Greetings. I wanted to take this opportunity to draw our attention to some recent “wins” within the child welfare policy space that have warmed my heart. The Families First Prevention Services Act was signed into law, and both CHIP and MIECHV were reauthorized in February. As these federal policies are moving ahead, I thought it would be a good time to remind ourselves of how we can keep involved and engaged in the political process on a continual basis, not just when there are large policy initiatives at stake. Although it might be easy to cast a wide net with regard to our roles as concerned citizens (e.g., going to rallies and marches, writing personal letters to legislators, writing letters to newspaper editors), I want us to devote some thought to how we can think about advocacy within our academic and practitioner roles. I think it best to begin by defining the term advocacy and highlighting how it differs from lobbying. Indeed, as faculty members and official representative of institutions, we must be cautious about pushing specific policy changes (i.e., lobbying) and focus on becoming more effective, honest brokers who offer support interpreting research evidence in ways that can inform a range of policy changes.
Let’s start with some basic definitions. Advocacy is the process of stakeholders making their voices heard on issues that affect their lives and the lives of others at the local, state and national level. It also means helping policymakers find specific solutions to persistent problems. Most nonprofits can and do engage in as much advocacy as possible to achieve their goals. Some examples include: telling your members of Congress how a federal grant your organization received has helped their constituents; educating members of Congress about the effects of a policy on the targeted population and inviting members of Congress to visit your organization so that they may see firsthand how federal funding or a policy has played a role on day-to-day operations or lives. Lobbying, on the other hand, involves activities that are in direct support of or opposition to a specific piece of introduced legislation. For example, this would include asking your member of Congress to vote for or against legislation. Although nonprofits can engage in some lobbying, the IRS regulates the proportion of nonprofit budgets that can support these activities. There are also prohibitions on any use of federal funds for lobbying.
A good rule of thumb is to speak from a researcher’s or clinician’s perspective, use data that either you have published or that you know of that is peer-reviewed and, stick to what the research says. When wearing our science hats, we should avoid “supporting” a specific policy and instead provide the translation of the research that could be used to inform policymakers’ decisions. (As private citizens, one certainly can support a specific policy, but this should be done free from your scientific affiliations, e.g., use a Gmail address.) Such an approach is about establishing relationships and creating a community of experts both in and outside of government who can give informed input on policies. Relationships are a salient issue in this context because policymakers tend to rely on trusted advisors for information, and interactions with researchers can facilitate their interpretation and use of research evidence. Yet, interactions between researchers and policymakers tend to be few and infrequent. Furthermore, being more aware of the political aspects of research can help academics understand and re-evaluate their own arguments about the impact of research. This might take the form of working hard to respond to a legislative request for research and compiling the right kinds of evidence that staffers might need in order to hold an informed briefing.
Luckily, some of this hard work can be done within the context of organized coalitions and networks of erudite and committed experts. For example, there exists a rapid response network devoted to child welfare issues that I encourage all of you to join: the Research-to-Policy: Child Welfare Rapid Response Teamopens in new window.
Organized and supported by Penn State’s P50 Center for Health Children (PI: Noll), this team is currently comprised of over 100 researchers and practitioners who actively respond to solicitations from federal policy professionals for scientific information that can leverage child welfare policy change. Signing up for this network ensures that we identify experts who can respond to current research-to-policy opportunities and contribute to expert responses to legislative inquiries. Although we can target specific policies, as we did with Families First and are beginning to do with CAPTA, we do so by responding to legislative requests for research and technical assistance, based on congressional representatives’ current needs and priorities. For more information regarding how the research-to-policy model operates, see the newly published paper by Crowley, Scott and Fishbein entitled, “Translating prevention research for evidence-based policymaking: Results from the Research-to-Policy Collaboration pilotopens in new window” in Prevention Science.
Of course, we all need to understand that these processes are complex and that we should consult with the government affairs office at our respective institutions to ensure that we walk a careful line that does not cross into lobbying. The Section will hold regular research-to-policy workshops (as we did last June; stay tuned for more workshop dates to follow!) sponsored by Penn State’s P50 Translational Center for Child Maltreatment Studies that include practical information on how to engage the political process as an academic, including how to translate your important work into messages that resonate with policy makers. This training aims to cultivate "knowledge brokerage" skills, which involve understanding the policymaking process and decision-making factors, adapting to diverse political ideologies and working with policymakers to draw implications from research findings. The training emphasizes nonpartisanship and unbiased credibility, which can be done by considering an array of policy levers rather than advocating for a specific policy change. Because researchers and policymakers comprise relatively disparate groups characterized by their own professional cultures, we consider policymakers' lived realities that contribute to decision-making processes so that researchers empathize with these challenges, communicate more effectively and prepare to collaborate in the context of a policymaker's existing values and beliefs. Ultimately, the training aims to equip researchers with skills that prepare them to translate research that is relevant to current policy priorities by considering how information is conveyed through a range of mechanisms (e.g., policy briefs vs. hearings). The training concludes by having participants practice their emerging policy skills via role play during a mock meeting with legislative staff. Preliminary evaluation of this training suggests that participants gain an improved understanding of the policy process, which is a fundamental skill needed for effective policy engagement.
On a final note, it is with sadness that I announce to the Section the passing of one of our own, Karen Saywitz. Karen was a champion of advocacy within the child welfare space and a past recipient of the division’s Nicholas Hobbs Lifetime Advocacy Award. We will honor Karen at this year’s annual meeting. I encourage to read the tribute to Karen in this newsletter.
Taylor Bishop Scott, Research-to-Policy Coordinator at the National Prevention Science Coalition, assisted in the development of this article.