March 10, 2022
Grandfamilies Alert
Hello Friends of Grandfamilies,

You are receiving this email because you are a GRAND Voice or because you are a Grandfamilies Advisory Group Member. We are transitioning our biweekly updates to Constant Contact and hope this will improve your experience receiving them. If you have any concerns or something you would like included in the next alert please reach out to me at droznowski@gu.org.

Best,
Diane and the Grandfamilies Team
Top News
We’re Hiring - Generations United is seeking a Communications Specialist to join our results-oriented team. Learn more and apply by 3/15.
The US must confront its failures of Native children in foster care - Generations United Executive Director Donna Butts' op-ed in The Hill on why the Indian Child Welfare Act must be protected and strengthened. The op-ed highlights Native grandfamilies including GRAND Voice Sonya Begay a citizen of the Navajo Nation.
Events
Child Tax Credit Webinar – Wednesday, March 30, 2022 – 2:00 PM in ET Nearly 90% of children in the U.S. became eligible for the Child Tax Credit when it was expanded last year. Families can still claim the full 2021 CTC - up to $3,600 per child per family - by filing tax returns this year.

This webinar is designed to help professionals in the field and caregivers better understand the expanded Child Tax Credit and how to help families claim this critical benefit. You do NOT have to be a tax expert. We'll share ready-to-use resources to help you provide information to families and connect them to tax preparation assistance.

The webinar and accompanying multilingual resources are designed to help you easily integrate CTC outreach to families in your existing programs and communications. In the training, we'll address common immigration-related questions connected to claiming the CTC.

Join Generations United, the Coalition on Human Needs and the Partnership for America's Children for this training to learn more!

Please register even if you are not positive that you can attend in order to receive the slides and recording after the training.
Training Opportunity with Social Security Administration
The Social Security Administration has a new opportunity for third party organizations to participate in a training to help people start and/or complete applications. Generations United is working with SSA to set up a training. If you are interested in attending, please email Diane Roznowski at droznowski@gu.org.
Share Your Perspective
Request from GRAND Voice Lynn Urvina – Please respond to lynn@familyess.org

In Washington state, we are encouraging our child welfare agency to use a term other than "unlicensed" to identify kinship families that are not part of the formal system but are fulltime kinship caregivers. Our families do not want to be called "unlicensed" because there has never been a license here for those that stepped up to care for their relative children before the child welfare department became involved. The term "informal" has been a problem as many caregivers have what they consider a "formal" court order that they spent years and thousands of dollars to acquire through family court. I have suggested "Grandfamilies" which we intend to be inclusive of all kinship families, but aunts and uncles have said they feel left out.

If you are using another term successfully in your state, could you share what terms you are using? We are searching for a very inclusive term that would identify the kinship caregivers as providing full time care without the support of the child welfare system.