Discussion Guide: Focus Groups

ATTACHMENT 5:

YARH DISCUSSION GUIDE FOR FOCUS GROUPS

March 2014

The Planning Grants to Develop a Model Intervention for Youth/Young Adults with Child Welfare Involvement At-Risk of Homelessness (YARH) process study will use the discussion guide that follows this cover page to guide focus groups conducted during the site visits. It is the same discussion guide as presented in Attachment 4: YARH Discussion Guide for Individual Interviews. These are draft versions; if any updates are made, revised guides will be submitted to the OMB Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs as a nonsubstantive change, per the terms of approval.

The YARH Process Study will include one site visit to each grantee where we interview: (1) planning team leaders, (2) planning team members, and (3) partner organizations that are not represented on the planning team. Interviews will be conducted either one-on-one or in small groups, depending on staffing structure, roles, and the number of individuals in a role.

Below is a list of topics we will cover. The list of topics is organized around the three key research questions presented in Supplemental Part A.

Introductory Script

Thank you very much for agreeing to participate in this conversation. Your participation is very important to the study. I’m __________ and I work for Mathematica Policy Research, an independent social policy research center.

We are conducting a study for the Office of Planning, Evaluation and Research at the Administration of Children and Families (ACF) at the U. S. Department of Health and Human Services. The major goal of the study is to understand how the planning grant supported the work of local communities in building a comprehensive service model to serve youth and young adults at-risk of homelessness. We will analyze survey results, documents submitted as part of the grant – such as semi-annual reports, and notes from conversations like this to understand the activities grantees planned and completed, what grantees see as the major outcomes of the planning process, the target populations for whom the comprehensive service model is designed, the interventions that will be part of the comprehensive service model, and the partnerships and integration that were supported for or rose from the planning grant activities.

We would like to talk with you about your experiences and perceptions of the planning grant process and activities. Our team will use your responses in conjunction with other data sources to identify themes that help explain the planning grant experience. Comments will not be attributed to specific individuals or grantees, and no individuals will be quoted by name. Your participation in this discussion is voluntary.

I am going to moderate the discussion. It is really important for everyone to speak up so we can have a lively and informative discussion. It will also be helpful if you speak one at a time, so everyone has a chance to talk. We ask that you respect each other’s point of view.

Your responses will be kept private and used only for research purposes.

There are no right or wrong answers. You are the experts and we want to learn from you.

We will not share your comments with anyone other than members of the research team. We will not attribute any statements to you, or your organization, in the final report submitted to ACF.

We have many topics to cover during the discussion. At times, I may need to move the conversation along to be sure we cover everything.

I would like to tape-record our discussion so I can listen to it later when I write up my notes. No one besides our research team will listen to the tape. If you want to say anything that you don’t want taped, please let me know and I will be glad to pause the tape recorder. Does anybody have any objections to being part of this interview or to my taping our discussion?

As a reminder, we want to reiterate that being part of this discussion is up to you, and you can choose not to answer a question if you wish. Being part of this discussion will not affect your employment.

The discussion will last no more than one and a half hours, and we will not take any formal breaks. Please feel free to get up at any time if you need to.

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 collection is 0970-XXXX and it expires XX/XX/XXXX.

Once again, thank you for agreeing to meet with us today. Are there any questions before we get started?

TOPICS FOR DISCUSSION

The particular questions will be developed for each grantee and participant to reflect what is known about the grantee prior and participant’s role on the planning team. We have presented the topics organized by research question described in Supporting Statement Part A.

Planning Grant Activities and Outcomes

• Advantages of having planning grant to plan comprehensive service model

• Disadvantages to planning a comprehensive service model using a team approach

• Accomplishments due to the planning grant that would not have been feasible otherwise

• Reason for accomplishments (e.g., funding support, protected staff time, potential of additional funding, reporting requirements of grant, technical assistance)

• Deliberate use of a theory of change and/or logic model to plan comprehensive service model

• Facilitators to planning a comprehensive service model

• Barriers to planning a comprehensive service model

• Facilitators to designing a rigorous evaluation plan

• Barriers to designing a rigorous evaluation plan

• Community commitment to rigorous evaluation

• Community commitment to comprehensive service model

Development of Target Populations and Intervention Design

• Changes in definition for or understanding of target population

• Surprises in developing data use agreements or memoranda of understanding related to data sharing

• Use of data to guide planning team activities and decisions

• Community commitment to assessing current services, including removing or adding other services

• Process for identification of evidence-based or evidence-informed practices

• Changes to screening and /or assessment tools

Partnerships and Service Integration

• Membership of planning team

• Facilitators to forming planning team

• Barriers to forming planning team

• Lessons learned about forming a planning team

• Frequency and type of meetings

• Use of shared vision to guide planning team work

• Establishment of procedures or processes to do the planning team work (e.g., communication, decision-making)

• Changes in procedures and processes among partner organizations

4