HHS ACF - Technical Assistance and Evaluation for Discretionary Grants - MRAS

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), through the General Services Administration (GSA), is conducting market research to support the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Data Collaborative 2.0 (TDC 2.0). This initiative is spearheaded by HHS's Administration for Children and Families (ACF), specifically the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE). The overarching goal of this contract is to enhance the capacity of state and local TANF agencies to perform equity-focused data analyses. By doing so, HHS aims to improve program administration and outcomes for children and families who benefit from TANF services.

The work requested under this contract involves providing technical assistance to both grant-recipient sites and other TANF agencies. The contractor will design and implement customized, intensive technical assistance for up to eight sites that will receive competitive grants. These sites will undertake equity-focused projects using TANF data. Additionally, the contractor will offer general technical assistance related to equity issues for other state and local TANF agencies that do not receive grants.

As part of their responsibilities, the contractor will collect, analyze, and report on performance monitoring data from each participating site. The insights gained will be used to develop reports on findings from these analyses as well as special topics papers aimed at advancing equity-centered analyses of TANF data. These efforts are intended not only to improve agency programming but also to enhance individual and family outcomes by ensuring that policies are informed by comprehensive data analysis.

This project builds upon previous initiatives such as the TANF Data Innovation Project initiated in September 2017. This earlier project laid the groundwork by facilitating a collaborative training effort known as the TANF Data Collaborative (TDC), which focused on increasing data analytics capacity among state TANF agencies through training sessions, webinars, and an intensive pilot initiative involving eight states. TDC 2.0 seeks to expand on these efforts by further emphasizing equity in data analysis practices across participating agencies.