Newsletter June 2022

Federal Funding for

In-Home Family Education

Expires on

September 30, 2022

West Virginia receives nearly $6 million in federal Maternal Infant Early Childhood Home Visiting (MIECHV) funding. This is the largest amount of monetary support that IHFE programs in WV receive.

Congress must act before September 30 to ensure that families across the country continue to receive essential home visiting services. The Home Visiting Coalition urges Congress to pass a bipartisan reauthorization bill to continue and expand home visiting with three critical priorities:

1. Increase MIECHV funding by $200 million annually to reach more families and better support the workforce over the next five years.

2. Double the Tribal set-aside from three percent to six percent to reach more families in Tribal communities.

3. Continue to allow virtual home visiting with model fidelity as an approved option for service delivery to families.

For more information, go to https://nationalhomevisitingcoalition.org/what-can-congress-do/

Within the federal MIECHV benchmark area Maternal and Newborn Health, West Virginia aims to increase the number of infants aged 6 – 12 months who were breastfed any amount at six months of age, as well as the number of infants aged 6 – 12 months enrolled in home visiting for at least six months among mothers who enrolled in home visiting prenatally.

New River Health Parents As Teachers shares these successful stories around breastfeeding:

Parent Educator Taralyn said that thanks to a grant from the Sisters of St. Joseph Health and Wellness Foundation, they were able to purchase breast pumps for the nursery as well as parts for each mom at Turning Pointe for Families, so that the mothers there can provide breast milk for their babies, even when they are not with their babies. One mother mentioned that being able to breastfeed was important to her and she wouldn’t have been able to do so if it wasn’t for the pumps.

Parent Educator Ashley B. said that within one of the families she serves, a mother who just delivered is successfully breastfeeding. This is her third child but the first she has decided to breastfeed.