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Reach Up Annual Report 2018 18

Section 8

Profiles of Families with 60 Countable Months of Reach Up

During the last fiscal year, 549 families were already at or had newly reached their 60-month limit. These families had a total of 2,193 barriers. There were 269 average monthly cases at the 60-month limit.

The most significant barrier in this population is adult employment, with 68% of these families presenting with poor or no work history, or no employment opportunities. This is notably higher than the overall Reach Up population where 53% report employment history and opportunity as a barrier.

An in-depth look at time limit leavers9 Between November 2015 and October 2016, DCF identified 276 instances of cases leaving Reach Up due to time limits. This period was selected in order to examine leavers’ use of support programs and their likelihood of returning to Reach Up during the 12 months following their “forced” (due to time limits) exit from Reach Up. Some families had multiple instances of being forced to leave Reach Up between November 2015 and October 2016 because they left, returned to Reach Up and then left again within this period. For this reason, the number of unique families forced to leave Reach Up during this period was 189. For families that exited Reach Up more than once, this analysis focused on the experiences related to their earliest Reach Up exit during November 2015 through October 2016.

9 Information in the remainder of Section 8 prepared and written by Black-Plumeau Consulting, LLC 68% 49% 48% 46% 40% 28% 24% 23% 19% 18% 15% 15% 4% 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 Number of Households with Barriers Types of Barriers Households with 60 or more Countable Months of Reach Up - Barriers