TANF Data Collaborative (TDC) 2.0 – Formative Data Collection

OMB Control No: 0970-0531

Expiration date: 9/30/2025

TDC 2.0 Evaluation Plan – Focus Group #1

Note: This focus group will occur at the January Kickoff Convening.

Verbal Consent

This session has two goals: (1) to identify high-priority areas of growth for your organization and team around which you can set goals for your time participating in TDC 2.0; and (2) to gather initial information about your team and organization that will help us tailor our coaching, evaluate how well we are supporting your needs, and allow you to see the progress you have made during the three year collaborative. We will record this conversation for documentation and to identify themes within and across sites as it relates to challenges, growth areas, and definitions of success at the beginning of TDC 2.0. We will come back to the areas of growth you identify today at the end of the project to reflect on the progress you have made over the project period. For the project’s public-facing evaluation report, quotes from this conversation may be used, but they will not be attributed to you or your agency, unless permission is given.

The topics discussed in this focus group are organizational and programmatic in nature. We do not anticipate any risk to you as a result of this conversation, but you can skip any questions that make you feel uncomfortable or you do not want to answer. We will not share your information outside of our research team. Because this is a group conversation, however, we cannot guarantee full confidentiality. We ask that all participants keep what is shared here today private. If you have any issues or concerns after the focus group, please reach out to Emma Monahan ([email protected]).Nothing you discuss will have any effect on your ability to receive funding from ACF, now or in the future; we encourage you to be as candid as possible in your responses. This session will last approximately 60 minutes.

According to the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995, an agency may not conduct or sponsor, and a person is not required to respond to, a collection of information unless it displays a valid OMB control number. The valid OMB control number for this information collection is #0970-0531 and the expiration date is 9/30/2025.

Do you consent to participate in this focus group? Please verbally say yes or no.

Do you consent to this conversation being recorded? Please verbally say yes or no.

Thank you!

Part One: Facilitated exercise to identify high-priority goals and areas of growth

The first thing we will do is identify the highest priority dimensions of growth for your organization and your TDC Equity Analysis Award project. See your handout for examples of dimensions of growth in these two levels. Please take a second to review and ask any questions or offer any additional dimensions of growth that you do not see on the lists in Table 1.

[handout] Table 1. Example Dimensions of Growth

Organization

• Staff capacity

• Collaboration and communication

• Data infrastructure

• Documentation

• External partnerships

• Demand for analytics

• Organizational data literacy

• External partnerships

• Leadership commitment

• Equity orientation

Project

• Data sharing/access

• Data infrastructure for accessing data

• Data infrastructure for linking data sources

• Codebook creation

• Understanding data quality

• Strong team relationships

• Descriptive analyses capacity

• Longitudinal analyses capacity

• Development and answering of research questions

• Generating interest from leadership and/or other agencies

• Transparency in data collection, manipulation, and analysis

• Application of equity principles like mitigating cognitive bias, asset-framing in analytics and dissemination, incorporation of lived experience, etc.

Great, thank you. Now, please take 5 minutes to write down the following:

• Purple sticky note: 1-2 areas in need of the most growth to allow your organization to engage with data and examine equity as standard practice in your organization

• Green sticky note: 1-2 areas where you expect to concentrate to make your TDC Equity Analysis Award project a success

Now, please put your sticky notes on the appropriate sheet around the room. [Facilitator will then read out the themes from around the room and lead a discussion for the site team to identify its collective Top 2 Growth Areas for the organization and for the project. These growth areas will be recorded for future reflection among teams.]

In total, this exercise should take 30 minutes (5 minutes for consent and introduction, 5 minutes for individual reflection, 7 minutes to put up sticky notes and read others’ reflections, 13 minutes to read sticky notes and identify the areas of growth and project focuses that are highest priority for the team as a whole).

Now I’m going to ask you a few questions related to the different priorities of the collaborative. No need to raise your hand or answer every question; these questions are meant to facilitate conversation to help us effectively tailor our TA, learn from each other, and provide thoughts and discussion we can reflect on at the end of the collaborative.

[handout with questions below and corresponding note-taking space will also be provided for participants to jot down notes as team members speak]

Topic	Question	Probes
Impact of TDC 2.0 on TANF program improvement	What are the ways you see participation in the TDC 2.0 training and technical assistance having a potential impact on your agency’s TANF program and the families it serves?	What skills and lessons do you hope to learn in TDC 2.0 that will help facilitate change?
	How will you know these impacts have been achieved?	Is that something you can measure? If not, what do you need to do to be able to measure that?
Infrastructure objectives for sustainable data analysis	Thinking of the areas of growth identified earlier, has your agency previously attempted to grow in these areas or address barriers to growth in those areas?	If yes, what was successful? What was unsuccessful?
	How do you want TDC 2.0 to support your team and agency to grow in these areas and meet your goals?
	What would success look like for your agency as it relates to successful analytic data use?	How will you know when you’ve overcome some of the previously mentioned barriers and made significant growth?
	What would success look like for your agency as it relates to sustainable data use?	How will you know the skills and knowledge gained during TDC 2.0 are set up to continue developing in a sustainable way?
Learning objectives for equity	Does your agency currently consider or discuss equity related to the TANF program?	If so, how? If not now, has your agency discussed equity previously?
	In what ways does your agency currently embed equity in your research and analytics?	[if struggling to think of any, can give examples] Do you regularly look at differences by race/ethnicity? Or other characteristics of interest? Do you regularly discuss equity-related issues amongst your project teams? Is it clearly prioritized by leadership? If so, how?
	What do you see as the biggest challenges for your organization to authentically embedding equity in research and analytics from beginning to end? And for your TDC Equity Analysis Award project?	How would you like TDC 2.0 to offer support and TA to address some of these issues?
	What would success look like in your organization, as it relates to authentically embedding equity in research and analytics?	Are there more intermediate outcomes that need to be achieved first to get to that ultimate success outcome? Are these outcomes measurable? If not, what needs to be in place so they can be measured?

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