Appendix E: FLASH-V Study Design Changes in Response to Public Comments

APPENDIX E: Family Level Assessment and State of Home Visiting (FLASH-V) Outreach and Recruitment Study Design Changes in Response to Public Comments

The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation requested public comment on new data collection activities to gather information about how Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) local implementing agencies (LIAs) recruit families for program participation and work with their community referral partners to recruit families. The FLASH-V project is designed to examine challenges programs experience reaching caseload capacity and how challenges might be overcome. Originally, proposed data collection focused on LIAs that were under capacity in terms of the number of families they serve. Proposed data collection activities included 75-minute semi-structured interviews with those LIAs and their identified community referral partners, as well as collection of existing management information system (MIS) data from a small subset of those LIAs. Other previously proposed activities associated with data collection burden were included to support sample selection to ensure inclusion of LIAs that currently receive MIECHV funding, were under capacity, and reflected an overall sample with a diverse set of characteristics that may be relevant to recruitment and enrollment processes (e.g. program model, type of staff member(s) responsible for recruitment and enrollment).

During the notice and comment period, three sets of comments were received (see Appendix B-D). These comments: (1) requested clarification on study logistics, including eligibility requirements, inclusion of Tribal programs, and number of participants interviewed; (2) recommended expanding the data collection to include LIAs at capacity in addition to those that are under capacity to expand the opportunity to learn from all LIAs and to minimize the possibility that data collection will be perceived as punitive; and (3) recommended increasing the estimated burden for MIS data collection.

We changed the proposed FLASH-V Outreach and Recruitment study design to respond to comments received during the 60-day comment period. Changes include: (1) expanding the data collection to include a broader range of LIAs (now including MIECHV-funded LIAs at capacity and Tribal LIAs); (2) including a national survey targeting all MIECHV-funded LIAs; (3) increasing the number of semi-structured interviews with LIAs while decreasing the length of those interviews to 45 minutes; and (4) removing the interviews with community referral partners and the MIS data collection. These changes will still allow for examination of the challenges programs experience reaching caseload capacity, while also providing an expanded opportunity to learn about possible innovations to address those challenges.

The changes in design allow for a streamlined participant recruitment process as well. As all LIAs that receive MIECHV funding are now eligible to participate in the survey, participant recruitment efforts will now be minimized and focused on obtaining relevant contact information for LIAs. LIAs will be selected for interviews based on their survey responses and expressed interest in participating.

The revised design also allows us to retain the depth of information provided by qualitative interviews of LIAs even while shortening the interviews by moving many items to the survey. Efforts were made to minimize perceptions that the items are punitive by reframing items to be strength-based and by including both LIAs that are at capacity and under capacity.

To respond to comments related to MIS burden, we eliminated MIS data collection, which reduces burden on LIAs and shortens the data collection timeline. Finally, the 30 day notice was revised to specify the data collection is voluntary in response to public comments.

As a result of the changes described here, the following instruments are no longer needed:

• LIA Eligibility Assessment Form,

• LIA Eligibility Assessment Form for MIS Data

• Request for LIA Recommendations from HARC State Networks,

• Request to LIAs for Community Referral Partner Contact Information,

• Interview Protocol Community Referral Partner, and

• MIS Data Submission.