%0 Book %A National Research Council %E Voss, Paul R. %E Marton, Krisztina %T Small Populations, Large Effects: Improving the Measurement of the Group Quarters Population in the American Community Survey %@ 978-0-309-25560-8 %D 2012 %U https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13387/small-populations-large-effects-improving-the-measurement-of-the-group %> https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13387/small-populations-large-effects-improving-the-measurement-of-the-group %I The National Academies Press %C Washington, DC %G English %K Behavioral and Social Sciences %K Surveys and Statistics %P 176 %X In the early 1990s, the Census Bureau proposed a program of continuous measurement as a possible alternative to the gathering of detailed social, economic, and housing data from a sample of the U.S. population as part of the decennial census. The American Community Survey (ACS) became a reality in 2005, and has included group quarters (GQ)-such places as correctional facilities for adults, student housing, nursing facilities, inpatient hospice facilities, and military barracks-since 2006, primarily to more closely replicate the design and data products of the census long-form sample. The decision to include group quarters in the ACS enables the Census Bureau to provide a comprehensive benchmark of the total U.S. population (not just those living in households). However, the fact that the ACS must rely on a sample of what is a small and very diverse population, combined with limited funding available for survey operations, makes the ACS GQ sampling, data collection, weighting, and estimation procedures more complex and the estimates more susceptible to problems stemming from these limitations. The concerns are magnified in small areas, particularly in terms of detrimental effects on the total population estimates produced for small areas. Small Populations, Large Effects provides an in-depth review of the statistical methodology for measuring the GQ population in the ACS. This report addresses difficulties associated with measuring the GQ population and the rationale for including GQs in the ACS. Considering user needs for ACS data and of operational feasibility and compatibility with the treatment of the household population in the ACS, the report recommends alternatives to the survey design and other methodological features that can make the ACS more useful for users of small-area data. %0 Book %A National Research Council %E Rivard, Jeanne C. %E O'Connell, Mary Ellen %E Wegman, David H. %T Review of Disability and Rehabilitation Research: NIDRR Grantmaking Processes and Products %@ 978-0-309-22229-7 %D 2012 %U https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13285/review-of-disability-and-rehabilitation-research-nidrr-grantmaking-processes-and %> https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13285/review-of-disability-and-rehabilitation-research-nidrr-grantmaking-processes-and %I The National Academies Press %C Washington, DC %G English %K Health and Medicine %K Behavioral and Social Sciences %P 358 %X The National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research (NIDRR) is the principal federal agency supporting applied research, training, and development to improve the lives of individuals with disabilities. NIDRR's mission is to generate new knowledge and promote its effective use in improving the ability of persons with disabilities to perform activities of their choice in the community, as well as to expand society's capacity to provide full opportunities and accommodations for its citizens with disabilities. NIDRR prides itself on being proactive in establishing program performance measures and developing accountability data systems to track the progress of its grantees. An electronic annual reporting system is used to collect data from grantees on many aspects of grant operation and outputs. Various formative and summative evaluation approaches have been used to assess the quality of the performance and results of the agency's research portfolio and its grantees. Prompted by the need to provide more data on its program results, in 2009 NIDRR requested that the National Research Council (NRC) conduct an external evaluation of some of the agency's key processes and assess the quality of outputs produced by NIDRR grantees (National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, 2009a). Review of Disability and Rehabilitation Research presents the results of that evaluation. %0 Book %A Institute of Medicine %A National Research Council %E Olson, Steve %E Stroud, Clare %T Child Maltreatment Research, Policy, and Practice for the Next Decade: Workshop Summary %@ 978-0-309-25442-7 %D 2012 %U https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13368/child-maltreatment-research-policy-and-practice-for-the-next-decade %> https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13368/child-maltreatment-research-policy-and-practice-for-the-next-decade %I The National Academies Press %C Washington, DC %G English %K Health and Medicine %K Behavioral and Social Sciences %P 218 %X In 1993 the National Research Council released its landmark report Understanding Child Abuse and Neglect (NRC, 1993). That report identified child maltreatment as a devastating social problem in American society. Nearly 20 years later, on January 30-31, 2012, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) and NRC's Board on Children, Youth and Families help a workshop, Child Maltreatment Research, Policy, and Practice for the Next Generation, to review the accomplishments of the past two decades of research related to child maltreatment and the remaining gaps. "There have been many exciting research discoveries since the '93 report, but we also want people to be thinking about what is missing," said Anne Petersen, research professor at the Center for Human Growth and Development at the University of Michigan and chair of the panel that produced the report. Child Maltreatment Research, Policy, and Practice for the Next Decade: Workshop Summary covers the workshop that brought together many leading U.S. child maltreatment researchers for a day and a half of presentations and discussions. Presenters reviewed research accomplishments, identified gaps that remain in knowledge, and consider potential research priorities. Child Maltreatment Research, Policy, and Practice for the Next Decade: Workshop Summary also covers participant suggestions for future research priorities, policy actions, and practices that would enhance understanding of child maltreatment and efforts to reduce and respond to it. A background paper highlighting major research advances since the publication of the 1993 NRC report was prepared by an independent consultant to inform the workshop discussions. This summary is an essential resource for any workshop attendees, policy makers, researchers, educators, healthcare providers, parents, and advocacy groups. %0 Book %A National Research Council %E Schirm, Allen L. %E Kirkendall, Nancy J. %T Using American Community Survey Data to Expand Access to the School Meals Programs %@ 978-0-309-25720-6 %D 2012 %U https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13409/using-american-community-survey-data-to-expand-access-to-the-school-meals-programs %> https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13409/using-american-community-survey-data-to-expand-access-to-the-school-meals-programs %I The National Academies Press %C Washington, DC %G English %K Behavioral and Social Sciences %K Food and Nutrition %K Surveys and Statistics %P 406 %X The National School Lunch and School Breakfast Programs, administered by the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), are key components of the nation's food security safety net, providing free or low-cost meals to millions of schoolchildren each day. To qualify their children each year for free or reduced-price meals, many families must submit applications that school officials distribute and review. To reduce this burden on families and schools and to encourage more children to partake of nutritious meals, USDA regulations allow school districts to operate their meals programs under special provisions that eliminate the application process and other administrative procedures in exchange for providing free meals to all students enrolled in one or more school in a district. FNS asked the National Academies' Committee on National Statistics and Food and Nutrition Board to convene a panel of experts to investigate the technical and operational feasibility of using data from the continuous American Community Survey (ACS) to estimate students eligible for free and reduced-price meals for schools and school districts. The ACS eligibility estimates would be used to develop "claiming percentages" that, if sufficiently accurate, would determine the USDA reimbursements to districts for schools that provided free meals to all students under a new special provision that eliminated the ongoing base-year requirements of current provisions. Using American Community Survey Data to Expand Access to the School Meals Program was conducted in two phases. It first issued an interim report (National Research Council, 2010), describing its planned approach for assessing the utility of ACS-based estimates for a special provision to expand access to free school meals. This report is the final phase which presents the panel's findings and recommendations. %0 Book %A National Research Council %E Eddy, William F. %E Marton, Krisztina %T Effective Tracking of Building Energy Use: Improving the Commercial Buildings and Residential Energy Consumption Surveys %@ 978-0-309-25401-4 %D 2012 %U https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13360/effective-tracking-of-building-energy-use-improving-the-commercial-buildings %> https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13360/effective-tracking-of-building-energy-use-improving-the-commercial-buildings %I The National Academies Press %C Washington, DC %G English %K Energy and Energy Conservation %K Behavioral and Social Sciences %K Surveys and Statistics %P 150 %X The United States is responsible for nearly one-fifth of the world's energy consumption. Population growth, and the associated growth in housing, commercial floor space, transportation, goods, and services is expected to cause a 0.7 percent annual increase in energy demand for the foreseeable future. The energy used by the commercial and residential sectors represents approximately 40 percent of the nation's total energy consumption, and the share of these two sectors is expected to increase in the future. The Commercial Buildings Energy Consumption Survey (CBECS) and Residential Energy Consumption Survey (RECS) are two major surveys conducted by the Energy Information Administration. The surveys are the most relevant sources of data available to researchers and policy makers on energy consumption in the commercial and residential sectors. Many of the design decisions and operational procedures for the CBECS and RECS were developed in the 1970s and 1980s, and resource limitations during much of the time since then have prevented EIA from making significant changes to the data collections. Effective Tracking of Building Energy Use makes recommendations for redesigning the surveys based on a review of evolving data user needs and an assessment of new developments in relevant survey methods. %0 Book %A Institute of Medicine %A National Research Council %E O'Grady, Michael J. %E Wunderlich, Gooloo S. %T Medical Care Economic Risk: Measuring Financial Vulnerability from Spending on Medical Care %@ 978-0-309-26604-8 %D 2012 %U https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13525/medical-care-economic-risk-measuring-financial-vulnerability-from-spending-on %> https://nap.nationalacademies.org/catalog/13525/medical-care-economic-risk-measuring-financial-vulnerability-from-spending-on %I The National Academies Press %C Washington, DC %G English %K Health and Medicine %K Industry and Labor %K Behavioral and Social Sciences %K Surveys and Statistics %P 312 %X The United States has seen major advances in medical care during the past decades, but access to care at an affordable cost is not universal. Many Americans lack health care insurance of any kind, and many others with insurance are nonetheless exposed to financial risk because of high premiums, deductibles, co-pays, limits on insurance payments, and uncovered services. One might expect that the U.S. poverty measure would capture these financial effects and trends in them over time. Yet the current official poverty measure developed in the early 1960s does not take into account significant increases and variations in medical care costs, insurance coverage, out-of-pocket spending, and the financial burden imposed on families and individuals. Although medical costs consume a growing share of family and national income and studies regularly document high rates of medical financial stress and debt, the current poverty measure does not capture the consequences for families' economic security or their income available for other basic needs. In 1995, a panel of the National Research Council (NRC) recommended a new poverty measure, which compares families' disposable income to poverty thresholds based on current spending for food, clothing, shelter, utilities, and a little more. The panel's recommendations stimulated extensive collaborative research involving several government agencies on experimental poverty measures that led to a new research Supplemental Poverty Measure (SPM), which the U.S. Census Bureau first published in November 2011 and will update annually. Analyses of the effects of including and excluding certain factors from the new SPM showed that, were it not for the cost that families incurred for premiums and other medical expenses not covered by health insurance, 10 million fewer people would have been poor according to the SPM. The implementation of the patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) provides a strong impetus to think rigorously about ways to measure medical care economic burden and risk, which is the basis for Medical Care Economic Risk. As new policies - whether part of the ACA or other policies - are implemented that seek to expand and improve health insurance coverage and to protect against the high costs of medical care relative to income, such measures will be important to assess the effects of policy changes in both the short and long term on the extent of financial burden and risk for the population, which are explained in this report.