Happy New Year, everyone! We look forward to another year of providing assistance, resources, and webinars and sharing additional information and opportunities from around the field. As always, we are here to support you in your efforts to serve kinship/grandfamilies. | |
Register for Our Upcoming Webinars! | |
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Unaccompanied Immigrant Children in Kinship Families
2:00 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. ET
In 2022, over 128,000 children entered the U.S. with no lawful immigration status and no parent or guardian immediately available to provide care. Around 60% of these children were released into the care of sponsors who are kin, elevating the need for kinship programs to be aware of this special population. This webinar will provide more information about these kinship families and the unique challenges they face and explore opportunities to provide culturally relevant services to these families in your community. Our presenter is Emily Smith Goering, MSW, PhD.
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Leveraging Data to Understand Kinship/Grandfamilies and Inform Policy and Practice
2:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. ET
High-quality data is critical for informing changes to policy and practice that meaningfully improve the experiences and well-being of kinship/grandfamilies. Researchers from Child Trends will provide an overview of how existing data sources can be used and combined in innovative and creative ways to provide meaningful information about kinship/grandfamilies. Our presenter is Brittany P. Mihalec-Adkins, PhD, Research Scientist I, Child Welfare, Child Trends.
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ONLY TWO WEEKS LEFT!
Don't Miss the Deadline to Apply for Bridging Systems for Kinship Families
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Apply by 11:59 p.m. ET on January 30 for the chance to be one of two jurisdictions – states, territories, and/or large counties – receiving in-depth support from Network experts. The application is short, but the benefits will endure! The goal is to improve collaboration across government systems and nonprofit service providers, address service barriers, and leverage resources to maximize support of all kinship families, whether they are involved in the child welfare system or not. The Network's support, all free of charge, will focus on collaborative goals identified by the lead agencies and their partners.
Our partners at the National Indian Child Welfare Association (NICWA) also have a separate application for tribes and tribal organizations. Please note that our partners and subject matter expert at NICWA will be available to assist jurisdictions that apply to the Network program and want to better engage with tribes and Native families. The NICWA-led opportunity is specifically for applicants that are tribes and Native-serving organizations. Applications to the NICWA-led opportunity are due by 11:59 p.m. PT on March 18, 2024.
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What's New From the Network? | | |
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EXEMPLARY PROGRAMS:
Kinship Care Project at Atlanta Legal Aid Society, Inc. and High Country Caregivers in North Carolina
We are thrilled to continue our announcements of our Exemplary Kinship/Grandfamilies Program Designation recipients by sharing our write-ups of the Kinship Care Project at the Atlanta Legal Aid Society, Inc. and High Country Caregivers in North Carolina.
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How Relative Caregivers Can Advocate for Relative Native Children in State Child Welfare Agency Custody
The National Indian Child Welfare Association developed this resource as a tip sheet for tribal service providers to share with relatives seeking to become caregivers for children involved with state child welfare systems. The resource can also be helpful to relatives who want to support these children in ways other than serving as their full-time placement.
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Family Resource Center Services and Supports for Kinship/Grandfamilies
This fact sheet is for professionals working within an array of government systems and nonprofit organizations that support (or want to support) kinship/grandfamilies. It highlights services that Family Resource Centers commonly offer, which could benefit the families you serve.
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Monthly Resource
Grandfamily Support Groups: Seven Tips for Getting Started
Many kin caregivers count peer support groups as the lifeline that helps them carry on. This two-page resource provides seven tips for starting such a group. We are grateful to our partners at ZERO TO THREE for their leadership in producing these monthly resources and to Network Subject Matter Expert and Generations United GRAND Voice Gail Engel and GRAND Voice Victoria Gray for allowing us to share their words. Victoria Gray also reviewed the content of the resource.
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Please like and/or share our LinkedIn post about the Bridging Systems for Kinship Families opportunity. It’s available here. | |
Individual Technical 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 date, we have responded to TA requests from 47 states and territories.
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What's New Around the Network? | | |
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Using Asset-Based Community Development To Support Children Involved in Mental Health and Child Welfare Systems – Webinar
National Center on Advancing Person-Centered Practices and Systems
Monday, January 22, 2024, 2 p.m. ET
Asset-based community development (ABCD) is a strengths-based approach that centers identifying and mobilizing existing community resources, skills, and services on a local level to meet individual needs. ABCD benefits communities and the people who are a part of them by building capacity, helping community members realize their own strengths and potential, and forming partnerships to achieve long-term change. In this webinar, panelists will discuss how communities can get started with ABCD and outline how ABCD can be used to support children outside of formal service systems and keep them in the least restrictive placements with their families and natural supports.
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Expanding Access to Service Coordination: Two Models of Braiding Funding - Webinar
Housing and Services Resource Center
Wednesday, January 31, 2024, 2 p.m. ET
Many older adults, people with disabilities, and people who are experiencing (or are at risk of experiencing) homelessness would benefit from improved access to service coordination, which identifies and connects the services and supports that people want and need. One strategy to increase access to service coordination and maximize the use of existing resources in a sustainable way is “braiding,” which involves lacing together funds from multiple sources, each funding unique activities, to support a common goal while maintaining the specific program identity of each individual funding source.
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More kids are living with their grandparents. Can safety net policy keep up?
Brookings Institution
According to the authors of this research brief, since 2000, the share of children in the U.S. living with at least one grandparent has increased by more than 36%. While this data point includes multigenerational households in which the parents are also present, the report also specifically notes an increase in “skip-generation households” and an increase in white children living in these arrangements. Network staff were pleased to speak to the authors as they were preparing their piece, and we appreciate that they link to the Network’s Kinship Navigator Programs Around the United States resource.
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Notable Funding Opportunity | |
Aim High: Supporting Out-of-School Time Programs Serving Middle School Youth is a competitive grant opportunity that seeks to support and bolster the ability of afterschool and summer learning programs to help prepare middle school students for success in high school, college, and life. Nonprofits can apply for either a one-year grant or a two-year grant. The program will award 20 one-year grants of $15,000, 10 two-year grants of $25,000 per year, and 10 two-year grants of $50,000 per year. Applications are due by 5 p.m. ET on Thursday, February 1, 2024. | | |
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All of our previous newsletters are linked on our website, so you can access them anytime. |
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Generations United is committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion. For more information, read our full statement. | |
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The Grandfamilies & Kinship Support Network is the first-ever 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 [email protected].
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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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