October 2, 2012

Dear Colleagues & Friends:

As of September 30, 2012, the Center is transitioning to focus on dissemination and new project development. During this time I hope that you will enjoy some of the research reports we have produced over our first five years, including our latest report, Tossed on a Sea of Change: A Status Update on the Responsible Fatherhood Field, on the Center’s web site. Here we reach readers who need practical information relevant to their day-to-day work on fatherhood and other initiatives that strengthen families. To access some of this research you will be re-directed to academic publications, where our work also reaches scholars, graduate students, policymakers and policy analysts.

Our core mission is to build the knowledge base on the role of fathers (and father figures) in the lives of disadvantaged children and the processes by which nonresident fathers (and father figures) affect child development and family well-being. This mission requires subjecting our work to the critique of other experts in our field and in related fields. This critique adds to the accuracy and credibility of our results, which we then disseminate to still wider audiences. Along with my teaching and other University commitments, this multiple step process will be the focus of my work (with graduate students) over the coming months. We will re-draft completed reports, to emphasize theoretical and concerns of interest to readers of academic journals, revise and resubmit manuscripts in response to expert critique, and then translate our results into formats more suitable to non-specialists.

Unfortunately, I will not have the benefit of the skilled and dedicated research and administrative staff, who have supported the Center’s work over its first five years. Therefore, I hope you will understand if I am slow to respond to correspondence and unable to accept invitations to speak or present at other venues.

Sincerely,

Ronald B. Mincy, PhD

Director

 

May 2010

May 2009