4 LIA Program Staff Focus Group Protocol

OMB Control #: XXXX-XXXX

Expiration Date: XX/XX/XXXX

The purpose of this study is to explore how family voice and leadership activities are implemented in the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting Program. 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 control number for this information collection is 0906-XXXX and it is valid until XX/XX/202X. This information collection is voluntary. Data will be kept private to the extent allowable by the law. Public reporting burden for this collection of information is estimated to average X hours per response, including the time for reviewing instructions, searching existing data sources, and completing and reviewing the collection of information. Send comments regarding this burden estimate or any other aspect of this collection of information, including suggestions for reducing this burden, to HRSA Information Collection Clearance Officer, 5600 Fishers Lane, Room 14N39, Rockville, Maryland, 20857 or paperwork@hrsa.gov. Please see https://www.hrsa.gov/about/508-resources for the HRSA digital accessibility statement. 

Home Visiting Program Staff Focus Group Protocol¹

Introduction

Hello, thank you for taking the time to speak with us today. My name is [NAME] and I work at Child Trends, a research organization focused on improving the lives of children and families. We are working on a project funded by the Health Resources and Services Administration, or HRSA, to learn about different aspects of home visiting implementation quality, including family voice and leadership. By “family voice and leadership”, we mean opportunities for families to be included in decision making about their home visiting program beyond their own personal visits, for example on things like policies, evaluations, or implementation efforts. Specifically, we are hoping to learn about the types of family voice and leadership opportunities available, families’ experiences participating in these opportunities, and what impact family leaders may be having on home visiting. As part of our project, we will be hearing from home visiting leaders, family leaders, and program staff like you through surveys, focus groups, and interviews.. We will analyze what we learn to identify key themes and develop recommendations for the home visiting field on how to better engage in family voice and leadership activities.

Before we get started, I wanted to share some of our expectations for this discussion.

• As the facilitator, I’ll be asking you questions. However, our goal is to start a discussion between all of you, and you should feel free to respond directly to one another. I might interrupt the conversation to ask you to clarify something or move us on to another topic.

• It is up to you to share as you feel comfortable. You don’t have to answer any questions you don’t want to or that you don’t remember the answer to, and you can leave at any time. There are no right or wrong answers! Everyone here today comes from a variety of backgrounds and you may have different experiences or opinions, which we want to hear and understand.

Your decision on whether to participate in this discussion today will not have any effect on your employment or current or future grant status.

We will take every precaution to keep what you share here today as confidential as possible. Because this is a focus group with many people, we cannot guarantee confidentiality, but we do ask that you not share with anyone outside this group what you hear today so that everyone can feel more comfortable participating. We will not share your name, the name of your home visiting program, or any other information that could identify you with anyone outside the study team, including HRSA.

We will take notes and record our discussion today so we don’t miss anyone’s important comments. We will use the recording to fill in our written notes, and it will not be shared with anyone outside our team. At the end of our project, the recording will be destroyed.

Are you still willing to participate in our focus group today and be recorded?

Do you have any questions for us before we begin?

 Introductions 

• Please share your name, where you’re located, your current role, and how long you’ve been involved in home visiting.

Family Voice and Leadership Opportunities

• What is your current involvement with family voice and leadership activities in your home visiting program? By family voice and leadership activities we mean opportunities for families to be included in decision making about their home visiting program beyond their own personal visits, for example on things like policies, evaluations, or implementation efforts.

  • Example probes:

    • Was supporting these activities an assigned part of your job, or something you took on out of your own initiative?

    • If you opted into this work on your own, what made you decide to do so?

• Including the activities you support, what types of family voice and leadership opportunities does your program provide?

  • Example probes:

    • Does this feel like the right level of involvement for family leaders, or do you think families should be more or less involved?

    • What are family leaders’ roles in these opportunities? Do they have decision-making authority?

    • What projects or topics have family leaders been most involved in consulting on?

    • Are there projects or topics that you or your home visiting program have not wanted family leaders to consult on? Why?

• How are families recruited for these activities?

  • Example probes:

    • How do you recruit families for these opportunities? To what extent has recruitment been easy or difficult?

    • To what extent are the families involved in these activities representative of the families in your program? What have been effective strategies or challenges you have faced in recruiting families that represent the diversity of the community you serve?

• How are family leaders engaged and supported in these activities?

  • Example probes:

    • What supports do you offer to family leaders participating in these activities? What has facilitated their participation?

• Probe for: Child care, transportation, devices such as laptops or tablets, meals, interpretation supports, translated materials, appropriate literacy levels, convenient scheduling, convenient locations, virtual activities, internet connectivity, flexible participation, adequate family representation at meetings and events

• Of these supports, which have been most impactful?

• What are the barriers you have faced to engaging family leaders in family voice and leadership activities?

  • Probe for: What additional supports would help you overcome these challenges and engage more meaningfully with families?

Impacts of Family Voice and Leadership

• In general, how do you think your program is doing in providing opportunities for family voice and leadership?

  • Example probes:

    • What are examples of key successes?

    • What are examples of areas for improvement, or areas in which you would like to grow your work?

• What are the benefits and drawbacks of engaging families in family voice and leadership opportunities?

  • Example probes:

    • What have been key benefits or advantages?

    • What have been key drawbacks or disadvantages?

• What changes have you seen as a result of family voice and leadership activities, if any?

  • Example probes:

    • What changes have you seen for the family leaders themselves at a personal level?

    • What changes have you seen in implementation quality or outcomes for families?

    • Are there other aspects of implementation quality or outcomes for families that you think family voice and leadership should or could influence?

Recommendations

• What advice would you have for home visiting programs that want to begin or strengthen their family voice and leadership work?

  • Example probes:

    • If a program was struggling to attract or retain family leaders, what would you advise them?

    • What questions should programs be asking themselves? What kinds of things should they be putting in place?

Closing 

• Is there anything else you’d like to add? 

Thank you for your time today! In appreciation of your time, we will send each of you a $50 e-gift card to Amazon or Walmart.

1 Note that this protocol is intended to serve as a guide rather than a script. Moderators will tailor questions and probes as needed to further explore experiences shared by focus group participants.