Exciting Times!! Marriage Awards announced - 10/2/07

Tue Oct 2 17:18:04 EDT 2007

These are exciting times!!

- BOWLING GREEN STATE TO HOUSE THE NATIONAL CENTER FOR MARRIAGE RESEARCH
- LIST OF HEAD START HEALTHY MARRIAGE AWARDS RELEASED
- BRIAN HIGGINBOTHAM/UTAH STATE RECEIVES HEAD START HEALTHY MARRIAGE GRANT
- BOWLING GREEN STATE TO HOUSE THE NATIONAL CENTER FOR MARRIAGE RESEARCH

ACF has announced the Award for the nation's FIRST EVER
National Center for Marriage Research: the awardee for the national center
is Bowling Green State University.

Drs. Wendy Manning and Susan Brown will co-direct the NCMR at the Department
of Sociology at Bowling Green State University.

ACF has announced a $900,000 cooperative agreement to establish the
National Center for Marriage Research to improve our understanding of how
marriage and family structure affect the health and well-being of
individuals, families, children, and communities, and to inform policy
development and programmatic responses. In addition to supporting
interdisciplinary research on marriage and family structure, the National
Center for Marriage will develop research capacity and widely disseminate
findings.

FOR DETAILS: http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/news/NCMR07.htm

#################################
- LIST OF HEAD START HEALTHY MARRIAGE AWARDS RELEASED

Here is the official list of the Head Start Marriage grants.  These are big
ones.  I don't know WHO many of these are (I mean can't connect names we'd
recognize from the marriage ed field to these awards) but I'm guessing we'd
recognize many of them.  I'll send anything I get as soon as I get it about
who/what - see another one, at end of this post.  I also do NOT have
anything yet on the Compassion Capitol Intermediary or Capacity Building
grant awards.  Please don't call or email to ask.  I get this stuff out to
you the same hour I receive it.  - diane

Office of Head Start HEALTHY MARRIAGE Initiative Grant Awards announced:
Name               

1.            Economic Opportunity Committee of St. Clair County, Inc.
            Port Huron, MI 48060

2.            Utah State University
            Logan, Utah 84322

3.            Northern Kentucky Community Action Commission, Inc.
            Covington, KY 41012

4.            Kings Community Action Organization
            Hanford, CA  93230

5.            Lake Cumberland community Action Agency, Inc.
            Jamestown, KY 42629

6.            People Incorporated of Southwest Virginia
            Abingdon, VA            24210

7.            Community Action Corporation of South Texas
            Alice, TX  78332

8.            Douglass Community Services
            Hannibal, MO  63401

9.            Maricopa County
            Phoenix, AZ  85004

10.            Avance, Inc., Houston Chapter
            Houston, TX  77092

11.            Central Missouri Community Action
Colombia, MO  65203

12.            Municipality of Mayaguez
Mayaguez, PR            00680

13.            Family Enrichment Network, Inc.
            Johnson City, NY  13790

14.            Charter, County of Wayne, Michigan
            Detroit, MI  48226

15.            Catholic Healthcare West DBA California Medical Center
Los Angeles, CA  90015

16.            Ogden-Weber Community Action Partnership, Inc.
            Ogden, UT  84401

17.            Central Vermont Community Action Council
            Barre, VT  05641

18.            Children¹s Home Society of Washington
             Seattle, WA  98115

19.            Hillsborough County Board of County Commissioners
            Tampa, FL  33614

20.            Holyoke Chicopee Springfield Head Start, Inc.
Springfield, MA  01105

21.            Community Relations-Social Development Commission
            Milwaukee, WI  53212

22.            Little Dixie Community Action Agency, Inc.
            Hugo, OK  74743

23.            Pinellas County Head Start Child Development & Family
Services, Inc.                   Pinellas Park, FL  33781

24.            Rural Opportunities, Inc.
            Harrisburg, PA 17102

##########################
- BRIAN HIGGINBOTHAM/UTAH STATE RECEIVES HEAD START HEALTHY MARRIAGE GRANT

I sent an announcement from Missouri yesterday, and here's one from Utah.
So that's two of the 24 "identified".  This one is great - it teaches
marriage skills to Hispanic stepfamilies using Francesca Adler-Bader's Smart
Steps curriculum!!  It's a five-year project with the federal share (80% of
project budget) for the five years at $1,648,391.41.  Yearly budgets are
between $300,000 and $375,000.
- diane 

Teaching Healthy Marriage Skills to Low-Income, Hispanic Couples in
Stepfamilies
Head Start Healthy Marriage Initiative

ABSTRACT
The project will teach healthy marriage skills to low-income, Hispanic
couples in stepfamilies. As the target population includes immigrant
families, this project proposes to serve some of neediest and most
underserved couples in the country.  Marriage education classes will be
offered by three Head Start/Early Head Start agencies (at six different
sites) in various counties throughout Central and Southern Utah. The Head
Start agencies have established connections with and are already serving the
targeted population. In light of the rates of divorce, cohabitation, and
out-of-wedlock births, the rationale for this project is that stepfamilies
are becoming an increasingly common family formation in the United States.
There are, however, few educational programs that help couples prepare for
remarriage and/or enhance their relationships in the context of
stepfamily-living. There are even fewer programs, if any, that provide these
services for low-income, Hispanic couples in stepfamilies.
This project will utilize the Smart Steps curriculum, a 12-hour
research-based program. Adults, children, and adolescents (up to age 17)
meet separately for the first hour-and-a-half of each class and then combine
for the last half-hour for family-strengthening activities. The curriculum
focuses on commitment, communication, (step) parenting, managing of family
budgets, conflict management, and other elements to enhance family
stabilization. The classes will be offered in Spanish. The English version
of Smart Steps will be available to sites with English-speaking-Hispanic and
non-Hispanic families, which will serve as a comparison group. Booster
sessions and newsletters will reinforce the skills learned. By addressing
the barriers that have historically hindered these couples from
participating in marriage education, this project provides low-income,
Hispanic couples in stepfamilies with unique opportunities to learn healthy
marriage skills. The project will also include a longitudinal study of
participant outcomes and a formative evaluation of effective strategies to
reach and teach these fragile families.

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