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ERIC ED437481: Fathers' Fair Share: Helping Poor Men Manage Child Support and Fatherhood. PDF

259 Pages·1999·3.3 MB·English
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DOCUMENT RESUME UD 033 276 ED 437 481 Johnson, Earl S.; Levine, Ann; Doolittle, Fred C. AUTHOR Fathers' Fair Share: Helping Poor Men Manage Child Support TITLE and Fatherhood. Manpower Demonstration Research Corp., New York, NY. INSTITUTION Department of Health and Human SerVices, Washington, DC.; SPONS AGENCY Pew Charitable Trusts, Philadelphia, PA.; Russell Sage Foundation, New York, NY.; Kellogg Foundation, Battle Creek, MI.; Mott (C.S.) Foundation, Flint, MI.; Department of Agriculture, Washington, DC.; Annie E. Casey Foundation, Baltimore, MD.; Department of Labor, Washington, DC.; Smith Richardson Foundation, Inc., Greensboro, NC.; Ford Foundation, New York, NY.; North Carolina Governor's Highway Safety Program.; Northwest Area Foundation, St. Paul, MN. ISBN-0-87154-411-3 ISBN 1999-00-00 PUB DATE 258p. NOTE CUP Services, P.O. Box 6525, Ithaca, NY 14851 ($45). Tel: AVAILABLE FROM 607-277-2211; Fax: 607-277-6292. Reports - Descriptive (141) Books (010) PUB TYPE MFO1 /PC11 Plus Postage. EDRS PRICE Blacks; *Child Support; Father Attitudes; *Fathers; Hispanic DESCRIPTORS Americans; *Parent Participation; Parent Role; *Parenting Skills; *Poverty; Unemployment African Americans IDENTIFIERS ABSTRACT This book examines the experiences of 32 men paticipating in Parents' Fair Share (PFS), which was designed to help them get better jobs, pay child support, and become more involved with their children. All participants were low-income, noncustodial fathers who were not paying court mandated child support. Most were African American or Latino and lived in inner city, low-income neighborhoods. Data came from semi-structured interviews, informal conversations, and observations. Participants offered their opinions of and reactions to PFS and discussed whether it helped them lives become consistent child support payers. They also discussed their outside of PFS, articulating obstacles encountered when trying to become more active parents. Eight appendixes present sample data and research family methodology; maps; lists and descriptions of peer support sessions; tree; personal shields; profiles of two participants deciding how to use their money; profiles of selected participants; questions for noncustodial references.) (SM) parents in PFS; and profile of interviewees. (Contains 60 Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document. 1 4 OF EDUCATION U S DEPARTMENT Research and Improvement Office of Educational RESOURCES INFORMATION EDUCATIONAL CENTER (ERIC) been reproduced as This document has or organization received from the person originating it been made to Minor changes have quality improve reproduction this opinions stated in ° Points of view or necessarily represent document do not policy official OERI position or (V) 466, and Ann Leiiineer Doolittle- Fr C. AVAILABLE BEST COPY to air ne of the most challenging goals for welfare reformers has been improving the collection of child support payments from noncustodial parents, usually fathers. Often vilified as "deadbeats" who have dropped out of their children's lives, these fathers have been the target of largely puni- tive enforcement policies that give little consideration to the complex circum- stances of these men's lives. Fathers' Fair Share presents an alternative to these mea- sures with an in-depth study of the Parents' Fair Share program. A multi-state interven- tion run by the Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation, the program was designed to better the employment and life skills of nonpaying fathers with children on public assistance, in the belief that this would encourage them to improve their level of child support. Chronically unem- ployed or underemployed, undereducated, and often earning their money on the streets, the men chosen for the program bore the scars of drug or alcohol abuse, troubled family lives, and arrest records. Among those of African American and Hispanic descent, many felt a deep-rooted distrust of the mainstream economy. The Parents' Fair Share program offered these men the chance not only to learn the social skills needed for stable employment but to participate in discussions about personal 3 (continued on back flap) FATHERS' FAIR SHARE 4 FATHERS' FAIR SHARE Helping Poor Men Manage Child Support and Fatherhood Earl S. Johnson, Ann Levine, and Fred C. Doolittle A Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation Study RUSSELL SAGE FOUNDATION / NEW YORK The Russell Sage Foundation The Russell Sage Foundation, one of the oldest of America's general purpose foundations, was established in 1907 by Mrs. Margaret Olivia Sage for the "improvement of social and living con- ditions in the United States." The Foundation seeks to fulfill this mandate by fostering the devel- opment and dissemination of knowledge about the country's political, social, and economic problems. While the Foundation endeavors to assure the accuracy and objectivity of each book it publishes, the conclusions and interpretations in Russell Sage Foundation publications are those of the authors and not of the Foundation, its Trustees, or its staff. Publication by Russell Sage, therefore, does not imply Foundation endorsement. BOARD OF TRUSTEES Peggy C. Davis, Chair Neil J. Smelser Jennifer L. Hochschild Alan S. Blinder Eugene Smolensky Timothy A. Hultquist Joel E. Cohen Marta Tienda Ira Katznelson Thomas D. Cook Eric Wanner Ellen Condliffe Lagemann Robert E. Denham John S. Reed Phoebe C. Ellsworth Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Johnson, Earl (Earl S.) Fathers' Fair Share: helping poor men manage child support and fatherhood/ Earl S. Johnson, Ann Levine, and Fred C. Doolittle. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-87154-411-3 2. Child supportGovernment 1. Child welfareGovernment policyUnited States. 4. Fathers 3. FathersServices forUnited States. policyUnited States. 5. Poor menServices forUnited States. Employment forUnited States. 7. Children of single parents.United 6. Poor menemployment forUnited States. StatesEconomic conditions. I. Levine, Ann. III. Title. II. Doolittle, Fred C. 98-47551 HV741.J63 1999 CIP 3627'1dc21 The Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation's preparation of this volume was supported by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Pew Charitable Trusts, W. K. Kellogg Foundation, Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Annie E. Casey Foundation, U.S. Department of Labor, Smith Richardson Foundation, Ford Foundation, McKnight Foundation, and Northwest Area Foundation. The findings and condusions presented herein do not necessarily represent the official positions or policies of the funders or the states par- ticipating in the Parents' Fair Share Demonstration, which are listed in this document. Interested readers may wish to contact the states for more information on the program. 1999 by Russell Sage Foundation. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of Copyright America. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmit- ted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Reproduction by the United States Government in whole or in part is permitted for any purpose. The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials. ANSI Z39.48-1992. RUSSELL SAGE FOUNDATION 112 East 64th Street, New York, New York 10021 To our parents 7 CONTENTS Foreword by Mercer L. Sullivan ix Acknowledgments xiii Chapter 1 Introduction 1 Chapter 2 The Participants 18 Chapter 3 The World Outside PFS: An Insider's View 58 Chapter 4 The Noncustodial Parents' Perspectives on Child 85 Support and the Child Support System Chapter 5 The Only Game in Town: Walking Through 104 the Doorway of Parents' Fair Share Chapter 6 The Employment and Training Component of PFS: 133 Job Club/Job Search Chapter 7 Conclusion 151 Sample, Data, and Research Methodology Appendix A 176 Maps Appendix B 185 Appendix C List and Description of Peer Support Sessions 192 8 viii FATHERS' FAIR SHARE 200 Family Tree Appendix D 204 Personal Shields Appendix E 207 Profile of Two Participants Deciding How to Appendix F Use Their Money 209 Profiles of Selected Participants Appendix G 213 Questions for Noncustodial Parents in PFS Appendix H 217 Profile of Interviewees Appendix I 222 Notes 228 References 233 About the Authors 234 Index FOREWORD This book is about unknown men. More than forty years after Ralph 1 Ellison's (1952) great imaginative evocation of the invisibility of all African Americans and more than thirty years after Elliot Liebow's (1968) classic ethnography of streetcorner men, men like those por- trayed here are still seen by most people, if they are noticed at all, through the distorting lenses of stereotyping, scapegoating, and, at best, condescension. To say that is not to deny that many children with noncustodial fathers could be lifted out of poverty if their fathers provided ade- quate financial support or that this lack of paternal financial support is not a major social problem. Effective and reasonable child support policies need to be devised and implemented. Despite considerable recent attention by policymakers to this issue, however, we are a long way from having such policies. There are many reasons for this fail- ure. One of the most important is that policy is so poorly informed about the men it seeks to change, especially men like these who have the least ability to provide support. When the policy alternatives are defined on a spectrum that runs from patronizing neglect to tough love to just plain tough, as they have been, it should not be surprising that efforts to force men who have trouble supporting themselves to bail their children out of poverty are not very productive. A few years ago, Fred Doolittle called me from the Manpower Demonstration Research Corporation (MDRC) to invite me to a meet- ing with a young researcher named Earl Johnson who had just been hired to do ethnographic research with participants in the Parents' Fair Share program (PFS). Having done qualitative studies with non- custodial fathers and having been involved with MDRC's early efforts to design the program, I looked forward to the meeting with interest and curiosity. Subsequently, I have had many conversations with Earl about his efforts to engage and build rapport with PFS participants ix

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