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These articles represent a selection of our perspectives
on health
and human services. Please refer to our Terms
of Use policy regarding acceptable use of content
on the ICF International Web site.
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PUBLICATIONS |
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How to Reduce Your Firm’s Risk and Increase Revenues Related to Nanotechnology: An 8-Step Program for Small Firms
April 2008. With limited time and resources, how can your firm start to think about or expand on its environmental, health, and safety (EHS) practices related to the use of nanomaterials? This pamphlet—developed by Deanna Lekas Lizas of ICF International and published by the Project on Emerging Nanotechnologies, a partnership between the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, and The Pew Charitable Trusts—presents eight suggestions to assist nanotechnology firms in addressing EHS issues associated with the production and use of nanomaterials.
The Greenbook Initiative Final Evaluation Report
The final evaluation report of the Greenbook Initiative, examining the process and effects of implementing the Greenbook recommendations on collaboration, systems change, and practice within and across three primary systems (child welfare agencies, domestic violence service providers, and the dependency courts), was completed in 2008. The evaluation was funded by the U.S. Departments of Justice and Health and Human Services. This final evaluation report, authored by the National Evaluation Team, assesses the extent to which the Greenbook implementation activities facilitated cross-system and system change and practice within the three primary systems. Findings of the evaluation show the efforts of the partners, the challenges they faced in carrying out their work, and the changes they were able to bring about in how the systems work to identify and respond to the needs of families and children experiencing the co-occurrence of domestic violence and child maltreatment.
Issue Briefs on Addressing the Needs of Human Trafficking Victims
ICF International, in collaboration with Advocates for Human Potential (AHP), is conducting a study to develop information on how U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) programs are currently addressing the needs of victims of human trafficking, including domestic victims (i.e., citizens and legal permanent residents), with a priority focus on domestic youth. The project will provide in-depth and timely information to help HHS design and implement effective programs and services that help trafficking victims overcome the trauma and injuries they have suffered, to regain their dignity, and become self-sufficient. Components of the study include a comprehensive review of relevant literature; studies of data related to providing services to victims of human trafficking; nine site visits to geographic areas; at least three issue briefs highlighting interesting, innovative, and/or effective experiences, knowledge, or information resulting from the site visits; and a final report providing a synthesis of all information obtained under the study. The Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR) is partially funding this study with the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Planning and Evaluation (ASPE). |
- Identifying Victims of Human Trafficking: Inherent Challenges and Promising Strategies from the Field
February 2008. This issue brief focuses on the identification of international and domestic victims of human trafficking in the United States and presents the inherent challenges to identifying victims based on the definition provided in the Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000 (TVPA), as well as promising strategies undertaken by law enforcement, service providers, and other organizations to identify and reach victims.
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Professional Development Programs for Infant/Toddler Caregivers: Setting the Stage for Lifelong Learning
Published in the journal of the Southern Early Childhood Association (SECA), Dimensions of Early Childhood, Volume 35, No. 3, Fall 2007, pages 12-20. The article was co-authored by experts within ICF International's Early Education Institute—Melissa D. Zwahr, Caroline F. Davis, Jill Aviles, Kristen H. Buss, and Helen Stine. The purpose of this article is to demonstrate the need for high-quality training and professional development opportunities specifically designed for caregivers of infants and toddlers. It challenges the early education field to raise the bar for the quality of care provided to children from birth to 3 years.
Cross-Continent Training of Trainers: A Relationship-Based Approach
Published in the November 2007 issue of Young Children, a publication of the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), pages 33-35. This article, co-authored by ICF staff (Helen Stine, Jill Aviles, Barbara McCreedy) and three of the six Indian participants (Anubha Rajesh, Ridhi Sethi, and Vini Gupta), describes an effort by ICF to extend its early education services in an outreach to India, by developing a model of collaborative, interactive training. The Training of Trainers workshop in New Delhi, India, brought together ICF and Indian participants with experiences in early care and education in various parts of the world. This model established a foundation that will support the expansion of high quality, culturally relevant, responsive training programs.
Childhood Obesity Prevention
August 2007. Policymakers and researchers across the United States recognize the critical need for new, systemic approaches to address the rising childhood obesity epidemic in our country. Responding to this need, ICF International developed this report to describe the current areas of consensus in the research and policy fields and to propose a holistic and comprehensive prevention strategy for addressing childhood obesity across the full spectrum of environments, including homes, child care and educational settings, communities and neighborhoods, and health care practices. The report also highlights promising practices and ICF programs that have demonstrated innovation and effectiveness in tackling many of the challenges associated with childhood obesity prevention.
School Mental Health Program Retrospective Report: 2000-2005
In 2007, the District of Columbia (DC) Department of Mental Health (DMH), Office of Program and Policy, Child and Youth Services Division released its first published multi-year evaluation study of the School-based Mental Health Program. This evaluation report, co-authored by Dr. Olga Acosta Price, Deputy Director of George Washington University’s Center for Health and Health Care in Schools (former Director of the program) and Dr. Amy R. Mack, Senior Associate with ICF International (former Evaluation Coordinator of the program), provides comprehensive information about the program since its creation in 2000. Successes and challenges are discussed in detail along with aggregate-level data highlighting promising practices and programs. The report provides much-needed data regarding evaluating prevention, early intervention, and intervention services provided by social workers and psychologists to children and youth in 30 Washington, D.C., public and public charter schools.
Validating Culture- and Gender-Specific Constructs: A Mixed Method Approach to Advance Assessment Procedures in Cross-Cultural Settings
Co-published in Journal of Applied School Psychology, Vol. 22, No. 2, 2006, pp. 13-33; and in Multicultural Issues in School Psychology, pp. 13-33. Copyright 2006 by The Haworth Press, Inc. Written by John Hitchcock and colleagues of ICF Caliber, this article describes a mixed-method (i.e., quantitative and qualitative) approach for developing a psychological measure that accounts for cultural factors. Despite ongoing calls for developing cultural competency among mental health practitioners, few assessment instruments consider cultural variation in psychological constructs. To meet the challenge of developing measures for minority and international students, it is necessary to account for the influence culture may have on the latent constructs that form a given instrument. What complicates matters further is that individual factors (e.g., gender) within a culture necessitate additional refinement of factor structures on which such instruments are based. The current work endeavors to address these concerns by demonstrating a mixed-methods approach utilized to assess construct validation within a specific culture, and in turn develop culturally-specific instruments. Article copies are available from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1.800.HAWORTH.
| The Achievement Gap: Overcoming the Income Gap
Published in InfoBrief, an Information Brief
of the Association
for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ACSD),
October 2006, by Anne Nelson of ICF Caliber. This
issue, the fourth in a series exploring the achievement
gap in education, focuses on the challenges to academic
achievement presented by the income gap and strategies
educators can use to overcome them.
Closing the [Achievement] Gap: Keeping Students
in School
Published in InfoBrief, an Information Brief
of the Association
for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ACSD), Summer
2006, by Anne Nelson of ICF Caliber. This issue,
the third in a series exploring the achievement
gap in education, focuses on strategies educators can
employ to keep students engaged in school and reduce
dropout rates.
Closing
the Gap: Early Childhood Education
Published in InfoBrief, an Information Brief of the Association
for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ACSD), April 2006, by Anne
Nelson of ICF Caliber. This issue, the second in a series exploring the achievement
gap in education, focuses on the challenges to academic achievement presented
in early childhood and strategies educators can use to overcome them.
Closing
the [Achievement] Gap: An Overview
Published by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD)
in Infobrief, Issue 44, January 2006, and authored by ICF International’s
Anne Rogers Poliakoff. The article is the first in a series that focuses on
the achievement gap in education. It seeks first to examine what the gap is,
as a statistical construct, and to present what educational research has determined
about its many causes, outside of schools as well as within. The intent of
the series is to provide guidance for policymakers and practitioners seeking
to institutionalize processes that successfully address achievement gap issues. |
Translating
Research into Practice: Speeding the Adoption of Innovative
Health Care Programs
Published by The Commonwealth Fund, July 2004, and
co-authored by ICF International's Michael C. Barth, Ph.D.,
and Elizabeth H. Bradley, Tashonna R. Webster, Dorothy Baker,
Mark Schlesinger, Sharon K. Inouye, Kate L. Lapane, Debra
Lipson, Robyn Stone, and Mary Jane Koren. The study presents
case studies of four clinical programs to identify key
factors influencing the diffusion and adoption of evidence-based
innovations in health care.
A Low-Cost, Post Hoc Method to Rate Overall Site Quality
in a Multi-Site Demonstration
Published in the American Journal of
Evaluation, Volume 25, Issue 1, Spring 2004, by Michael
C. Barth of ICF International. Copyright © 2004 Elsevier
Inc. This paper describes an alternative
approach to site quality measurement with observations elicited
from national program staff of the Healthy Steps for Young
Children program, which was implemented in 25 sites. The
Concept Mapping approach applied to this large demonstration
project can be applied to many social and human resource
demonstration programs, including on-the-job and classroom
training, job readiness coaching, early childhood education,
parenting programs, and mental health and substance abuse
treatment.
Research Links Childhood Lead Exposure to Changes
in Violent Crime Rates Throughout the 20th Century
The full text is available in Environmental Research, May 2000, by Rick
Nevin. This research summary was distributed at the Office of Juvenile Justice
and Delinquency Prevention National Conference (Washington, D.C., December 13,
2000). This study compares changes in children's blood lead levels in the United
States with subsequent changes in IQ, based on norm comparisons for the Cognitive
Abilities Test (CogAT) given to representative national samples of children in
1984 and 1992.
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