Expert Intermediaries: Family Resource Center Staff Approaches to Resource Navigation for Low-Income Families

Background: Family Resource Centers (FRCs) are community-based organizations that provide services and opportunities to low-income families (Casey Family Foundation, 2024). FRCs in Wisconsin follow a “Family Support” approach to practice which centers advocacy, collaboration, and a strengths-based approach to human service delivery. They are asked to “work with families to mobilize formal and informal resources to support family development” and be “resources to their own members, to other families, to programs, and to communities” (WI FRC Best Practice Model, n.d., p. 3). Research around human service providers finds that staff use discretion to navigate uncertainty and translate organizational mandates into practice (Hodgson et al., 2019). However, while FRCs are essential resources for families in many communities, the practices they employ to connect families with resources have received limited scholarly attention (Trivette & Dunst, 2014; Waddell et al., 2001).

Purpose: This study builds on the qualitative portion of a statewide evaluation of FRCs. It asks two research questions: first, how do FRCs respond to unmet resource needs among families with young children? Secondly, how do staff leverage localized knowledge and inter- and intra-organizational collaborations to support families with unmet resource needs?

Methods: This analysis builds on one structured focus group and 5 qualitative interviews with more than 20 FRC staff members. Interviewees included staff working in interpersonal practice and agency administration. Questions prompted FRC staff to describe how they determine family needs and connect families to resources using internal programming and external referral. A team of researchers used inductive coding strategies to identify themes. The coders triangulated themes to improve inter-coder reliability and themes were analyzed following best practices in thematic analysis (MacPhail et al., 2016).

Results: The results reveal that staff leverage their knowledge of local, state and national resource networks to connect low-income families to resources. Resources included internal programs (diaper banks, food pantries), community partners (churches, food banks, the United Way) and public safety net programs such as WIC, SNAP and Medicaid. They tailor resource navigation approaches to families based on families’ self-identified needs and, in some agencies, needs flagged by screening forms. The most common family needs included housing, transportation, diapers, childcare, healthcare, and food.

Conclusion: This study finds that FRCs mobilize local knowledge and to connect families with resources. The interviews revealed the variety of partnerships and practices used to connect families with local resource networks following a Family Support approach. The discussion will center around effective micro and mezzo-level social work within constraints on agencies’ time, capacity, scope, and funding.

Implications: This study reveals how FRC staff operationalize a strengths-based approach to connect low-income families with resources. More specifically, it reveals concrete practices that are used in service of strengthening parent-child relationships. These insights are important for evidence-based social work practice in a variety of community-based settings. They also lend insight for future research and investment in community-based organizations that bridge the gap between families and the larger system of human services and social safety net programs.