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Welcome to our final newsletter of 2025!
Please read on to learn about our latest resources and news, as well as other resources and news from around the field.
| | Join Us for Our Upcoming Webinar! | | |
Engaging Caregivers in the Community
2:00 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. ET
In keeping with our practice, the webinar will be one hour, followed immediately by an open Q&A session that will last for half an hour.
Kinship families want and need support, and effectively engaging them is key. This begins with trust and mutual respect, which can be fostered using a relational, rather than transactional, approach. By centering lived experience, creating welcoming environments, and listening to what caregivers say they need, we build authentic relationships that connect families to both formal systems and community-based support. This is the space where genuine engagement, change, and positive outcomes happen. Join this webinar to learn more about intentional and practical strategies for engaging kinship families in the community. Our speakers for this webinar are Dr. Ali Caliendo and Dr. Angela Tobin.
| | | | Since we launched our LinkedIn page in September 2023, we’ve been using it to share the latest news, data, and replicable practices and tools to support your work with kinship families. Follow our page to keep up with the latest kinship news between monthly issues of this newsletter. | | What's New From the Network? | |
Kin Engagement Toolkit
Thanks to Subject Matter Expert Marina Nitze and her team at the Child Welfare Playbook, we have updated our Kin-Finding Toolkit, giving it a new title and refreshing the content. All links to our Kin-Finding Toolkit will now lead directly to this updated version, which features almost 20 practical strategies to help you locate and engage with family members and trusted adults (collectively called “kin” throughout this toolkit) who can provide placement or ongoing support for youth. If you have any questions about implementing a strategy in this toolkit or want to learn more about how a jurisdiction named as an example is doing things, we encourage you to reach out to us through this form. We will get back to you quickly to assist in whatever way we can.
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Tech Use for Grandfamilies
Many of us who grew up with computers or have used them professionally for decades take our skills for granted, but a lack of computer literacy is a barrier for many older adults. This tip sheet, prepared in collaboration with our partners at ZERO TO THREE, provides ideas to help you address grandfamilies’ technology needs.
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Oglala Sioux Tribe GrandFacts Fact Sheet
Our partners at the National Indian Child Welfare Association have prepared another Tribal fact sheet, in collaboration with Oglala Sioux Tribe, and we have added it to the GrandFacts Fact Sheet page of our website. The fact sheet is full of information and links that will be useful to kinship/grandfamilies and the professionals who work with them. It presents resources organized into seven primary service areas, each with subcategories that describe specific types of services.
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Check out this LinkedIn post about data on children in foster care who are living with kin. The latest data distinguishes between children in foster care who are living with kin in unlicensed homes and children in foster care who are living with kin in licensed homes. This distinction is important since licensing is tied to foster care maintenance payments to help meet the needs of children. Without licensure/approval, children with kin typically do not receive ongoing financial support like other children in foster care. The Network is helping jurisdictions implement kin-specific licensing, which seeks to address this disparity. | | Individual Assistance Spotlight | | | | The Network is responding free of charge to individual technical assistance (TA) requests from professionals who work in systems and organizations that serve kinship/grandfamilies. To request assistance on the array of issues impacting kinship/grandfamilies, please complete our request assistance form. | | |
We answer questions and respond to requests of all sizes. Some questions focus on a very specific topic and/or location, while others are much broader. Below, we share an example TA request and response. As is typical for this spotlight, the request below only required an email response. Many of our requests inspire more intensive responses from our TA team. We often host meetings with peers or other subject matter experts; review data and policies; and provide specific guidance to help enhance programs, implement policies, or otherwise improve services for kin.
Request
We are a community-based organization looking for ways to build capacity and expand our reach to support schools and kinship families.
Response
The Network has several resources and webinars that you may be interested in related to capacity building and outreach to schools and kinship families:
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GrandFacts Fact Sheets – we have GrandFacts Fact Sheets for each state and for some territories and Tribes, and each fact sheet lists multiple organizations in that area that serve kinship families; the GrandFacts for your area may introduce you to organizations that may be good to make connections with
To make an individual request, please complete this form and we will get in touch.
| | North Carolina’s Department of Health and Human Services (NCDHHS) has made kinship care a central priority—expanding efforts to place more children with kin; increasing licensing of kin caregivers; and coordinating supports across counties, private agencies, and community partners. As this work evolved, NCDHHS staff began relying on the Grandfamilies & Kinship Support Network for cross-system guidance. Foster Care Coordinator Jessica Frisina, who helps lead the state’s internal kinship team, calls the Network one of the few resources she consistently follows… | | Upcoming Presentation by the Network | | | | Melissa Devlin, the Network’s assistant director, and Berenice Rushovich, representing the Network’s evaluation partner Child Trends, will present at the Society for Social Work and Research Annual Conference in Washington, DC on Thursday, January 15th. Their presentation, “Measuring the Impact of a Technical Assistance Center on Enhancing Cross-System Collaboration to Improve Supports for Kinship Families,” will be part of a symposium called Transforming Social Work for Kinship Families: The Power of Community-Engaged Qualitative Research. | | What's New Around the Network? | |
Webinar – The Right Information at the Right Time: Findings on I&R/A Collaboration
ADvancing States
Friday, December 19 at 3 p.m. ET
| | | This session will highlight insights from the national Information & Referral/Assistance (I&R/A) survey and practices across aging and disability networks. The webinar will explore how I&R/A programs collaborate with partners within the I&R sector and with health and human service providers to strengthen referrals and access to services. Participants will gain an understanding of the elements that support collaboration; the roles of I&R/A programs in consumer access systems; and the impacts on service delivery for individuals seeking information, resources, and assistance. | | |
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Webinar – Building Caregiving Research-Practice Partnerships: A Virtual Exchange for Caregiving Providers and Researchers
USAging and the National Alliance for Caregiving
Tuesday, January 13 at 2 p.m. ET
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Join USAging and the National Alliance for Caregiving for the first annual virtual networking opportunity to connect caregiving researchers and family caregiver service providers, including Area Agencies on Aging, Title VI programs, and other organizations.
The session will begin with short presentations from caregiving researchers and Aging Network providers on their experience of working together. After a brief Q&A, attendees will be assigned to virtual break-out rooms, where researchers and providers will have the opportunity to discuss with each other their perspectives on what makes a successful research partnership.
This webinar is part of the Creating and Advancing Caregiving Research and Evidence Network (CARE Network) -- a collaborative focused on creating a more unified and adaptable national infrastructure for family caregiving research.
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Caregiver Services and Supports Action Guides
USAging
| These eight guides all align with Goal 3 of the National Strategy to Support Family Caregivers, which is to strengthen services and supports for family caregivers, including kin caregivers. The guides contain best practices and implementation strategies designed to help Aging Network organizations develop and strengthen innovative services and supports that meet the needs of all family caregivers. Generations United is a partner in this important work and led a working group that drafted one of the guides, “Fostering Partnerships Between Child Welfare and Aging Systems to Improve Recognition of Support for Kin Caregivers.” Promoting agency cross-collaborations to leverage resources and efficiently serve kinship families is at the heart of the Network’s purpose. | |
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Relatives Raising Children: Federal Support Helps, but Challenges Persist
U.S. Government Accountability Office
| The U.S. Government Accountability Office was asked to review issues related to kinship families and, as part of their process, they interviewed Generations United staff, including our director. This report describes the characteristics of kinship families, how their challenges may have changed since the COVID-19 pandemic, the resources they are accessing, and how the federal government primarily supports them. It prominently highlights the Network’s activities, which are funded by the federal government, in a section on how the federal government helps communities serve kinship families. | |
Working With Kin Caregivers
Child Welfare Information Gateway, Children’s Bureau, U.S. Administration for Children and Families
| This “Bulletin for Professionals” provides an overview of the many benefits of kinship care for children who are separated from their parents. It also summarizes laws, policies, and programs that can support kinship families. The bulletin relies on and links to many Network resources, as well as resources produced by our parent organization, Generations United, and additional resources that Generations United and the American Bar Association Center on Children and the Law created as part of a long-standing partnership. | |
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Assessing the Agency’s or Organization’s Ability to Provide Kinship Services Post-Permanency
National Center for Enhanced Post-Adoption Support
| This short resource offers key considerations and practical strategies to assess an agency’s readiness and effectiveness in delivering support services to kin caregivers post-permanency. By using this tipsheet, agencies and organizations can better determine if they are equipped to meet the unique needs of kinship families over time. | | | |
Family Caregiving Counts: Adding Family Caregiver Questions to American Community Survey
Lurie Institute for Disability Policy, Brandeis University and Family Support Research and Training Center
| This brief, written by Joe Caldwell, Laurin Bixby, Nick Mirin, and Syd Pickern, supports the addition of family caregiving questions to the U.S. Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS). The authors note, “The ACS currently is able to identify grandparents who are caring for children. This important data source helped inform the National Strategy and the Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Council […]. While maintaining the ability to identify this important subpopulation within the ACS, additional caregiving questions would enhance our ability to inform broader caregiving policies across populations of caregivers.” | |
Notable Funding Opportunities
(listed in order of application deadline)
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Perdue Corporate Giving by The Franklin P. and Arthur W. Perdue Foundation focuses its giving on agriculture and the environment, education, fighting hunger and poverty, health and social services, and public safety. They also support organizations that celebrate the heritages and cultures of their communities. The final deadline of 2025 for requests for over $1,000 is Wednesday, December 31. The next deadline for requests for under $1,000 is Thursday, January 1.
Spark Good Local Grants from Walmart focus on three areas: creating opportunity, advancing sustainability, and strengthening community. The final grant application deadline of 2025 is Wednesday, December 31.
The Community Access to Child Health (CATCH) Program is a national initiative of the American Academy of Pediatrics that supports pediatricians in leading innovative, community-based efforts that increase children’s access to optimal health or well-being. Applicants can apply for a planning grant or an implementation grant. Applications are due by 11:59 p.m. CT on Tuesday, January 20.
The JA Community Foundation currently focuses its funding on the Japanese American community. They fund programs and projects that focus on senior health and services, history, arts and culture, and youth. Letters of inquiry for the 2026 Spring Grants cycle are due by Sunday, January 25.
RRF Foundation for Aging focuses on improving the quality of life for older people. Their national areas of focus are caregiving for older adults, economic security later in life, housing, and social and intergenerational connectedness. The next deadline for letters of inquiry is Sunday, February 1.
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The Imprint, December 14, 2025
In an interview last week, Assistant Secretary of the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) Alex Adams discussed his experience and his plans for the agency. Adams is very supportive of kin placement, kin-specific licensing, and the model standards, while also acknowledging that it is up to each state to decide how to move forward: “At ACF, we’re a financier and overseer. We’re not the direct service provider. So I will sing from the heavens why I think kin licensure makes sense, but those are ultimately state decisions.” To listen to the interview, check out the podcast.
U.S. Administration for Children and Families (ACF), December 11, 2025
State child welfare agencies often intercept federal benefits, such as Social Security survivor benefits earned through a deceased parent’s lifetime contributions, that are intended for a child in foster care. Agencies then use these funds to reimburse their own costs. ACF has notified all 39 governors who allow this practice and aims to work with states to end it. The goal is to ensure these earned benefits are no longer taken from foster youth and are instead preserved to support them as they transition out of state care.
U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS), December 8, 2025
This summer’s reconciliation legislation included significant changes to Medicaid eligibility and financing, and CMS has released guidance to help states implement the new requirements. Please note that the Network plans to release a resource with more information on this topic in 2026. In the meantime, it is important to be aware of the fact that there are exemptions to the “community engagement” requirement. The exemptions cover kin caregivers who are raising at least one child under the age of 14 or at least one child who is 14 or over and has a documented disability. The National Council of Urban Indian Health has released a one-pager on exemptions for American Indian and Alaska Native people.
U.S. Administration for Children and Families (ACF), November 24, 2025
“A Home for Every Child” is a new national initiative that seeks to achieve a foster home-to-child ratio greater than 1:1 in every state. The initiative focuses on both sides of the equation — increasing the availability of safe homes through diligent recruitment, prioritizing kin, and improving retention of existing caregivers while reducing entries into foster care through effective prevention and faster pathways to permanency. ACF plans to leverage all $11.4 billion of its annual federal funding for foster care and child welfare to advance this mission.
Children’s Bureau, U.S. Administration for Children and Families (ACF), November 24, 2025
This information memorandum reaffirms the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' longstanding interpretation that Title IV-B services (other than foster care) are not classified as "federal public benefits." Child welfare agencies may therefore provide these services to children and families without regard to immigration status.
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The Grandfamilies & Kinship Support Network is the only national technical assistance center for those who serve grandfamilies and kinship families. It was created to help guide lasting, systemic reforms. The Network is a new way to collaborate, to work across jurisdictional and systemic boundaries, to eliminate silos, and to help one another and be helped in return. Thank you for being part of it.
We'd love to hear from you! Please send any feedback on this newsletter to mweiss@gu.org.
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The Network is supported by the Administration for Community Living (ACL), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as part of a financial assistance award totaling $9,950,000 with 95 percentage funded by ACL/HHS and $523,684 and 5 percentage funded by non-government sources. The contents are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement, by ACL/HHS, or the U.S. Government.
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