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Family Navigation

Category

Family Support

Child's Age

0-1 years, 1-2 years, 2-3 years, 3-4 years, 4-5 years

Participant

Parents/Guardian

Languages

English, Other

Brief Description

Family Navigation services assess the needs of families with children 0-5 and connect them to community resources. This strengths-based approach to partnering with families aims to increase parents’ knowledge and use of local resources.

Expected Impact

  • Increased knowledge and use of community resources

Core Components for Model Fidelity

  • Documented Guidelines Manual: Smart Start Local Partnerships must explicitly document their policies and procedures in a manual to clearly describe guidelines for family navigation activities and services. 
  • Common Screening: Brief entry screening must be used to identify family needs and interests during initial contact. This tool must be reviewed and approved by NCPC’s Evaluation Officer. The common screening tool must consider protective factors, community and family needs, and resources available for referrals. See the CFSA 2.0 as an example of a high-quality screening tool
  • Concrete Supports for Basic Needs and General Services (As Needed):  Families may require brief assistance with non-monetary concrete supports such as clothing, food (including infant and young child feeding supplies based on individual family feeding goals), child care supplies, diapers, or wipes. 
  • Referrals and Follow-Up: Referrals include services such as parent education programs, life skills training, job training, emergency financial assistance in seeking housing or medical aid, and referrals to other agencies/services. NCPC requires that referrals are tracked and families receive follow-up as they are referred to other services or agencies to ensure that services were received or to identify barriers to receiving necessary services. This will include at least one of the following: calling the family, calling the referral agency, or using an app or referral tracking platform to follow-up. NCPC recommends utilizing NCCARE360 or other referral platforms to document and track referrals and follow-up.
  • Family Development:  LPs must be able to refer families to other programs or agencies providing family development, case management or goal planning services for families receiving family navigation services more than 6 times per year. LPs may consider implementing the Family Navigation with CFSA 2.0 and Family Development with CFSA 2.0 solutions if they are interested in providing Family Navigation and Development services with Smart Start funding.

Languages Materials are Available in

English, Other*

*Contact purveyor about additional available languages.

Delivery Mode

In-person is preferred. Over the phone or virtually is possible when necessary.

Dosage

  • Initial intake including referrals
  • At least one follow-up (6 max)

Infrastructure for Implementation

Space: Family intake space and space for children while parents interact with staff. 

Staffing Requirements

Dedicated staff must be identified to support family navigation by tracking engagement and referrals. Staff must have experience working with families, be representative of the community served, and receive appropriate training.

Training for Model Fidelity

At minimum, staff are required to receive training in the following:

NCPC recommends that staff receive training in cultural responsiveness, protective factors, motivational interviewing, cultural humility. NCPC recommends the following additional training options: 

Additional training on specific referral and tracking data management system, as needed.

Contact Information

For more information, contact your Program Officer or Daphne Alsiyao.

Daphne Alsiyao: Family Support Manager at NCPC; daphne@smartstart.org

Cost Estimates

Cost varies on staffing needs, affiliate fees, training, etc.  

Purpose Service Code (PSC)

5506 - Family Support Services

Program Identifier (PID)

Family Navigation

Minimal Outputs for NCPC Reporting

FY 24-25:

  • Number of parents/guardians participating† 

†Select Family Support Programs data collection will include basic demographic data for parent/guardian participants including Race, Ethnicity. Data on interpretation and transportation will be collected when appropriate. 

Minimal Outcomes for NCPC Reporting

FY 24-25:

  • Increase in parent use of services 

Minimal Measures for NCPC Reporting

FY 24-25:

  • Parent use of services calculation

NCPC Evidence Categorization

Evidence Informed- Industry Standard

Research Summary

The most relevant publication on family navigation is a review of comprehensive screening and connection programs (CSCPs).1 The Prenatal-to-3 Policy Impact Center’s evidence review of three CSCPs for their policy clearinghouse identified commonalities among these programs. CSCPs screen children and parents/caregivers on a wide variety of factors, including mental health, social predictors of health (such as exposure to violence, food insecurity, financial strain, and others), physical development, and behavioral issues. After identifying needs, families are referred to services and supports and receive coordinated care and follow up from the CSCPs who ensure linkage and use of support services. CSCPs are intended to be universal and available to all families in a community. The evidence review considered rigorous evaluations of CSCPs that began providing services within the child’s first year of life. This included Family connects in Durham, NC, a national evaluation of HealthySteps, and DULCE in Boston, MA. To date, CSCPs have not been evaluated as a statewide policy so the review was limited to local implementation only. The key aspects of CSCPs include the use of a comprehensive screening tool to identify the needs of children and parents/caregivers, referrals to and the initiation of effective services, ensuring a warm hand-off to the referral agency/service, and following up to verify services were received or to learn about barriers to receiving services. The specific measures and screening tools used by CSCPs may vary depending on the program’s focus and outcomes of interest. The Prenatal-to-3 Policy Impact Center found the strongest evidence for positive impacts on families’ access to services and community resources with some additional impacts on participation in quality child care and child health outcomes like timely vaccinations, safe sleep, and emergency care use. Compared to their peers in control groups, CSCP participants were more likely to report greater knowledge and use of community resources. These families also reported attending routine health care visits more often than the comparison groups. 

  1. ^ See Prenatal-to-3 Policy Impact Center (2023). The Prenatal-to-3 Policy Impact Center conducted an evidence review of three comprehensive screening and connection programs (CSCPs) for their policy clearinghouse. CSCPs screen children and parents/caregivers on a wide variety of factors, including mental health, social predictors of health (such as exposure to violence, food insecurity, financial strain, and others), physical development, and behavioral issues. After identifying needs, families are referred to services and supports and receive coordinated care and follow up from the CSCPs who ensure linkage and use of support services. CSCPs are intended to be universal and available to all families in a community. The evidence review considered rigorous evaluations of CSCPs that began providing services within the child’s first year of life. This included Family connects in Durham, NC, a national evaluation of HealthySteps, and DULCE in Boston, MA. To date, CSCPs have not been evaluated as a statewide policy so the review was limited to local implementation only. The key aspects of CSCPs include the use a comprehensive screening tool to identify the needs of children and parents/caregivers, referrals to and the initiation of effective services, ensuring a warm hand-off to the referral agency/service, and following up to verify services were received or to learn about barriers to receiving services. The specific measures and screening tools used by CSCPs may vary depending on the program’s focus and outcomes of interest. The Prenatal-to-3 Policy Impact Center found the strongest evidence for positive impacts on families’ access to services and community resources with some additional impacts on participation in quality child care and child health outcomes like timely vaccinations, safe sleep, and emergency care use. Compared to their peers in control groups, CSCP participants were more likely to report greater knowledge and use of community resources. These families also reported attending routine health care visits more often than the comparison groups. There was some evidence of a reduction in parent reports of clinical anxiety among mothers at the 6 month follow up, as well as improvements in scores on the responsivity and acceptance subscales of the Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (HOME) assessment for Family Connects participants. HealthySteps participants were more likely than the comparison group to use inductive discipline techniques (negotiation or diversion instead of punitive techniques like coercion or threats) as measured by Parental Responses to Child Misbehavior scale at ages 16-18 months. They also reported higher scores on the Nursing Child Assessment by Satellite Training (NCAST) assessment of parent-child warmth and nurturance at the second interview, although the authors note a skewed sample attrition of 37% between the first interview at 16-18 months and the second interview at 34-37 months. Additionally, HealthySteps was found to be most beneficial for white families and families with higher incomes and may not have been culturally relevant to all families as lower-income families and Black or Hispanic families did not benefit from the program. Family Connects participants reported positive trends toward use of nurturing and responsive child care in safe settings. Among Family Connects participants that used out of home childcare, these settings received quality ratings of 0.66 points higher on North Carolina's 5-point quality rating and improvement scale compared to the facilities used by their peers in the control group. Finally, the CSCP participants reported significant reductions in emergency care use, improvements in safe sleep practices, and a greater likelihood of receiving immunizations on time. The Prenatal-to-3 Policy Impact Center notes that these studies were limited in generalizability based on geographic location, statewide or local implementation, and racial/ethnic and income-based disparities (as several studies did not include information about impacts for different racial or ethnic groups or families from varying socioeconomic statuses).

Researched Population

  • Black, White, and Hispanic families
  • Families with varying socioeconomic statuses
  • Families located in Durham, NC, and Boston, MA (as well as a national sample)

Clearinghouse and Compendium References

 Prenatal-to-3 Policy Clearinghouse

Prenatal-to-3 Policy Impact Center. (2023). Prenatal-to-3 policy clearinghouse evidence review: Comprehensive screening and connection programs (ER 06B.0923). Peabody College of Education and Human Development, Vanderbilt University. https://pn3policy.org/policy-clearinghouse/2022-comprehensive-screening-and-connection-programs/



Local Partnerships Currently Implementing

Local Partnerships in purple have adopted Family Navigation. Local Partnership contact information can be found here.