Much of Chapin Hall’s research agenda evolves through long-term engagement with public agency directors, government officials, and philanthropic and community leaders. These stakeholders turn to Chapin Hall for research evidence that helps them shape their policies and programs.

One such example of long-term collaboration is currently underway in Florida’s Palm Beach County. For more than a decade, the county has been building an infrastructure of prevention and early intervention services and the Children’s Services Council of Palm Beach County commissioned Chapin Hall to conduct a multiyear evaluation of how families use and are affected by this system of services.

“We are looking at patterns of service use over time and their relationship to family functioning and child development,” explains Julie Spielberger, “particularly as they relate to school readiness.”

Chapin Hall Research Fellow Julie Spielberger is the principal investigator for this multiyear longitudinal study. Her work and expertise centers around child development and early childhood education, with particular interest in school readiness and improving program quality and professional development.

“It is important to track families during the early years of a child’s life when they are most likely to come into contact with the service system,” says Spielberger. “We selected as our primary study group families with newborns living in four targeted low-income communities, with the intent of following them at least until their children entered school.”

Designed to support children at different stages of their development, the Palm Beach County infrastructure is made up of four primary programs or systems, which include a network of health and social services for high-risk pregnant women and new mothers; a combination of several initiatives intended to improve the quality of childcare and early education; Children’s Behavioral Health Initiative and other school-based intervention to improve children’s adjustment to school; and a network of afterschool programs for elementary and middle-school youth supported by Prime Time.

Although separate evaluations have been conducted on several individual programs that are or have been part of the Palm Beach County service system (Children’s Behavioral Health Initiative, Prime Time Initiative, Early Childhood Cluster Initiative), these evaluations alone cannot provide information on how families use multiple services over time or how a system of services might affect children’s well-being and development.

Two reports, published in 2007 and 2009 focus on the second and third year of the multiyear Palm Beach Family Study. A third report is set to appear in 2010. The reports describe the characteristics and needs of families and detail opportunities and challenges for improving the service system.

“To be effective, program policies and practices need to be grounded in the circumstances of the low-income families they are intended to serve,” concludes Spielberger. “They also have to take into account the range of different services and systems with which families may have contact.”

“As we continue to learn more in the course of this study about families and their service experiences, we will learn more about how to strengthen community supports and design effective services and service delivery to fit the diverse needs and circumstances of these families.”