Laura Lein

Parental Involvement during the Transition to High School

In this article, the authors conducted a study to discover what types of parent involvement are effective as students make the transition to high school.This study also aimed to elaborate on the role parents play in connecting their children to desirable peer networks during this transition.In-home interviews were conducted with 26 students as well as their parents before and after entering high school.The successfulness of the students’ transition was evaluated in terms of their final grades as well as the number of credits earned and their school attendance.They identified five forms of parental involvement that helped students succeed: monitoring the teen’s academic and social life, evaluating the information obtained about the teen, helping the teen with schoolwork, creating positive peer networks for the teen, and participating directly in the school.

The Private Safety Net: The Role of Charitable Organizations in the Lives of the Poor

Abstract As welfare reform unfolds, nonprofit social service agencies will increasingly be called upon to help fill the gap between what unskilled and semiskilled mothers can earn in the low‐wage labor market and what they need to meet their monthly expenses. This article draws on in‐depth interviews with low‐income single mothers and multiyear observational studies of two nonprofit social service agencies. Using these data, the authors show what kinds of resources these agencies provide low‐income single mothers, how mothers mobilize the resources available, to what degree agencies actually contribute to mothers’ cash and in‐kind resources, how agencies distribute their resources, and what effect agencies’ distribution practices have on these women. The analysis shows that although nonprofit social service agencies are a crucial part of many low‐income mothers’ economic survival strategies, they cannot come close to substituting for the eroding public safety net.

ECONOMIC ROULETTE: When is a job not a job?

Complementing previous literature on welfare reform and the character of jobs in the low-wage labour market, we illustrate the lack of regularity and security that mark the jobs held by many low-income mothers. To do so, we present a typology of mothers’ work patterns and illustrate their experiences through case examples. Our qualitative analysis of longitudinal pathways-to-work in three cities involved an examination of the experiences of 99 diverse, low-income working mothers with a young child. The work patterns that emerged from this analysis include: continuous duration of a single job; multiple job spells; underemployment; and churning in and out of employment. Findings indicate that a complicated ‘coming together’ of well-paying stable jobs, consistent aid from public systems and stable family networks are necessary for mothers to take even the first steps into stable employment.

Complexity and Instability: The Response of Nongovernmental Organizations to the Recovery of Hurricane Katrina Survivors in a Host Community

This case study of a single host city documents the complexity of the local response to displaced survivors of Hurricane Katrina by nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and faith-based organizations (FBOs). Although additional disaster-related funding provided needed case management and financial services, it also added complexity to the service delivery system. Furthermore, changes in the federal disaster and income maintenance programs to address the crisis created an unstable service environment that was challenging for both survivors and service providers to navigate. NGOs and FBOs proved to be highly motivated, flexible, and creative. However, the response overall was marked by limited resources, equity, accountability, and coordination, illustrating some of the weaknesses of devolution and the increasing reliance on NGOs to provide basic services.

The State and Civil Society Response to Disaster: The Challenge of Coordination

This article presents a case study of the reception of low-income Hurricane Katrina evacuees in Austin, Texas, to reveal the multiple barriers and problems faced by families and individuals dislodged by Katrina, as well as the difficulties faced by the service providers. The authors surveyed evacuees who had used the emergency shelter system and received housing assistance at least 10 weeks after the disaster. These survey data are supplemented with focus group and individual interviews with the city staff who conducted the survey, as well as interviews and participant observation with a range of service providers who assisted evacuees in the months following Katrina. Austin’s case managers were able to quickly organize and respond to evacuee families with an array of emergency services, including food and household goods. They also introduced new coordination efforts among agencies to distribute newly available Katrina funding. These efforts were aimed at both targeting emergency services and enhancing the capacity of case managers to help evacuees negotiate the complex maze of emergency and human services, particularly Federal Emergency Management Agency. Nevertheless, these coordination efforts were insufficient to address the problem of low-income urban evacuees living in indefinitely prolonged but possibly temporary circumstances.

Economic Survival Strategies and Food Insecurity: The Case of Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans

Abstract This article reports on a study of 67 Hurricane Katrina survivors who were evacuated to one Texas community. The authors examine the economic survival strategies employed by Katrina evacuees to feed their families during the approximately one week time frame beginning the day before the storm and ending when they were ultimately evacuated from New Orleans. An analysis of their strategies and actions provides insight both into the nature of households and sharing networks under the pressure of this disaster and the shortages that ensue when federal and state systems cannot meet basic needs beyond the resources of the local community.

Coordinated services for children's mental health: a process evaluation.

This article reports on a process evaluation of the Texas Children’s Mental Health Plan, a statewide initiative to provide interagency coordinated mental health services to severely emotionally disturbed children and their families. Researchers followed the activities of the state management team and three local sites during the first year and a half of the project’s implementation. This article delineates the major positive effects of the plan as well as the facilitating factors and barriers to the development of such an effort.

The Importance of Selection Factors: Evaluating the Impact of Employment on Family Well-Being in Families Transitioning from Welfare to Work

ABSTRACT Longitudinal ethnographic data of 49 families in the San Antonio site of the Three City Study illustrate the ways in which families that remain on welfare differ in important ways from families in which the mother is employed. Families that remain on welfare experience substantial health and emotional problems; have limited access to informal supports; and are headed by mothers with little education or prior work experience. These ethnographic findings have important implications for survey-based studies in which the selection problems can easily affect results when families on welfare are compared to wage-reliant families.

Ordinary Poverty: A Little Food and Cold StorageOrdinary Poverty: A Little Food and Cold Storage, by DiFazioWilliam. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 2005. 220 pp.

You should see the people I have to compete with. I am waiting for a job interviewwith amoving company. Beautiful operation. They likedme but they said they didn’t want to trainme. It’s not because I’m obese. At least not this time. It’s a computerized operation, and I would have to be trained on the computer. But I’m sitting waiting for the interview, the other guy sitting to be interviewed is an MBA, also my age. Knows how to use computer. Laid off from Wall Street,

22.95 paper. ISBN: 1592134580.

80,000-a-year job. He’s competing with me. I told him I just applied for a warehouse job at Busch Terminal. He asks me for the information and if I mind that he’ll apply for the job. I give him the address. He’s