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Acknowledgements
This report represents the culmination of the exploratory phase of implementation research on the Community Healthy Marriage Initiative pioneer sites. As such, it could not have happened without the support of many people. We especially thank the families — predominantly low-income women with children — whose lives are represented in the statistics and stories throughout this report. We hope that the report reflects their experiences and contributes to policy decisions that will improve their lives and opportunities.
We are particularly grateful for the many kinds of support we received from the leadership of the Healthy Marriages Healthy Relationships initiative. Carol VanderWal, Mark Eastburg, Earl James and Marlene Olson in particular were very generous with their time and expertise and helped us to arrange interviews, fully understand their activities, plans, and challenges, and set up and transfer program data that is analyzed in this report. Ellen Durnan of the Michigan Office for Child Support was very helpful in transferring the child support data as needed and in providing background about the State’s role and efforts. Other members of the Healthy Marriages Healthy Relationships effort, including the ten direct service providers and members of Healthy Marriages Grand Rapids also generously shared their expertise with us, and we appreciate their contributions to this profile of their efforts. As participants in our exploratory effort of their pioneer effort, we appreciate the insight and flexibility that was demonstrated by all.
We received helpful feedback throughout the process from Mark Fucello and Richard Jakopic of the Office for Policy, Research, and Evaluation at the Administration for Children and Families. Their guidance is evident in this report, and is much appreciated. Within our project team, we appreciate the efforts of Mai Nguyen in arranging data transfers and creating analytic files and Danny Occoquan for taking meticulous notes on the healthy marriage update calls. Laudi Aaron, of the Urban Institute, assisted in developing the interview protocols for the qualitative data collection during the site visit. Elaine Crider, of Crider Associates, arranged, conducted and analyzed focus group activities with participants in Healthy Marriages Healthy Relationships classes. Mike Fishman and Mary Farrell of The Lewin Group, as the contractor for Technical Assistance to Healthy Marriages Healthy and other CHMI sites, have been very helpful to us and to the site. We appreciate their collaboration.
Within RTI, Katy Dowd and Susan Mitchell provided valuable oversight to the implementation analysis as a whole, including overseeing IRB activities within RTI. Matt Stagner and Pamela Winston played a similar role at the Urban Institute. Adele Monroe edited the report and Roxanne Snaauw prepared it for publication. The efforts of the entire CHMI team are appreciated.
The Authors
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