Subrecipient Interview Guide

Evaluation of the Trafficking Victim Assistance Program (TVAP) and Aspire: Child Trafficking Victim Assistance Demonstration Program (Aspire)

Virtual Site Visit

Subrecipient Interview Guide

Overview

• Purpose: Conduct a 90-minute, semi-structured virtual interview with personnel from subrecipients to learn about their involvement and experiences with TVAP and/or Aspire.

• Respondents: Personnel from subrecipients who serve TVAP and/or Aspire clients.

• Scheduling activities:

• TVAP/Aspire Regional Coordinators (RCs) within the ACF regions where site visits are being conducted will assist in identifying potential respondents for recruitment and provide an introduction via email.

• The evaluation team will schedule virtual interviews directly with respondents and email them information about the interview (see Introduction and Consent information below) before.

• Pre-interview & Interview activities:

• The evaluation team will review the programs’ progress reports to inform the interview.

• INTERVIEWER NOTE: We are not expecting that every respondent will speak to every question and every prompt. Move on to the next question/section if the respondent doesn’t seem to have input to provide on a certain topic. Use your knowledge of the programs to help guide the interview. If needed, review the guide beforehand to identify priority questions for each respondent.

• Respondents will be given a $60 token of appreciation.

Respondent ID
Agency/Organization
State, ACF Region
Date
Interviewer(s)

Part 0. Introduction and Consent

Thank you for speaking with us today. My name is [NAME] and this is my colleague [NAME]. We are part of the team at RTI International, a nonprofit research organization, that is conducting the evaluation of the Trafficking Victim Assistance Program (TVAP) and Aspire: Child Trafficking Victim Assistance Demonstration Program (Aspire). This evaluation is overseen by the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE) in partnership with the Office on Trafficking in Persons (OTIP) at the Administration for Children and Families in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

We are conducting interviews with TVAP and Aspire subrecipients in your region. The purpose of this interview is to understand the experience of all subrecipient partners in the region, including how they receive and make client referrals to the programs, provide comprehensive case management to clients, and receive support from TVAP and Aspire program leadership. This information will help improve the TVAP and Aspire programs.

Do you have any questions about the purpose of this interview or the evaluation?

Before we start, I want to share some guidelines.

• We anticipate this interview taking approximately 90 minutes.

• You will receive $60 as a token of appreciation. When we finish the interview, I’ll email you a link to get your gift card.

• Your participation in this interview is voluntary. There are no right or wrong answers, and we can skip any questions. You can also end the interview at any time.

• The information we collect from you is private to the extent permitted by law. We store all materials associated with your interview on a secure computer drive that only our RTI team can access. These materials will be stored securely until the project ends in 2028, and then we will delete it.

• We will not identify you individually by name or connect anything you say directly to you. When we share information in reports or presentations, your answers will be summarized with answers from other people we interview. We may use quotes from this interview, but we'll remove identifying information and describe you using general terms like "subrecipient." Please tell us if there is anything you do not want us to quote, and we will delete it from our notes and not include it in any reporting. We will never share what you say in a way that identifies you directly to OTIP or TVAP and Aspire program leadership.

Do you have any questions about these guidelines?

Lastly, we would like to ask your permission to audio record your interview. This will allow us to create a transcript of your interview and accurately capture what you shared. You can ask us to stop or pause recording at any time or ask us to delete something from the transcript. If you prefer not to be recorded, we will take electronic notes instead. We will delete the recording after it is transcribed.

Is it okay if we record the interview?

The last thing before we begin—I’m required to let you know that 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 for this information collection is 0970-XXXX and the expiration date is XX/XX/XXXX.

[If consent was provided, start the recording. Let the respondent know the recording has started and remind them that they can ask you to turn it off at any point.]

Part 1. Respondent and Subrecipient Background

[For respondents who completed the Wave 1 virtual interview]

Thank you again for agreeing to speak with us today. It’s good to see you again since we last spoke in [MONTH, YEAR].

1. Has your role in [SUBRECIPIENT ORGANIZATION] changed since we last spoke?

2. Has [SUBRECIPIENT ORGANIZATION] experienced any major changes since we last spoke?

   1. Examples: changes related to primary activities, service populations, or grants related to human trafficking.

[SKIP to Part 2]

[For new respondents]

Thank you again for agreeing to speak with us today. To start, we’d like to learn more about you and your organization.

3. Can you tell us about your title and role in [SUBRECIPIENT ORGANIZATION]?

4. How did you come to work at [SUBRECIPIENT ORGANIZATION]?

5. Can you briefly describe your organization?

   1. What are your organization’s primary activities?

   2. Who does your organization serve?

   3. What other types of grants and grant programs does your organization have?

6. Can you briefly describe your organization’s role in TVAP and/or Aspire?

   1. Is your organization a subrecipient to one or both programs? Which programs?

   2. Was your organization a subrecipient under the former TVAP model?

7. How did your organization become a TVAP and/or Aspire subrecipient?

   1. What prompted your organization to become a subrecipient?

   2. What was your organization’s experience with this process?

8. What was your organization’s experience onboarding as a subrecipient?

   1. What trainings and other onboarding activities did you complete?

9. How is TVAP and/or Aspire funding allocated to your organization to serve clients?

   1. What is your experience with invoicing for client case management and services?

   2. What is your experience completing service logs?

Part 2. Client Referral and Enrollment

Next, we’d like to learn more about your TVAP and/or Aspire client referrals and enrollment.

10. How do clients typically come to your organization to receive TVAP and/or Aspire services?

    1. How often do you refer clients for enrollment in TVAP and/or Aspire versus receive client referrals from TVAP and/or Aspire?

    2. About what proportion of referred potential clients are you able to serve?

    3. What factors do you consider when deciding to accept a TVAP and/or Aspire referral? E.g., client characteristics and needs, organizational capacity and funding.

    4. If you have other related grants/grant programs, how do you determine whether to enroll a client in one of those programs versus TVAP and/or Aspire?

    5. Have you experienced any challenges with the referral process?

11. Can you describe your TVAP and/or Aspire clients and caseload?

    1. How frequently do you enroll new clients into TVAP and/or Aspire?

    2. What is the size of your caseload?

    3. How is your caseload distributed between TVAP and Aspire clients?

    4. Have you noticed any client trends among your TVAP and/or Aspire clients (e.g., types of trafficking experienced)?

12. What is your intake or enrollment process for TVAP and/or Aspire clients?

    1. What screening or assessment tools do you use?

    2. How do you assess clients’ needs?

    3. How do you conduct service or goal planning?

    4. How do you conduct safety assessments and planning?

    5. How do you build trust and rapport with clients?

    6. Have you experienced any challenges with the intake/enrollment process?

Part 3. Case Management & Supportive Services

Now we’re going to ask some questions about the case management and services that you provide to TVAP and/or Aspire clients.

13. Can you describe the primary characteristics of your case management approach?

    1. How often do you formally meet with clients?

    2. How often and why might you communicate with clients informally or ad hoc?

    3. How do you meet with clients? E.g. virtually, in-person at the office, in-person in the community.

    4. Do you assist TVAP clients to obtain HHS Certification to maintain program eligibility? If so, how?

    5. Do you assist Aspire clients to obtain HHS Eligibility to maintain program eligibility? If so, how?

    6. What do you do to keep clients engaged in the program?

    7. Have you experienced any challenges providing case management?

14. Now we’re going to review a list of 15 services that TVAP and/or Aspire clients may need. For each service type, we’ll ask how you help TVAP and/or Aspire clients access it, the need for the service, and any facilitators or barriers to access.

    1. How do you provide or help TVAP and/or Aspire clients access [SERVICE]? E.g., directly by the case manager, internally through the subrecipient organization, through community referral.

    2. About how often do clients need or want [SERVICE]?

    3. How successfully are you able to provide or help clients access [SERVICE]? Are there common facilitators? Are there common barriers?

[Ask Q14 for each of the following services]

1. Advocacy and information about crime victims’ rights and services

2. Interpretation or translation

3. Basic needs (e.g., food, clothing, personal care, cell phone)

4. Transportation

5. Healthcare/health insurance (including medical, dental, vision)

6. Behavioral health care (including mental health, psychiatry, substance use treatment)

7. Housing (e.g., emergency shelter, rental/utilities assistance, furnishings, landlord advocacy)

8. Public benefits (e.g., coordinating with benefit agencies, completing/submitting forms, compiling documentation, scheduling appointments, appealing denials)

9. Legal advocacy and services

10. Employment/vocational services

11. Education-related services

12. Life skills training

13. Peer-to-peer support and mentoring

14. Family reunification and supportive services

15. Childcare

1. Are there any other services that you commonly provide to TVAP and/or Aspire clients or help them access?

2. What are your most important lessons learned related to assisting TVAP and/or Aspire clients?

3. Overall, how successfully do you think TVAP and/or Aspire are meeting clients’ needs?

   1. What is most helpful to clients?

   2. Is there anything clients often need but can’t access?

4. How do you determine when to close out a client’s case?

   1. What does that process entail, including connection to post-discharge services?

5. Do you collect client feedback regarding the services they received via your organization? If so, please describe how.

Part 3. External Collaboration

20. Can you describe any support, resources, training, and/or technical assistance you receive to help you provide TVAP and/or Aspire services?

    1. Who provides this support?

    2. How helpful is the support?

    3. Are there any supports you need or would like that you haven’t received?

21. Who are the primary people or organizations you collaborate, communicate, or otherwise work with most often on TVAP and/or Aspire related activities?

    1. Examples: Other people in the subrecipient organization; OTIP; TVAP and Aspire program leadership, regional coordinators, and case managers; other TVAP and/or Aspire subrecipients; other non-TVAP/Aspire service providers; government agencies and entities in your local jurisdiction and/or state.

22. In what ways do you collaborate, communicate, or otherwise work with these people/organizations?

    1. How does this collaboration/communication help you meet your organization’s goals/objectives related to TVAP and/or Aspire?

    2. How effective do you think this collaboration/communication is?

Part 4. Feedback and Wrap-Up

Thank you for sharing your experience as a TVAP and/or Aspire subrecipient service provider. We’d like to end our interview with a few wrap-up questions.

23. What are your goals as a subrecipient in TVAP and/or Aspire during the remainder of the award period?

    1. What support and resources do you need to achieve these goals?

24. From your perspective, what motivates your organization to continue serving clients under TVAP and/or Aspire?

25. Are there any other challenges you’ve experienced that we haven’t discussed already? If so, what are they and how have you addressed them?

26. Do you have any suggestions to improve the implementation of the TVAP and/or Aspire programs that we haven’t discussed already?

27. Is there anything else that comes to mind regarding your experience as a subrecipient that you’d like to share with us today?

Thank you again for participating in this interview. Have a great rest of your day.

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