Poverty is not only about the numbers. It's about the stark realities of daily life for millions of Canadians. We hope that the numbers provided here will help communities share information, leverage resources and create solutions to the blight of urban poverty in Canada. The Urban Poverty Project 2007 is a series of comprehensive analytical reports, resource tools, and data profiles which take a broad look at different aspects of urban poverty in Canada, using detailed data from Statistics Canada Censuses and other sources. Reports in the UPP series pay special attention to the status of certain population groups particularly vulnerable to poverty, while others examine the concentration of poverty in urban neighbourhoods.

Professor Richard Hugman (University of New South Wales). Glasgow School of Social Work Research Seminar Series: 19th June 2007 - audio.

Partnership, choice and control are central to the policy agenda, along with a rights-based approach to challenging discrimination and an increasing emphasis on evidence-based policy and outcomes. There is a growing body of evidence highlighting the importance of developing strategies for promoting well-being, which is reflected in recent government policy, but the promotion of mental health and well-being in later life has been one of the least visible areas of activity in older people’s services. The concepts of well-being, independence and choice are also essential elements in the philosophy of extra care housing, which is becoming a popular model of specialist housing with care provision for older people. This research project explores best practice for promoting social well-being in this environment.

Statistical neighbour models provide one method for benchmarking progress in children's services. This tool allows the user to display up to five outcome measures from a list. The outcome measures displayed will be updated regularly by DCSF.

The notion of belonging, or social identity, is a central aspect of how we define who we are. We consider ourselves to be individuals but it is our membership of particular groups that is most important in constructing a sense of identity. Social identity is a fundamental aspect of what it is to be human. In Britain today there is public debate suggesting that we are losing this essential sense of belonging — that globalization, for example, far from bringing people
closer together, is actually moving us apart. We hear that our neighbourhoods are becoming evermore impersonal and anonymous and that we no longer have a sense of place. But is this really the case? Are we losing our sense of belonging, or are we simply finding new ways to locate ourselves in a changing society? This report seeks an answer.

The Social Security Administration (SSA) maintains multi-stage determination and appeals processes for applications to the Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) and Supplemental Security Income (SSI) programs. These processes begin with an initial determination of disability by a state agency, followed by multiple opportunities for administrative appeals. Unsuccessful applicants are also entitled to appeal their decisions to the federal courts. These processes have been criticized by the SSA, the Social Security Advisory Board, the Governmental Accountability Office, and others for the timeliness of the final decision, for rendering initial decisions that are reversed on appeal, and for inconsistency across states. In response to these criticisms, the SSA recently proposed changes to the disability determination and appeals processes. These changes would allow clearly disabled applicants to get a final decision in 20 days and would bring in-line and endof-line quality reviews into the processes. The reconsideration stage would be replaced with a review by a federal official and the Appeals Council would be replaced by a board that would review cases likely to contain errors. Critics of these reforms have expressed concerns that the changes would put additional procedural burdens on persons with disabilities and make it more difficult for them to navigate the system and have all of the evidence in support of their cases heard.

This research brief details six programs that have been shown through careful evaluation to either delay sex, improve contraceptive use, and/or reduce teen pregnancy. Some of the programs were designed specifically for Latino teens and some were not; those that were not designed specifically for Latinos included Latino teens as part of the program evaluation or were found to be particularly effective among Latino teens. Four promising programs—those that have not been as rigorously evaluated but have shown some encouraging results—are also briefly discussed. This list of programs is a starting point for those interested in helping Latino teens avoid too-early pregnancy and parenthood. More effective programs designed specifically for Latino youth are needed as are additional strategies for reaching parents, families, policy makers, and other community leaders.

This primer on health care costs examines the rapid growth in the nation’s health care costs since 1970, when the average growth in health spending exceeded the growth of the economy as a whole by an average of 2.5 percentage points. It also examines the impact of health care costs on families, with insurance premiums rising 87% between 2000 and 2006, more than four times the growth in wages. The primer describes the types and sources of health care spending and the demographic factors associated with higher or lower levels of spending. It also discusses other factors that influence health care spending growth, including the use of new medical technology, population changes, and changes in disease prevalence.

Every Child Matters aims to improve the daily experiences of all young people in England from birth to 19, focusing on their wellbeing, personal development and future prosperity. This paper explores the influence of the environment on children's wellbeing and is written for everyone designing and delivering services that impact on children's lives.

Improving employment and other vocational outcomes for people with disabilities is a clear goal of policymakers, advocates, people with disabilities, and our larger society. To achieve this end, we need to better understand what actions the public and private sector can and should undertake. To do this we need to know what works—that is, what programs, policies, and actions are effective in reaching the goal of improved employment and related outcomes for people with disabilities. The research on employment of people with disabilities spans multiple areas of inquiry and academic disciplines. For example, there is clinical research that attempts to understand the role of different medical treatments in improving work outcomes; policy research that studies the connection of legislation and public disability programs to employment; and rehabilitation research evaluating promising vocational interventions. Multiple methods are used with many different sources of data and with varying research quality. This report reviews research (primarily since 2002) related to employment of people with disabilities. While a comprehensive review of the entire literature was beyond the scope of this effort, this report provides a systematic review of a set of literature across key research areas. The review provides an initial understanding of the research being conducted in these areas and identification of limitations and gaps in the research. The report also discusses on-going research focusing on employment of people with disabilities in a few key agencies and centers.

This Article examines the major missing component of retirement planning – namely, how to finance the potentially explosive cost of long-term care. It begins by reviewing the wide array of long-term care options currently available, including home care, assisted living facilities, and nursing homes. The Article next examines the coverage for long-term care provided by the government health program for older American, Medicare, and private insurance policies that supplement that program. Finding such coverage woefully deficient, the Article then considers the governmental health care program for poor people of any age, Medicaid, and assesses that program’s coverage of long-term care and its eligibility limitations as tightened by recently enacted legislation. The Article then turns to private long-term care insurance and analyzes its major components and the various pitfalls that prospective retirees encounter in purchasing such insurance. Finally, the Article critiques the federal government’s major initiatives to encourage such insurance – namely, the tax deduction of premiums and coordination of certain long-term care insurance policies with the Medicaid program.

Drivers 65 and older are 16 percent likelier than adult drivers (those 25–64 years old) to cause an accident, and they pose much less risk to the public than do drivers under 25, who are 188 percent likelier than adult drivers to cause an accident. However, older drivers are highly vulnerable to fatal injury in a crash. These findings offer little support for stricter licensing policies targeting older drivers but offer some support for policies to improve driver safety for seniors.

This report provides a brief description of the degree attainment and persistence of a nationally representative sample of students who began postsecondary education for the first time in the 2003–04 academic year. The report provides a first look at the experience of these students over three academic years, from July 2003 to June 2006, and provides information about rates of program completion, transfer, and attrition for students who first enrolled at various types of postsecondary institutions using data from the 2004/06 Beginning Postsecondary Students Longitudinal Study (BPS:04/06).
The BPS survey is the longitudinal component of the 2003–04 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study (NPSAS:04), a nationally representative sample that includes students enrolled in all types of postsecondary institutions.

I’ve been asked to address the question: “What Happened to the Old Social Contract?” It’s a challenge to say what happened to the old social contract, because I fear if I asked each one of us what it was, I’d get that many different answers. Many of us talk about this idea in the context of the social and economic programs first implemented after the Depression and in the decades following WWII, but those were very unique times. As are these times. As is every other time period. So allow me to stipulate the following: a social contract, new or old, is, like any other contract, an agreement, a quid-pro-quo. You agree to do something for me and I agree to provide something to you. Or, in the case of a social contract, you agree to act in society’s interest, and society will provide you with something you want and need.

Professor Andrew Cooper (Tavistock Clinic). Glasgow School of Social Work Research Seminar Series: 11th January 2007 - audio.

The Supporting People programme, which began on 1 April 2003, was designed to separate out the costs of bricks-and-mortar housing (which, where needed, would continue to be paid through Housing Benefit) from the costs of the support necessary to enable vulnerable adults to attain or maintain independent tenancies. For people with learning disabilities, this new funding mechanism appeared to offer a much-needed opportunity for some of the changes set out in the 2001 Valuing People White Paper to be made a reality. This research project set out to examine how local Supporting People teams were interpreting national guidelines in relation to the provision of housing-related support and to explore the impact that this was having on people with learning disabilities.

The paper first outlines a framework for understanding bias crimes, using the American context as a point of departure, and addresses several of the challenges that Professor Minow has set for those who argue in support of bias crime legislation. First, criminal punishment must elevate society even as it punishes wrongdoers. Second, criminal punishment has an essential educative and expressive function. Perhaps put more accurately, criminal punishment plays a role in the development and expression of societal values, a wide-ranging process that involves public and private realms, and moves well beyond legal systems to embrace education, civic and social organizations, and private social relations. The experiences of the United Kingdom may have much to teach us in this regard.

Using data from the Kaiser Post-Katrina Baseline Survey of the New Orleans Area, this Survey Brief profiles young adults (those ages 18-34) living in the Greater New Orleans area, a group that will play a key role in the success and rebuilding of New Orleans. The brief looks at whether they plan to stay in the New Orleans area, their outlook for the future, their demographic profile, and some of the challenges they face. The Kaiser Post-Katrina Baseline Survey of the New Orleans Area was conducted door-to-door from September 12 to November 13, 2006.

There is a lot of research about people with learning difficulties and, increasingly, some of it is being done by people with learning difficulties. Much of this research is very good but often projects are taken over by academic researchers. A group of people with learning difficulties from Northampton (the Fresh Start team at Central England People First) wanted to look at what life was like for people with learning difficulties. They felt that the way research is done makes a big difference to what is discovered.

For many families, especially minorities and those with low incomes, access to credit opens doors that were previously closed—literally so in the case of homeownership. In the wake of the recent subprime home lending crisis, however, access to credit is becoming more restrictive across all credit products, from credit cards to home mortgages, car loans to consumer installment lines of credit, even while persistent differences in access to credit and in the cost of that credit are still based on race, ethnicity and income. Specifically, African-American and Hispanic families are still denied credit more often than white families with the same income, and low-income families are more often denied access to credit than middle-income and higher-income families—even when low-income families apply for credit in line with their income and creditworthiness. This type of discrimination in the credit marketplace remains pervasive despite a number of regulatory efforts to make access to credit non- discriminatory and to make access to credit for low-income families on par with that for wealthier families.

Results: The survey was completed by 310 people who met the inclusion criteria. This group was highly educated (58% with a master's degree or higher) and prosperous (51% of households had a yearly income > $100,000). Seventy-four percent rated the overall quality of US health care as excellent or good, compared with 50% who gave this rating to Canadian health care. Most preferred the American system for emergency, specialist, hospital and diagnostic services. Respondents rated the Canadian system more highly for access to drug therapy and expressed similar views of the two systems with respect to care from a family physician. The features of the US system rated most positively were timeliness and quality; those rated most highly in the Canadian system were equity and cost-efficiency. The most negatively viewed features of the US system were cost/inefficiency and inequity; those of the Canadian system were wait times and personnel shortages. Although respondents generally rated the components of the US system more favourably than Canada's, when asked which system they preferred overall, 45% chose the US system and 40% chose Canada's.

This table estimates the 2005 work participation rate for each state. States are required to meet a 50% work rate by October 2006 or face penalties.

The Scottish Institute for Excellence in Social Work Education (SIESWE) is currently working in partnership with the Scottish Executive to produce a Research and Development Strategy (R&D Strategy) for the social services in Scotland. This falls under the Practice Governance Change Programme of Changing Lives Implementation Plan (Scottish Executive, 2006). In order to help us build a better picture of practice-related research and to identify key people with whom to hold further discussions, we are using a series of questionnaires which will be followed up with interviews to inform the research and development strategy. We are also analysing and considering Scottish data gathered through a joint consultation exercise with Social Care Institute for Excellence (SCIE) relating to their consultation on social care research capacity and data gathered by the Scottish Executive by way of self-assessment forms linked to the Changing Lives Implementation Plan. Both of these will also inform the development of the strategy.

Alexis Jay and Gill Ottley, Social Work Inspection Agency. Glasgow School of Social Work Research Seminar Series: 8th February 2007 - audio.

This paper examines the reasons behind the low rates of participation in old age pension programs in developing countries. Using a large set of harmonized household surveys from Latin America we assess how much of the low participation can be explained by involuntary rationing out of jobs with benefits versus how much can be instead explained by workers’ low willingness/ability to contribute towards such programs. We compare contribution patterns among wage employees, for whom participation is compulsory, with contribution patterns among self-employed workers, for whom participation is often voluntary. For both types of workers the probability of contributing to old age pension programs is similarly correlated with education, earnings, size of the employer, household characteristics and age. Our results indicate that on average at least 20-30 percent of the explained within-country variance in participation patterns can be accounted for by individuals’ low willingness to participate in oldage pension programs. Nonetheless, we also find evidence suggesting that some workers are rationed out of social security against their will.

The Prison Rape Elimination Act of 2003 (P.L. 108-79) requires the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) to develop new national data collections on the incidence and prevalence of sexual violence within correctional facilities. This report fulfills the requirement under Sec. 4 (c)(1) of the Act for submission of an annual report on the activities of BJS with respect to prison rape. Between January 1 and June 30, 2007, BJS completed the third annual national survey of administrative records in adult correctional facilities, covering calendar year 2006. Although the results were limited to incidents reported to correctional officials, the survey provides an understanding of what officials know, based on the number of reported
allegations, and the outcomes of follow-up investigations. By comparing results of the 2006 survey with those from 2004 and 2005, BJS is able to assess trends in sexual violence for the first time since the Act was passed.

Heat waves, or periods of anomalous warmth, do not affect everyone; it is the vulnerable individuals or sectors of society who will most experience their effects. The main factors of vulnerability are being elderly, living alone, having a pre-existing disease, being immobile or suffering from mental illness and being economically disadvantaged. The synergistic effects of such factors may prove fatal for some. . . . Although heat waves have discernible effects on society, much remains unknown about their wider social impacts, diffuse health issues and how to manage them.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has provided for public viewing the updated regulations for the reauthorization of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Program. The regulations are on public display and available for copying today, June 28, at the Federal Register office, located in the Government Printing Office, and will be published in the Federal Register for broader public viewing on June 29. States are required to comply with the regulations by October 1, 2006 or face penalties in FY 2007. If states require legislative action in order to enact the regulations, states must submit explanations to HHS for consideration. Comments will be due by mid- to late-August.

Disadvantage markers are used by Jobcentre Plus advisers to identify customers from particular disadvantaged groups. This research looks at the use of these markers by advisers, whether this varies according to customer groups and how the use of the markers could be improved overall.

Perth & Kinross Council welcome the collaboration with the Scottish Institute for Excellence in Social Work Education (SIESWE) to identify key aspects of learning in the workplace. This was achieved by working with two groups of staff who charted their experiences of successfully completing Vocational Qualifications (VQs) with a focus on personal, professional and organisational gains. The Council are pleased to endorse the publication of this study which recognises the growing status and value of VQs to the creation of a skilled workforce, and applauds the effort made by staff to achieve these qualifications. Drawing on a wide range of resources, Perth & Kinross Council have invested heavily in the development of their staff to meet a variety of demands including registration requirements, best practice imperatives and demographic forecasts. In relation to underpinning the development of VQs, this can be clearly seen through the creation of a robust infrastructure with an aim to support candidates through the learning process. This publication highlights the value of VQ qualifications both to the individual and the organisation in terms of improved performance.

Glasgow School of Social Work - Research Seminars - audio

This document constitutes the Institute's formal guidance on how to encourage and support employees to stop smoking. The recommendations in this section are presented without any reference to evidence statements. Appendix A in the original guideline document repeats the recommendations and lists their linked evidence statements.

Increases in emergency use rates for mental health care by children and youth are emblematic of problems with access to community-based mental health services and supports. These visits further stretch an overextended emergency health care system. Emergency departments are poorly equipped to address the mental health needs of children, youth, and their families who seek psychiatric attention. While they encounter challenges meeting the need for pediatric and adolescent services, they are even less prepared to provide pediatric and adolescent mental health care. This issue brief reviews the state of mental health services for children and youth who visit hospital emergency departments for mental health-related reasons and provides an overview of the challenges associated with mental health-related emergency department visits. It discusses the policy implications of using emergency department services for mental health reasons for children and youth and makes recommendations for policy action.

The data in this report are drawn from the University and College Academic Staff Survey (UCASS). Conducted since 1946, UCASS presents a national picture of the socio-economic characteristics of full-time university teachers in degree-granting institutions. The survey is conducted annually, with a reference date of October 1. Therefore, the data collected through this survey present a snapshot of full-time teaching staff as of that date. This report presents information on the salaries of full-time teaching staff at 22 Canadian universities, along with information on their salary scales for the 2006/2007 academic year.

We have used longitudinal test data on various aspects of people’s cognitive abilities to analyze whether overeducated workers are more vulnerable to a decline in their cognitive abilities, and undereducated workers are less vulnerable. We found that a job-worker mismatch induces a cognitive decline with respect to immediate and delayed recall abilities, cognitive flexibility and verbal fluency. Our findings indicate that, to some extent, it is the adjustment of the ability level of the overeducated and undereducated workers that adjusts initial job-worker mismatch. This adds to the relevance of preventing overeducation, and shows that being employed in a challenging job contributes to workers’ cognitive resilience.

We have used longitudinal test data on various aspects of people’s cognitive abilities to analyze whether overeducated workers are more vulnerable to a decline in their cognitive abilities, and undereducated workers are less vulnerable. We found that a job-worker mismatch induces a cognitive decline with respect to immediate and delayed recall abilities, cognitive flexibility and verbal fluency. Our findings indicate that, to some extent, it is the adjustment of the ability level of the overeducated and undereducated workers that adjusts initial job-worker mismatch. This adds to the relevance of preventing overeducation, and shows that being employed in a challenging job contributes to workers’ cognitive resilience.

This report assesses the progress of Pathfinders in 2006-07. It looks at how they are changing, the lessons to be learned and identifies the wider policy implications of their work for local government and public service delivery. In particular, it presents overviews about activity and progress on crime and environment, economic development, community engagement and social capital.

Launched in January 2005, Improving Opportunity, Strengthening Society sets out the Government’s commitment to create strong cohesive communities in which every individual, whatever their racial or ethnic origin, is able to fulfil his or her potential through the enjoyment of equal opportunities, rights and responsibilities. Improving Opportunity, Strengthening Society: Two years on provides information on the work undertaken over the last year to improve race equality and community cohesion. This report outlines the progress that is being made towards achieving equality in the key public services and in building community cohesion. A detailed statistical breakdown called ‘Race Equality in Public Services’ (REPS) is included in the report.

Objective: Screen all adults for overweight or obesity.
Recommendations:
- Adult patients should have their BMI calculated from their height and weight to establish a diagnosis of overweight or obesity.
- Obese patients (BMI >30 kg/m2) should be offered weight loss treatment. . . .
- Overweight patients (BMI between 25 and 29.9 kg/m2) or patients with increased waist circumference (>40 inches for men; >35 inches for women) should be assessed for the presence of obesity-associated conditions that are directly influenced by weight, to determine the benefit they might receive from weight loss treatment.
- Normal weight patients (BMI between 18.5 and 24.9 kg/m2) should be provided with education regarding healthy lifestyle behaviors, advised of their BMI and their weight range margins, and instructed to return for further evaluation should those margins be exceeded.

This document constitutes the Institute's formal guidance on community-based interventions to reduce substance misuse among vulnerable and disadvantaged children and young people. The recommendations in this section are presented without any reference to evidence statements. Appendix A in the original guideline document repeats the recommendations and lists their linked evidence statements. Community-based interventions are defined as interventions or small-scale programmes delivered in community settings, such as schools and youth services. They aim to change the risks factors for the target population. For the purposes of this guidance, substance misuse is defined as intoxication by – or regular excessive consumption of and/or dependence on psychoactive substances, leading to social, psychological, physical or legal problems. It includes problematic use of both legal and illegal drugs (including alcohol when used in combination with other substances).

More than 7 million recipients of Social Security benefits have a representative payee—a person or an organization—to receive or manage their benefits. These payees manage Old Age, Survivor and Disability Insurance (OASDI) funds for retirees, surviving spouses, children, and the disabled, and they manage Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments to disabled, blind, or elderly people with limited income and resources. More than half of the beneficiaries with a representative payee are minor children; the rest are adults, often elderly, whose mental or physical incapacity prevents them from acting on their own behalf, and people who have been deemed incapable under state guardianship laws. The funds are managed through the Representative Payee Program of the Social Security Administration. The funds total almost $4 billion a month, and there are more than 5.3 million representative payees.

This report explores the role of neighbourhood management in developing social capital at the neighbourhood level. Drawing on case studies from three neighbourhood management pathfinders it: discusses the meaning of social capital and how it is used in policy; describes the range of activities that can be seen as contributing to social capital in the three neighbourhoods; explores how their impact can be assessed; and concludes by identifying key lessons and recommendations from the three case studies.

This report presents ethnographic case studies of eight young, unmarried, low-income fathers who participated in the Partners for Fragile Families (PFF) demonstration projects. PFF provided a range of services aimed at increasing the capacity of young, economically disadvantaged fathers to become financial and emotional supports to their children and sought to reduce poverty and welfare dependence. The study examines the nature of the fathers’ relationship with their children and the mother of their children, the fathers’ experiences with the PFF program and with matters related to child support, their views on employment prospects and experiences, and their hopes and aspirations for the future.

Using data from the 2000 U.S. Census, we document and explore three alternative explanations for the sexual orientation wage gap: occupational sorting, human capital differences, and discrimination. We find lesbian women earn more than their heterosexual counterparts irrespective of marital status while gay men earn less than their married heterosexual counterparts but more than their cohabitating heterosexual counterparts. Using a Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition we find that differences in human capital accumulation (particularly education) are the main reason behind the observed wage advantages, while discrimination and occupational sorting play a minimal role at best. Wage penalties, on the other hand, are largely explained by discrimination. Interestingly, while we do find there are some differences in the relative roles of our three alternative explanations across the wage distribution using a DiNardo, Fortin, Lemieux decomposition, the main conclusions from the Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition persist.

Social Security benefits over the next 75 years will exceed payroll tax revenues by $4.6 trillion. To close this enormous fiscal gap, one proposal is to cut the benefits of high-income workers. Many low- income workers depend almost entirely on Social Security for their retirement income, but it is often assumed that high-wage workers can maintain their standard of living without Social Security benefits due to their private pensions and savings. Surprisingly, however, even high-wage workers depend on Social Security for a substantial portion of their retirement income and would significantly change their consumption and saving behavior in the absence of Social Security. Specifically:
- Social Security accounts for virtually all of the discretionary consumption of households with modest preretirement incomes (less than $50,000 a year for couples or $25,000 for singles).
- It is equal to about one-third of the consumption of the highest-earning households (couples with preretirement incomes of $500,000 and singles with $250,000).

This report presents results from the Treatment Episode Data Set (TEDS) for 2005, and trend data for 1995 to 2005. The report provides information on the demographic and substance abuse characteristics of the 1.8 million annual admissions to treatment for abuse of alcohol and drugs in facilities that report to individual State administrative data systems. TEDS is an admission-based system, and TEDS admissions do not represent individuals. Thus, for example, an individual admitted to treatment twice within a calendar year would be counted as two admissions. TEDS does not include all admissions to substance abuse treatment. It includes facilities that are licensed or certifi ed by the State substance abuse agency to provide substance abuse treatment (or are administratively tracked for other reasons). In general, facilities reporting TEDS data are those that receive State alcohol and/or drug agency funds (including Federal Block Grant funds) for the provision of alcohol and/or drug treatment services.

We explain the recent increases in obesity in the United States with a model involving falling food prices, endogenous social body weight norms, and heterogeneous human metabolism. Calibrating an analytical choice model to American women in the 30-to-60-year-old age bracket, we compare the predicted weight distributions to NHANES survey data spanning (intermittently) the years 1976 through 2000. The model, the first to describe explicitly complete weight distribution dynamics for this group, predicts average weights and obesity rates with considerable accuracy and captures a significant portion of the recent growth in upper-quantile weights.

Trauma is pervasive among children, youth, and families in the United States, particularly for children and youth involved in public systems. Trauma exposure among children and youth is associated with lifelong health, mental health, and related problems and with increased related costs. The impact of trauma exposure can be mitigated by developing a care delivery and support system that is trauma-informed, prevention oriented, and focused on improving mental health functioning for children, youth, and their families. This report documents critical considerations in strengthening policies to support trauma-informed practice. It reviews current policies and practices to support children, youth, and families exposed to
trauma. A range of strategies were used to gather the information, including an extensive literature review, a meeting of policy and practice experts, and several case studies.

On 28 April 1996, 35 people were killed and 18 others were wounded at Port Arthur in Tasmania by an assailant using a semi-automatic rifle. In response, The Australasian Police Ministers’ Council convened a special meeting on 10 May 1996 and agreed to a national plan for the regulation of firearms—the Nationwide Agreement on Firearms. This agreement banned self-loading rifles and self-loading and pump-action shotguns, introduced a nationwide registration of firearms along with limitations to firearm ownership, and led to the Australian firearms buyback scheme. . . . This brief is a guide to some of the literature, statistics and information on firearm ownership, firearm offences, firearm controls and government policies since the Port Arthur massacre in 1996.

Compensation claims for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have attracted special attention. PTSD, in brief, is a psychiatric disorder that can develop in a person who experiences, witnesses, or is confronted with a traumatic event, often one that is life-threatening. PTSD is characterized by a cluster of symptoms that include:
• reexperiencing—intrusive recollections of a traumatic event, often
through flashbacks or nightmares;
• avoidance or numbing—efforts to avoid anything associated with the trauma and numbing of emotions; and
• hyperarousal—often manifested by difficulty in sleeping and concentrating and by irritability.

This study explored using outcome data to assess adolescent substance abuse treatment program performance. However, this approach may be problematic. A more promising approach may be to identify quality-of-care indicators for assessing performance.

The 60s Scoop refers to the adoption of First Nation/Metis children in Canada between the years of 1960 and the mid 1980's. This period is unique in the annals of adoption. This phenomenon, coined the "60's Scoop", is so named because the highest numbers of adoptions took place in the decade of the 1960s and because, in many instances, children were literally scooped from their homes and communities without the knowledge or consent of families and bands. Many First Nations charged that in many cases where consent was not given, that government authorities and social workers acted under the colonialistic assumption that native people were culturally inferior and unable to adequately provide for the needs of the children. Many First Nations people believe that the forced removal of the children was a deliberate act of genocide. Statistics from the Department of Indian Affairs reveal a total of 11,132 status Indian children adopted between the years of 1960 and 1990. It is believed, however, that the actual numbers are much higher than that.

Presents findings about violent crime experienced by non-Hispanic blacks. Data on nonfatal violent victimization (rape/sexual assault, robbery, aggravated and simple assault) are drawn from the National Crime Victimization Survey. Data on homicides are drawn from the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting Program’s Supplementary Homicide Reports. Comparisons are made with the victimization experience of other racial/ethnic groups. Findings include violent victimization rates by victim characteristics. Also examined are crime characteristics, including weapon use, offender race, police reporting, and police response to violent crime incidents. Trends in violent victimization are also discussed. Highlights include the following:
- Blacks were victims of an estimated 805,000 nonfatal violent crimes and of about 8,000 homicides in 2005.
- Blacks accounted for 13% of the U.S. population in 2005, but were victims in 15% of all nonfatal violent crimes and nearly half of all homicides.
- During the 5-year period from 2001 to 2005, the average annual rate of nonfatal violent victimization against blacks was 29 victimizations per 1,000 persons age 12 or older. For whites the rate was 23 per 1,000, and for Hispanics, 24 per 1,000.

Pre-test Discussion, Informed Consent, and Confidentiality
- Testing should be undertaken only with the individual's specific informed verbal consent which should be documented.
- Patients must be given a clear indication why testing is being considered.
- Provision of a leaflet about HIV testing can provide much of the information needed prior to obtaining consent.
- Patients identified as being at high risk for HIV or those with particular concerns should be offered more in depth discussion or counseling in addition to a test.
- Pre-test discussion (PTD) is appropriate for the majority of patients being tested with the aim of obtaining informed verbal consent.

Research shows that many disparities in health and well-being are rooted in early childhood. These disparities reflect gaps in access to services, unequal treatment, adverse congenital health conditions, and exposures in the early years linked to elevated community and family risks. Early health risks and conditions can have long-range implications for physical, emotional, and intellectual development as well as health. Their contribution to disparities in health status, disabilities, and educational achievement is well documented. But many risks can be addressed in the early years, starting with quality prenatal care and interventions in the earliest stages of life. Thus, literally, reducing disparities begins with babies. Risks for disparate outcomes disproportionately affect young children, low-income children, and minority children. Poverty brings risks for children of all races; however, racial/ethnic status is an independent risk factor. Young children are more likely than older children to live in families without economic security. Of the 10.2 million U.S. children ages birth through 5 years, 42 percent lived in low-income families (with income below the federal poverty level—FPL) and 20 percent lived in poor families (income below 100 percent of FPL) in 2005. (See Figure 1.) Minority young children also are overrepresented among the 2.2 million U.S. children ages birth through 5 who live in extremely poor families (income below 50 percent of FPL). The younger the child, the more harmful poverty is to developmental outcomes.

67% of Young People and 56% of Parents have seen the ‘Brain warehouse' TV advertising, clearly driving mental health risk associations. The ‘Brain Warehouse’ campaign has been effective in conveying its key ‘damage your mind’ message across all the target groups (spontaneous take-out of ‘affects your brain’ message is 54% and ‘messes with your mind’ – 34%). This evidence shows that the harder messages of FRANK are getting through to young people reinforcing a very powerful visual link between the brain and cannabis. The ‘Trip of a Lifetime’ (cannabis radio advert) proves to have a high recognition among cannabis users and vulnerable young people (22% of 11-18 yr olds vs 33% of vulnerable young people and 37% of young people with experience of cannabis).

Black boys and young Black men face serious challenges in every sector of society. They are less likely to do well at school, more likely to be unemployed and much more likely to become involved in the criminal justice system than their peers. There are, of course, many examples of Black boys and young Black men who excel at school, university and in all areas of life. But these young Black men are currently the exception rather than the rule. As well as the many success stories from individual young people, there are many very different, community based organisations and schools making real, life-changing contributions to Black boys and young Black men. In many cases even those boys considered statistically ‘at risk’ can be helped to thrive. These success stories should be replicated across the country. The REACH recommendations are aimed at doing just that, by creating a nationwide, cohesive strategy to change the structures and practices that hold back successful boys, organisations and schools.

In this paper, we examine the determinants of decision-making power by children and young adolescents. Moving beyond previous economic models that treat children as goods consumed by adults rather than agents, we develop a noncooperative model of parental control of child behavior and child resistance. Using child reports of decision-making and psychological and cognitive measures from the NLSY79 Child Supplement, we examine the determinants of shared and sole decision-making in seven domains of child activity. We find that the determinants of sole decision-making by the child and shared decision-making with parents are quite distinct: sharing decisions appears to be a form of parental investment in child development rather than a simple stage in the transfer of authority. In addition, we findthat indicators of child capability and preferences affect reports of decision-making authority in ways that suggest child demand for autonomy as well as parental discretion in determining these outcomes.

This report is being released as the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) approaches a September 30, 2007 expiration date. If the U.S. Congress and the White House do not reauthorize the program and agree on its funding, coverage for vulnerable children nationwide will be in jeopardy. Signed into law in 1997, SCHIP provides each state with federal funds to design a health insurance program for vulnerable children. Since SCHIP was first authorized, the percentage of uninsured kids in America has fallen by 24 percent. This report, being released by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF), shows that more than 6 million kids nationwide are at risk of not having health insurance unless Congress takes action.

Every day, about 1,600 people are released from prisons in the United States. Of these 600,000 new releasees every year, about 480,000 are subject to parole or some other kind of postrelease supervision. Prison releasees represent a challenge, both to themselves and to the communities to which they return. Will the releasees see parole as an opportunity to be reintegrated into society, with jobs and homes and supportive families and friends? Or will they commit new crimes or violate the terms of their parole contracts? If so, will they be returned to prison or placed under more stringent community supervision? Will the communities to which they return see them as people to be reintegrated or people to be avoided? And the institution of parole itself is challenged, with three different functions: to facilitate reintegration for parolees who are ready for rehabilitation; to deter crime; and to apprehend those parolees who commit new crimes and return them to prison.

This report describes the design and implementation of the Partners for Fragile Families (PFF) demonstration projects. Operating in 13 sites across the country, PFF provided a range of services aimed at increasing the capacity of young, economically disadvantaged fathers in becoming financial and emotional resources to their children and sought to reduce poverty and welfare dependence. The report examines the programs’ structure and institutional partnerships; participant characteristics; recruitment and enrollment efforts; the nature of employment, peer support, parenting, and child support-related services provided through the initiatives; and implementation challenges and lessons.

This new report from the Priory Group reveals that a shocking 72% of adults in Great Britain believe that there is a stigma associated with having a mental illness and describe people with mental illness as unpredictable (79%), dangerous (50%) and scary (49%). Less than half (45%) of the adult population think that people with long-term mental illnesses are able to lead independent, fulfilled lives. Over half of British adults (52%) agree that being diagnosed with a serious mental illness and being diagnosed with cancer are as bad as each other and 57% believe that all aspects of their lives would be negatively affected if they were diagnosed with a mental illness. Most damningly, 77% of adults state that the media does not do a good job in educating people about mental illness and 76% say that the media does not do a good job in de-stigmatising mental illness.

HIV/AIDS in 2005
- Hispanics/Latinos accounted for 18% of the 37,331 new HIV/AIDS diagnoses in 33 states with long-term, confidential name-based HIV reporting*
- For Hispanic/Latino men living with HIV/AIDS, the most common exposures were sexual contact with other men, injection drug use, and high-risk heterosexual contact. For Hispanic/Latina women living with HIV/AIDS, the most common exposures were high-risk heterosexual contact and injection drug use
- HIV testing rates were slightly higher among Hispanics/Latinos than among persons of other races or ethnicities except blacks. A 2002 study showed that 50% of Hispanics/Latinos aged 15–44 had been tested and that 18% had been tested during the past year

View image of Race/ethnicity of persons (including children) with HIV/AIDS diagnosed during 2005

This report examines the school breakfast programs in 23 large urban school districts in the 2005-2006 school year. Because numerous studies show that eating breakfast is essential to children’s ability to learn, stay healthy, and behave in school, it is vital to monitor how well schools are doing in reaching students with school breakfast, especially low-income students whose families struggle daily with tight food budgets. A majority of these 23 districts perform above the national average in reaching low-income students with breakfast, yet almost half fail to reach a majority of their low-income students with the important morning nourishment they need to succeed in school. Some have developed innovative programs which provide important models for other school districts that lag behind in reaching low-income children with school breakfast. But many more districts around the country must adopt such methods to insure that all children have access to adequate nutrition in order to learn, grow, and thrive.

This paper provides definitions of terms associated with substance-related disorders, mental disorders, co-occurring disorders, and programs. The purpose for which a definition is used and the context in which it is used will affect its meaning, dimensions, and precision. Thus, context and purpose should be made explicit in any policy, initiative, financing mechanism, or system in which a definition is used.

The poverty measure, however, has been widely criticized by analysts from the left and the right for under- or overstating poverty. Let me focus on its technical flaws because they are palpable and relatively objective—although correcting them raises what I consider to be unresolvable conceptual, technical, ideological, and financial challenges.

Information about federal and private agencies that offer financial assistance and information for adoption services.

One in every eight residents in the United States was foreign born in 2006. That is the largest immigrant share the country has had since 1920, when concern over the concentration of immigrants led to the adoption of laws to severely curtail their flow into the country. The 37.4 million foreign-born residents in 2006 is by far the greatest number in our history and it dwarfs the fewer than 14 million immigrants in 1920. Since 1970, following the reopening of mass immigration, the foreign-born population of the country has increased by 27.8 million persons — 289 percent. The traditional immigrant settlement states — New York, California, Texas, Illinois, New Jersey and Florida — continue be the destinations of the largest numbers of immigrants, including persons arriving illegally. Nevertheless, they are not the only states to see their population significantly affected by immigrant settlement.

This guidance sets out the responsibilities of local authorities to provide monthly information to HM Revenue and Customs in relation to looked after children and the Child Trust Fund.

Australian Social Trends 2007 is the 14th edition of an annual series that presents information on contemporary social issues and areas of public policy concern. By drawing primarily on a wide range of ABS statistics, and statistics from other official sources, Australian Social Trends describes aspects of Australian society, and how these are changing over time. It is designed to assist and encourage informed decision-making, and to be of value to a wide audience including those engaged in research, journalism, marketing, teaching and social policy, as well as anyone interested in how we live today and how we've changed over recent decades.

These Word Documents provide data on illicit drugs, marijuana/hashish, cocaine, crack, heroin, hallucinogens, LSD, PCP, Ecstasy, inhalants, nonmedical use of psychotherapeutics, pain relievers, OxyContin, tranquilizers, stimulants, methamphetamines & sedatives for the top 20 MSA's in the U.S.

Public health and safety officials have become alarmed by the newest entry into the world of alcoholic beverages.Alcoholic energy drinks are prepackaged beverages that contain not only alcohol but also caffeine and other stimulants. Earlier this year, 29 state attorneys general signed a letter to Anheuser-Busch expressing their concern about Spykes, an alcoholic energy drink packaged in colorful 2-ounce bottles with obvious appeal to youth. The objections of law enforcement officials as well as parents and leading public health organizations caused Anheuser-Busch to pull Spykes from the market. But the story does not end there. Many other alcoholic energy drinks are still on the market. Despite the sharp increase in sales of alcoholic energy drinks, their appeal to underage drinkers, and the health concerns involved in mixing stimulants with alcohol, research on the potential dangers of these products remains limited.This study reviews what data is available and takes an in-depth look at the alcohol industry’s marketing practices promoting the consumption of alcoholic energy drinks. The results, while preliminary, are unsettling. Both scientists and policymakers should focus increased attention on this emerging product category.

This workbook was developed for use in conjunction with "Anger Management for Substance Abuse and Mental Health Clients: A Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Manual" (BKD444). It provides individuals participating in the 12-week anger management group treatment with a summary of core concepts, worksheets to complete homework assignments, and space to take notes for each of the sessions.

The Rowell Foster Childrens' Positive Plan (RFCPP) (as the Rowell Foster Children Fund is now called) developed a five-year business operating plan to structure its growth and expansion. RFCPP is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to enhance the services provided to foster children in Los Angeles County.

This paper examines the impact of recent state-level Medicaid policy changes that expanded eligibility for family planning services to higher income women and to Medicaid clients whose benefits would expire otherwise. We begin by establishing that the income-based policy change led to a substantial increase in the number of program recipients. We then examine Vital Statistics birth data from 1990 to 2003 and determine that it also reduced overall births to non-teens by about two percent and to teens by over four percent. Our estimates suggest a nearly nine percent reduction in births to women age 20-44 made eligible by the policy change. We supplement our state-level analysis with an investigation of individual-level data from the 1988, 1995, and 2002 National Surveys of Family Growth (NSFG) to examine the impact of these policies on sexual behavior and contraceptive use. Evidence from this analysis suggests that the reduction in fertility associated with raising income thresholds for eligibility was accomplished via greater use of contraception. Our calculations indicate that allowing higher income women to receive federally-funded family planning cost on the order of $6,800 for each averted birth.

- In 2004 and 2005, males aged 12 or older were more likely than females to report past month alcohol use (57.5 vs. 45.0 percent), past month binge alcohol use (30.8 vs. 15.1 percent), and past month heavy alcohol use (10.5 vs. 3.3 percent)
- Males were twice as likely as females to have met the criteria for alcohol dependence or abuse in the past year (10.5 vs. 5.1 percent); these findings were generally consistent across demographic groups
- Among past month heavy alcohol users aged 12 or older, males and females had similar rates of past year alcohol dependence or abuse; for all other levels of current alcohol use, males were more likely to meet the criteria for past year alcohol dependence or abuse than females

All charities claim to be performing some good for others or for society. These ‘‘outputs’’ require inputs of charitable resources. Nongovernmental sources can be divided broadly into two major categories of contributions: financial or real capital, and volunteer labor. Both types of contributions, of course, may come in more complicated forms than outright and complete donation. Workers may provide labor services at below-market costs. Many (but not all) nonprofits have lower wage scales than business or government and pay fewer employee benefits. Individuals may also contribute extra by paying additional fees for some output produced by the charity or by paying an above-market price for some good or service at a fundraiser.

We propose a new system of financing long-term care services in the United States. Our plan expands Medicare to cover comprehensive long-term care services, including home care and custodial nursing home care. Beneficiaries would share in the cost of services through deductibles and copayments, but the program would include stop loss coverage and special protections for low-income adults. By providing long-term care insurance that actually protects the assets of older adults, our proposal would eliminate the disincentive to save inherent in the means-tested Medicaid system. Our plan would also remove the bias in the current system for institutional care, enabling more persons with disabilities to remain at home where most prefer to live. We propose to finance this expansion of Medicare benefits with a surcharge on federal income taxes. Unlike the regressive payroll tax that finances Medicare’s hospitalization coverage, the surcharge we propose would not increase tax burdens for low-income individuals or families. All of the revenue generated by the tax would be dedicated to a special Medicare trust fund that would finance future long-term care services.

Using all available government data, this paper calculates the actual, per-child costs of Head Start (including Early Head Start), child care provided under the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF), and prekindergarten/preschool programs. Besides being substantially higher than often reported by the relevant government agencies, the resulting cost estimates show dramatic differences in costs per child among the three forms of education and care. For 2003/2004, Head Start Bureau reported an average per-child cost of about $7,222 per year.1 This figure is apparently used by all analysts, inside and outside the government. However, it does not take into account other, substantial Head Start expenditures; represents the average per-child cost across all forms of Head Start, from part- to full-day, and from homebased to Early Head Start; and reflects the fact that Head Start is mostly a nine-month long program with about half the children in care for around four hours a day. (Unless otherwise indicated, all dollar amounts are in 2004 dollars.)

Combined 2004 and 2005 data indicate that 8.88 percent of youths aged 12 to 17 and 7.65 percent of adults aged 18 or older experienced at least one major depressive episode (MDE) in the past year. Among 12 to 17 year olds, rates of past year MDE were among the highest in Idaho (10.37 percent) and Nevada (10.28 percent) and among the lowest in Louisiana (7.19 percent) and South Dakota (7.40 percent). Rates of past year MDE among adults aged 18 or older were among the highest in Utah (10.14 percent) and Rhode Island (9.88 percent) and among the lowest in Hawaii (6.74 percent) and New Jersey (6.81 percent).

The National Institute on Aging (NIA), part of the Federal Government’s National Institutes of Health (NIH), has primary responsibility for basic research in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) as well as research aimed at finding ways to prevent and treat AD. The Institute’s AD research program is integral to one of its main goals, which is to enhance the quality of life of older people by expanding knowledge about the aging brain and nervous system. This 2005-2006 Progress Report on Alzheimer’s Disease summarizes recent AD research conducted or supported by NIA and other components of NIH.

The child welfare system investigates over 2 million children each year for parental abuse or neglect, yet little is known about the effects of removing children from home and placing them in foster care. Long-term outcomes are rarely observed, and children placed in foster care likely differ from those not placed, making comparisons difficult. This paper uses the removal tendency of investigators as an instrumental variable to identify causal effects of foster care placement on a range of outcomes for school-age children and youth. A rotational assignment process effectively randomizes families to these investigators. The results suggest that children assigned to investigators with higher removal rates are more likely to be placed in foster care themselves, and they have higher delinquency rates, teen birth rates, and lower earnings. Large marginal treatment effect estimates suggest caution in the interpretation, but the results suggest that children on the margin of placement tend to have better outcomes when they remain at home, especially for older children.

A review of the law to make clear to drunk offenders that alcohol will not be seen as a mitigating factor in their crimes was announced today. Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill told 200 delegates at the World Health Organisation's international conference on tackling violence in Tulliallan, Fife, that it was time for Scotland to change its 'bevvy' culture - and for the criminal justice system to leave those who do behave like this in no doubt that they, rather than alcohol, will be held responsible.

How charitable are charities? Can a charity that provides education or healthcare and has no profits be “noncharitable”? The Senate Finance and House Ways and Means committees think those questions are so important that they have been examining whether and when nonprofit hospitals deserve tax exemption. This article suggests that the measurement tool that should be used to determine whether nonprofit organizations are “charitable” is the balance sheet.

Despite the wealth and resources in America, families across the nation struggle every day to provide for their children. Millions of young people still lack access to quality health care and education. Thousands remain in households or communities where they are abused or neglected. The shortest path to improved circumstances for the country’s youngest citizens runs through the office of the Governor who sets the state’s course of action. This report highlights the policy priorities our nation’s Governors have laid out during their 2007 State of the State speeches and budget addresses that seek to chart a better future for our nation’s children and families. Promises to America’s Children: 2007 Governors’ State of the State Addresses captures Governors’ commitments to improving their state’s ability to better meet the health care, education, child welfare needs of children. State summaries also detail governors’ initiatives to improve the socioeconomic environment for families through proposals that look to increase the state’s minimum wage, reduce the tax burden and offer workforce investments.

The 110th Congress maintains a strong interest in the effects of crime and gang violence in Central America, and its spillover effects on the United States. Since February 2005, more than 1,374 members of the violent Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) gang have been arrested in cities across the United States. These arrests are raising concerns about the transnational activities of Central American gangs. Governments throughout the region are struggling to find the right combination of suppressive and preventive policies to deal with the gangs. Some analysts assert that increasing U.S. deportations of individuals with criminal records to Central American countries may be contributing to the gang problem. Most experts argue that the repressive anti-gangs laws adopted by El Salvador and Honduras have failed to reduce violence and homicides in those countries, and that law enforcement solutions alone will not solve the gang problem. Analysts also predict that illicit gang activities may accelerate illegal immigration and trafficking in drugs, persons, and weapons to the United States, although a recent United Nations report challenges those assertions.

As the first members of that huge generation known as the baby boomers begin to reach retirement, they are clearly more active and in better health than were earlier generations reaching that milestone.1 The boomers are looking forward to some two decades or more of what they believe will be an active, enjoyable third stage of life, given increases in longevity. What few of them have spent time contemplating, however, are the long-term problems that those extra years can bring: Will they be able to afford their new longevity? Will they remain healthy until the day they die? Who will care for them when they no longer can care for themselves? Although the issue for all of us is the potential impact that this growing segment of the population will have, particularly on our national economy, this brief will focus on the problems specific to those who live the longest—the oldest old2—looking in particular at (1) their special needs, (2) the costs of the long-term care necessary to meet those needs, and (3) the challenge of finding enough health care workers to provide that care.

There are over four million people in Britain receiving one of two non-means-tested benefits for disabled people: 2.8 million mostly young and working age people receive Disability Living Allowance (DLA) and 1.4 million older people receive Attendance Allowance (AA), although about 800,000 DLA recipients are now over retirement age. Regular social surveys and the 2001 census indicate that a further six million or so have some kind of long-term limiting illness or disability. Not all these six million have care and mobility needs that would qualify them for DLA/AA if they applied, but some do. Had the population eligible for DLA/AA been known, the take-up rate would have easily been calculated as a ratio of the number of recipients to the number of the eligible.

Section 11 of The Childcare Act 2006 gives local authorities a related duty to undertake childcare sufficiency assessments, the first of which must be completed within one year of the duty coming into force in April 2007. The assessment is a necessary step towards securing sufficient provision, enabling local authorities to identify gaps and establish plans to meet the needs of parents.

How can the hedonistic assumption (i.e., people's willingness to pursue pleasure and avoid pain) be reconciled with people choosing to expose themselves to experiences known to elicit negative feelings? We assess how (1) the intensity of the negative feelings, (2) positive feelings in the aftermath, and (3) the coactivation of positive and negative feelings contribute to our understanding of such behavior. In a series of 4 studies, consumers with either approach or avoidance tendencies (toward horror movies) were asked to report their positive and/or negative feelings either after (experiment 1) or while (experiments 2, 3A, and 3B) they were exposed to a horror movie. We demonstrate how a model incorporating coactivation principles and enriched with a protective frame moderator (via detachment) can provide a more parsimonious and viable description of the affective reactions that result from counter-hedonic behavior.

From its earliest days, Head Start has been an extremely popular program because it is based on a simple idea that makes great intuitive sense: A child’s early learning experiences are the basis of later development and, given the connections between poverty and low academic achievement, a compensatory preschool program should help disadvantaged children catch up with more fortunate children. Who could be against a relatively low-cost, voluntary program that children and parents seem to love? Especially if evaluations show that it “works”? But the attractiveness of Head Start’s underlying concept should not make it immune from constructive criticism. Given the results of recent evaluations, the program’s continued defensiveness has become counterproductive. Head Start cannot be improved without an honest appreciation of its weaknesses (as well as strengths) followed by real reform.

Many humans are trafficked across international borders for the purposes of labor or sexual exploitation. The Office for Victims of Crime (OVC) developed the “Services for Trafficking Victims Discretionary Grant Program - Comprehensive Services Sites.” The program provides direct services, such as legal and crisis counseling to assist victims once they are identified until they are “certified” to receive other federal benefits. Urban Institute researchers conducted face-to-face interviews with survivors and with key service providers in three evaluation sites. The in-depth interviews document victims’ service needs, their experiences using OVC-funded services, and barriers to services. They also provide a unique opportunity to listen directly to the voices of the victims.

This gives information on the Social Exclusion Task Force's code of practice, due to be published in March 2008, that will set out guiding principles for evaluating services and programmes for socially excluded groups. It will support commissioners and providers in conducting and using service evaluations to drive improved service delivery and will be a tool that can be used by local strategic partnerships to help identify ‘what works’.

This knowledge review looks at the significant gap in high quality and effective mental health advocacy in African and Caribbean men. Drawing on individual accounts the research raises questions about the services, advice and support services currently being provided and what is actually needed by this over-represented group in the mental health sector.

- SAMHSA's National Survey on Drug Use & Health defines alcohol dependence or abuse using criteria specified in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV). The criteria includes symptoms such as withdrawal, tolerance, use in dangerous situations, trouble with the law, and interference in major obligations at work, school, or home during the past year. Binge drinking is defined as drinking 5 or more drinks on the same occasion (at the same time or within a couple of hours of each other). Heavy drinking is defined as drinking 5 or more drinks on the same occasion on each of 5 or more days in the past 30 days.
- Based on combined data from SAMHSA's 2004-2005 National Surveys on Drug Use & Health, the rate of past year alcohol dependence or abuse among persons aged 12 or older varied by level of alcohol use: 44.7% of past month heavy drinkers, 18.5% binge drinkers, 3.8% past month non-binge drinkers, and 1.3% of those who did not drink alcohol in the past month met the criteria for alcohol dependence or abuse in the past year.
- Males had higher rates than females for all measures of drinking in the past month: any alcohol use (57.5% vs. 45%), binge drinking (30.8% vs. 15.1%), and heavy alcohol use (10.5% vs. 3.3%).
- Males were twice as likely as females to have met the criteria for alcohol dependence or abuse in the past year (10.5% vs. 5.1%).

Although much is known about how to help welfare recipients find jobs, little is known about how to help them and other low-wage workers keep jobs or advance in the labor market. This report presents an assessment of the implementation and effects at the two-year follow-up point of a program in Riverside County, California, that aimed to promote job retention and advancement among employed individuals who recently left the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program, the cash welfare program that mainly serves single mothers and their children. The study is part of the Employment Retention and Advancement (ERA) project, which is testing 15 programs across the country (including two programs in Riverside). The ERA project is being conducted by MDRC, under contract to the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, with additional funding from the U.S. Department of Labor.

Two years into his first term, in March 1999, Blair stunned observers by committing his government to an initiative to end child poverty in the next generation, which Brown—then the Chancellor of the Exchequer—eagerly carried forward. Together, the two leaders dramatically increased investments in children and families. By 2004, they had boosted the share of the United Kingdom’s gross domestic product being spent on public support for children by close to one percentage point, the equivalent of over $20 billion per year extra today. If Washington budgeted an additional 1 percent of our GDP to eliminate child poverty, we would have about $130 billion to work with.

Are mixed communities an effective way to reduce deprivation and social exclusion? Paul Cheshire argues that creating mixed neighbourhoods treats a symptom of inequality, not its cause. The problem, he says, is poverty – what makes people poor and what keeps them poor – not the type of neighbourhood in which people live. If it were true that creating mixed neighbourhoods could reduce poverty or improve individuals' life chances, then it would logically have to be true that living in a deprived neighbourhood must make you – or your children – worse off than you would otherwise have been. But the more carefully one looks the more difficult it is to find any convincing evidence that this is so. While the evidence does not show that the character of a neighbourhood causes poverty, there is important and obvious causation running from poverty to the sort of neighbourhood in which you live.

This study focuses specifically on working relationships between staff in social services departments (now in many cases, reorganised and redesignated as children’s services departments) and staff in Sure Start local programmes.

The VideoVoice Collective is a health advocacy, research, and evaluation team that works to turn documentary film on its head. Using the videovoice technique, we put digital video cameras in the hands of those who know their communities best, assisting them in communicating their ideas and visions. The Collective is a team of researchers, filmmakers, technology mavens, and social justice champions. We are dedicated to building film-making partnerships with marginalized communities in the United States and around the world.

The National Institute on Aging (NIA), part of the Federal Government’s National Institutes of Health (NIH), has primary responsibility for basic research in Alzheimer’s disease (AD) as well as research aimed at finding ways to prevent and treat AD. The Institute’s AD research program is integral to one of its main goals, which is to enhance the quality of life of older people by expanding knowledge about the aging brain and nervous system. This 2005-2006 Progress Report on Alzheimer’s Disease summarizes recent AD research conducted or supported by NIA and other components of NIH.

Mandatory work-focused interviews for lone parents claiming income support have been subject to extensive evaluation since their inception in April 2001. This report aims to bring together all evaluation findings, including those relating to small-scale changes to delivery and provision in recent years that have been implemented to further improve the programme.

This report presents the results of a literature review that looks at what is facilitating and inhibiting social mobility in the UK in the early years of the twenty-first century.

The aim of the secondary social, emotional and behavioural skills pilot programme was to encourage secondary schools to take a whole-school approach to developing social, emotional and behavioural skills among staff and pupils and to integrate these skills into their existing work. This evaluation looks at the effectiveness of the different modes of implementation, and provides evidence that will help develop the programme in the future.

NICE has produced two guidelines on drug misuse – ‘Drug misuse: psychosocial interventions’ (NICE clinical guideline 51) and ‘Drug misuse: opioid detoxification’ (NICE clinical guideline 52). They cover:
- the support and treatment people can expect to be offered if they have a problem with or are dependent on opioids, stimulants or cannabis
- how families and carers may be able to support a person with a drug problem and get help for themselves.NICE clinical guideline 51 makes recommendations for the use of psychosocial interventions in the treatment of people who misuse opioids, stimulants and cannabis in the healthcare and criminal justice systems. NICE has produced a joint quick reference guide and ‘Understanding NICE guidance’ that cover both guidelines, as well as tools to help organisations implement this guidance – these have been integrated with tools for other NICE guidance on drug misuse.

This publication is about one major resource—the Health and Retirement Study (HRS)—designed to inform the national retirement discussion as the population so dramatically ages. Since its launch in 1992, the HRS has painted a detailed portrait of America’s older adults, helping us learn about this growing population’s physical and mental health, insurance coverage, financial situations, family support systems, work status, and retirement planning. Through its unique and in-depth interviews with a nationally representative sample of adults over the age of 50, the HRS provides an invaluable, growing body of multidisciplinary data to help address the challenges and opportunities of aging.

In this article we argue that there is no universal guideline or rule of thumb for judging the practical importance or substantive significance of a standardized effect size estimate for an intervention. Instead one must develop empirical benchmarks of comparison that reflect the nature of the intervention being evaluated, its target population, and the outcome measure or measures being used. We apply this approach to the assessment of effect size measures for educational interventions designed to improve student academic achievement. Three types of empirical benchmarks are presented: (1) normative expectations for growth over time in student achievement; (2) policy-relevant gaps in student achievement, by demographic group or school performance; and (3) effect size results from past research for similar interventions and target populations. Our analysis draws from a larger ongoing research project that is examining the calculation, interpretation, and uses of effect sizes measures in education research. The more general message — that effect sizes should be interpreted using relevant empirical benchmarks — is applicable to any policy or program area, however.

This nation’s health system is broken, with costs as well as the number of uninsured Americans rising rapidly. An exception to these bleak trends has been the success of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program, or SCHIP. Enacted in 1997, the program has provided millions of previously uninsured children with health care coverage and cut the uninsured rate among children by one-third. . . . To help navigate the debate, the Center for American Progress has compiled the facts on children’s health insurance. From congressional testimony to reports on the effects of budget shortfalls on minority children, children’s health care benefits and a series of interactive maps, CAP has SCHIP covered.

This gives the Law Commission's recommendations on cohabitation to the Government following an extensive consultation. The consultation considered the financial consequences of the ending of cohabiting relationships by separation or death.

This report outlines the work of the Ethics Committee undertaken in 2006 and takes a forward look to some developments expected in 2007.

Economic inequality – the unequal distribution of financial resources within the population – is now a marked feature of the socio-economic structure of the UK. However, relatively little is known about public attitudes on this issue. This study examines public attitudes to economic inequality, and related issues of poverty and redistribution. Over the last 20 years, a large and enduring majority of people (73 per cent in 2004) have considered the gap between high and low incomes too large.

This