Children and Families

As shoppers prepare for the holidays with trips to the mall, supermarket, and big box stores, many workers who stock the shelves and work the registers are scrambling to piece together child care to match their unpredictable work schedules.

The impact of Child Protective Services (CPS) on families, children, and communities is a sensitive topic. When a child's health, safety, or welfare is endangered, CPS may ask the court to order the child be placed in foster care. Out-of-home placements disproportionately affect families with low incomes and families of color. For these reasons, CPS systems across the country are looking for ways to provide support earlier on to reduce racial disparities in removals and keep children with their families.

When it comes to supporting families through paid family and medical leave policies, the U.S. lags behind other developed nations. What explains the lack of policy action? Perhaps we have not acknowledged paid leave policy for what it really is: a critical backbone of support that follows workers through all the major moments of their lives.

In fall 2018, we launched a new Policies for Action Research Hub at Vanderbilt to examine barriers to the healthy development and success of low-income children in Tennessee. We knew that building a strong, policy-focused research agenda would require open communication and a cooperative spirit among our state agencies and community health and education organizations.