Strengthening the Implementation of Marriage and Relationship Programs (SIMR)

OMB # 0970-0356

Expiration Date: 06/30/2021

Appendix C:

Topics for SIMR Phone Meeting

Thank you for taking the time to meet with the Strengthening the Implementation of Marriage and Relationship Programs (SIMR)study team. As a reminder, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services has contracted with Mathematica and its partner, Public Strategies, to conduct the SIMR study. The study aims to identify and test strategies for addressing common implementation challenges facing healthy marriage and relationships education (HMRE) programs.

This document outlines the information the SIMR team will ask about in the phone interview. The interview will focus on your organization and program plans and will help the study team understand your HMRE program better. The conversation should help you understand the goals of SIMR and help us understand whether the proposed approaches for the SIMR study fit with your program. We expect these topics to guide our conversation. They do not all need to be answered in our first call. You do not need to answer these questions before our meeting. Instead, we hope they will help you prepare for our discussion. Thank you in advance for your time! [TAILOR TOPICS BELOW BASED ON APPLICATION REVIEW]

• Tell us about your organization. How long has it been operating? What other services and types of programs does the organization provide?

• [For returning grantees] How long have you been providing programming? What successes did you have, and what challenges did you face in earlier years? [For new grantees] Has your organization managed federal grants in the past? If so, what successes did you have, and what challenges did you face in implementing those grants?

• Have you made any major changes to the program from what you described in your grant application?

• In what ways is the HMRE program unique from other relationship programming in the community?

• Do you have additional funding sources beyond the ACF grant to support the HMRE program or specific services?

• What challenges are you anticipating in launching and implementing your HMRE program?

• Tell us about the data you collect to monitor your program and your process for program improvement. What is your process for addressing implementation challenges?

• Has your organization participated in an evaluation before? Did you partner with an external evaluator for the evaluation?

• Tell us about any plans for a local evaluation.

NOTE: The Paperwork Reduction Act Statement: This collection of information is voluntary and will be used to gather preliminary information about the healthy marriage-relationship education (HMRE) field and explore with HMRE programs the research questions that are of interest and the design options that are feasible. Public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average 60 minutes per response, including the time for reviewing instructions, gathering and maintaining the data needed, and reviewing the collection of information. An agency may not conduct or sponsor, and a person is not required to respond to, a collection of information unless it displays a currently valid OMB control number. The OMB number and expiration date for this collection are OMB #: 0970-0356, Exp: 06/30/2021. Send comments regarding this burden estimate or any other aspect of this collection of information, including suggestions for reducing this burden, to Robert Wood; RWood@Mathematica-mpr.com