Restoring Fatherhood, Rebuilding Families: The Transformative Power of the FOCUS+ Program

New Day Services offers its Families Offering Children Unfailing Support+ Mentoring (FOCUS+) Program to empower fathers involved with child protective services (CPS) and drive positive change for children. The organization partnered with JBA to complete a formative evaluation of FOCUS+, which includes 10 weeks of structured curriculum and support offered to all participants and optional mentor navigation for fathers with complex needs.

This brief summarizes program and survey data from 600+ fathers who enrolled in FOCUS+ from January 2023 through June 2024.

Fathers who graduated from FOCUS+ reported—

• New perspectives, practical skills, and deeper confidence in their parenting
• Increased willingness and capability to navigate their CPS cases
• Improvements to other life challenges such as unemployment or not having a steady place to live

Fathers who engaged in mentor navigation services (16% of graduates)—

• Increased their ability to navigate the CPS system (86% of fathers)
• Increased their willingness to cooperate with their caseworkers and service/safety plans (75% of fathers)
• Reported these gains despite also reporting lower income, larger number of children, and in some cases, 10 or more other life challenges when starting the program