national home visiting models and more rigorous evaluation leading to a better understanding of the key factors that can make programs successful. Learning how the characteristics of home visits—such as the dosage (frequency and duration), the content, and the quality of the relationships between home visitors and families—have an impact on program outcomes is helping researchers and practitioners look more deeply into the complexity of home visitation services.
An existing challenge is how to coordinate home visiting with other child and family services to provide a continuum of care, beginning during pregnancy and throughout the earliest years of life. In addition, the expansion and integration of home visiting services calls for welldeveloped systems and tools for collecting and sharing information and for the rigorous evaluation efforts that will ultimately lead to improved services and maximum benefits for young children and their families. The articles in this issue of Zero to Three provide a rich and thoughtful examination of the growth of the field of home visiting and the potential for the years to come.
Stefanie Powers, Editor
spowers@zerotothree.org
Order your issue now!
THIS ISSUE AND WHY IT MATTERS
Public interest in home visiting is on the rise due to the large increase in federal funding for high quality, evidence-based home visitation to be provided through the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act signed into law on March 23, 2010. With this legislation, the federal government is making an unprecedented investment in home visiting programs that provide services to young children and their families. The law established a 5-year, $1.5 billion federal grant program for programs serving high-risk children and families, such as those in low-income families, pregnant women less than 21 years old, families with histories of abuse and neglect or substance abuse, children with developmental delays, and families in the military.
The emphasis on evidence-based programs mirrors the push over the past decade for more rigorous program evaluation demonstrating home visiting’s effectiveness. In the 1990s, home visiting was not well understood or accepted as a valuable strategy for delivering services. Funding was in short supply and program evaluations showed mixed results. The contributors to this issue of Zero to Three describe how the landscape for home visiting has changed over the last decade, with greater collaboration among national home visiting models and more rigorous evaluation leading to a better understanding of the key factors that can make programs successful. Learning how the characteristics of home visits—such as the dosage (frequency and duration), the content, and the quality of the relationships between home visitors and families—have an impact on program outcomes is helping researchers and practitioners look more deeply into the complexity of home visitation services.
An existing challenge is how to coordinate home visiting with other child and family services to provide a continuum of care, beginning during pregnancy and throughout the earliest years of life. In addition, the expansion and integration of home visiting services calls for welldeveloped systems and tools for collecting and sharing information and for the rigorous evaluation efforts that will ultimately lead to improved services and maximum benefits for young children and their families. The articles in this issue of Zero to Three provide a rich and thoughtful examination of the growth of the field of home visiting and the potential for the years to come.
Stefanie Powers, Editor
spowers@zerotothree.org
No comments:
Post a Comment