Children’s Bureau Grant: Enhancing Child Welfare for Families Experiencing Domestic Violence

QIC
The QIC will be awarded funds for a 1-year planning phase and, pending successful completion of that phase, a 4-year implementation phase. During the planning phase, the QIC will engage in a collaborative process to review the literature, and relevant child welfare policies and practices, develop a conceptual framework that can be used across jurisdictions, clarify the focus of the project, and refine the implementation plan for the remainder of the project. In addition, the QIC will consult with key subject matter experts and representatives from relevant research, practice and policy fields, to support the QIC in successfully completing the project goals. During the implementation phase, the QIC will support, monitor, and provide training and technical assistance to 4-6 projects. The projects will test and evaluate using innovative practices that focus on building collaborative models, policies, procedures and interventions targeted toward improving the safety, permanency and well-being for children in families that are: (1) pregnant and/or have young children, (2) involved in the child welfare system, and (3) experiencing domestic violence. The QIC will evaluate each of the projects using agile methodology (agile methodology provides the opportunity to assess the direction and relevance of a project throughout the developmental life cycle). This methodology will help to ensure customer focus and impact, further the evidence base, and disseminate knowledge in the field. The evaluations will include process, practice, cost and outcome evaluation components.

Projects Sites
The QIC will support 4-6 projects in selected child welfare agencies working in partnership with a domestic violence coalition/program to support the piloting of evidence-based and/or evidence-informed, promising, and innovative practices to improve the safety, permanency and well-being for these young children and families. The projects will also focus on building the necessary infrastructure to support these services, including the development of collaborative policies, practices and procedures. Projects will engage in rigorous evaluations in order to document effective implementation and practices, and assess cost and outcomes. If the child welfare agency or the domestic violence coalition/program is not the lead for the project site, the applicant must have written commitments from these agencies.
The project period for this cooperative agreement is 5 years with five 12-month budget periods. In years 2 through 5, CB anticipates the funding level will be up to $3.5 million per year.