SCC-CIVIC-FA Track B: Streamlining and Supporting Access to Public Assistance Programs in Louisiana

在美国，近20%的五岁以下儿童生活在贫困中。为了支持这些儿童，美国政府资助了各种社会安全网计划，为家庭提供营养、医疗保健、幼儿教育和额外收入。对其中许多项目的研究表明，参与项目的儿童将获得长期的学术、健康和经济利益。然而，这些在州和地方两级管理的项目分散在多个机构之间，导致单独的、通常也很繁琐的申请程序。有关计划和资格的信息既不在中心位置，也不容易找到，申请门户网站往往笨拙、令人困惑、重复和过时。这些可用性问题可能会阻碍对有益计划的参与。如果没有有针对性的努力来简化和简化家庭的申请程序，许多贫困儿童不太可能从他们有资格享受的关键卫生和教育项目中获得所有好处。为了解决这个问题，该项目将为路易斯安那州的家庭开发一个简化的应用程序门户，在其中他们可以申请多个支持低收入儿童的计划，而不会重复努力。该项目的目的是改善和简化路易斯安那州家庭的福利申请程序，并提高参与计划的入学率。该团队通过在路易斯安那州SNAP应用程序中改善用户体验的当前努力来实现这些目标。这项奖励启用了一项新的SNAP试点应用程序，该应用程序将为随机选择的符合条件的家庭提供选项，以自动将其SNAP申请信息和文件发送到路易斯安那州WIC和新奥尔良公立学校的幼儿教育项目。通过这个随机设计，这个项目可以确定简化的应用程序对WIC和幼儿教育项目的申请率的因果影响。与当地机构领导人和利益相关者的访谈将确定开发和保持规模化应用程序的必要要素。公民创新挑战是与能源部、国土安全部和国家科学基金会合作的。该项目由CISE-公民创新、SBE-S和CC、既定的激励竞争研究计划和国土安全部能源部共同资助。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Nearly 20% of children under age five in the US live in poverty. To support these children, the US government funds various social safety-net programs to provide nutrition, healthcare, early childhood education, and additional income for families. Research on many of these programs demonstrates long-term academic, health, and economic benefits to participating children. However, these programs, which are administered at the state and local levels, are divided among multiple agencies, resulting in separate, and typically cumbersome, application processes. Information on programs and eligibility is neither centrally located nor easily findable, and application portals are often clumsy, confusing, duplicative, and outdated. These usability problems can hinder participation in beneficial programs. Without targeted efforts to simplify and streamline the application process for families, many young children in poverty are unlikely to receive all the benefits of the critical health and education programs for which they are eligible. To address this issue, this project will develop a streamlined application portal for Louisiana families, in which they can apply for multiple programs that support low-income children without duplicating efforts. This project's aims are to improve and streamline the benefits application process for Louisiana families and to increase enrollment rates in participating programs. The team achieves these aims by building on current efforts to improve user experiences in Louisiana’s SNAP application. This award enables a new pilot SNAP application, which will offer randomly selected eligible families the option to automatically send their SNAP application information and documents to Louisiana WIC and to New Orleans Public Schools’ early childhood education programs. Through this randomized design, this project can identify the causal effects of the streamlined application on application rates to WIC and early childhood education programs. Interviews with local agency leaders and stakeholders will identify the necessary elements to develop and maintain a streamlined application at scale.The CIVIC Innovation Challenge is a collaboration with Department of Energy, Department of Homeland Security, and the National Science Foundation.This project is jointly funded by CISE-CIVIC INNOVATION, SBE-S&CC, the Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR), and Department of Energy, Department of Homeland Security.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.