News from the Fatherhood Research & Practice Network

Today marks the exciting launch of the Fatherhood Research and Practice Network (FRPN) a five-year national project funded by the US Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation. The FRPN seeks to: Promote rigorous evaluation of fatherhood programs. Expand the number of practitioners and researchers collaborating to evaluate these programs. Disseminate information that leads to effective fatherhood practice and evaluation research. The FRPN includes three programmatic focus areas: responsible fatherhood, economic security and co-parenting/healthy relationships. Over the past few months, the FRPN workgroups, made up of fatherhood researchers and practitioners, have collaborated to draft reports outlining research gaps in these areas, which can be downloaded here. Funding Opportinity Today, we released the first of three FRPN requests for proposals to support rigorous evaluation of fatherhood programs. The purpose of these grants is to increase the number and quality of evaluations of fatherhood programs and learn more about how to better serve low-income fathers, racial/ethnic minorities and other under-studied populations. Letters of interest for this round of funding are due on July 30. The FRPN will notify applicants of their official invitation to submit a proposal by August 15. Full proposals will be due by September 30 and award notifications will be distributed on October 20. Selected projects will receive funding of $50,000 - $150,000 over 30 months. Click here to learn more about this funding opportunity. FRPN Website Launches The FRPN website, housed at www.frpn.org, serves as the focal point of our dissemination campaign. It is a platform to inform audiences of FRPN activities, upcoming and currently published evaluation research, training and technical assistance opportunities and other resources. The website also includes a Researcher & Practitioner Forum, which allows researchers and practitioners to connect and communicate with one another based on location and area of research interest.

Needs Assessment With the official launch of the FRPN in place, we now seek to gain a better understanding of the training and technical assistance needs of practitioners, researchers and program managers to conduct evaluations of fatherhood programs. The FRPN needs assessment is an online survey designed for practitioners and researchers to complete. Responses will help us develop future in-person and virtual training opportunities, connect researchers and practitioners and develop funding opportunities for relevant projects. Thank you for taking a few minutes to complete the needs assessment or forwarding it to your colleagues in the fatherhood field. Click here to complete the FRPN needs assessment.

Contact Us to Learn More FRPN Co-Director Jay Fagan, PhD | Professor, Temple University School of Social Work FRPN Co-Director Jessica Pearson, PhD | Director, Center for Policy Research FRPN Coordinator Rebecca Kaufman, MSW | Temple University

© 2014 Fatherhood Research & Practice Network. All rights reserved The Fatherhood Research and Practice Network is supported by grant #90PR0006 from the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The contents are solely the responsibility of the Fatherhood Research and Practice Network, Temple University and the Center for Policy Research and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, the Administration for Children and Families or the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.