Attention: Historians of the Family, Childhood, and Public Policy

A new organization can now help historians who want to effectively inform the Congress of the results and rele­vance of their research involving child and family issues. Last spring, the Con­sortium of Social Science Associations (COSSA), with the assistance of the Society for Research in Child Development (SRCD), organized Research Resources for Children, Youth and Families, a coalition of research societies whose members study child and family issues. Research Resources was organized to provide an efficient means through which congressional staff of the new House Select Committee of Children, Youth and Families, the Senate Chil­dren’s Caucus, and the Senate Caucus on the Family can obtain information about children’s issues from researchers in the field.

Until recently federal programs serving children and families were not con­gressional priorities. This resulted, in part, from the diffusion of congressional responsibilities for children’s pro­grams among many subcommittees. However, the creation of the Select Committee for Children, Youth and Families in the  House of Representatives and the two Caucuses in the Senate has now provided Congress with forums where the needs of children and fam­ilies can be considered in a comprehen­sive rather than in a piecemeal fashion. Moreover, the creation of these new bodies has brought renewed interest in, and attention to, federal programs serv­ing children and their families.

Research Resources has contacted senators and representatives who serve on these committees and has offered to provide their staffs with briefings on topics of interest to them. So far, Re­search Resources has responded to re­quests for information about the pre­vention of childhood injuries, the need for after-school day-care, adolescent runaways, the utilization of emergency medical facilities by children, and the effects of parental absence, among oth­ers. Because the membership of Research Resources includes scholars from a variety of disciplines, the organization is able to offer the Congress information that is more broadly based than that available from single “expert witnesses,” the sources of such information for Congress in the past.

Members of Research Resources include the American Historical Association, American Psychological Associa­tion, American Sociological Association, Family Impact Seminar, Population Resource Center, National Council on Family Relations, American Academy of Child Psychiatry, American Educational Research Association, National Associa­tion for the Education of Young Chil­dren, American Political Science Associ­ation, National Research Council Com­mittee on Child Development Research and Public Policy, George Washington University Women’s Studies Program, American Anthropological Association, American Psychiatric Association, and the National Center for Clinical Infant Programs. In addition, economists, law­yers, and pediatricians participate in Re­search Resources on an informal basis.

If you would like to participate in the efforts of Research Resources by mak­ing your research available to the Con­gress, contact Helen Rauch at COSSA (202/234-5703), or Jamil Zainaldin at the AHA offices.