Excerpt from Executive Summary of Report: This study was commissioned by the US Department of Health and Human Services, Administration for Children and Families, Office of Child Support Enforcement to:

• Develop critical measures of participant outcomes for the State Access and Visitation Program;
• Perform a limited, pilot evaluation using these measures in a sample of states offering the major types of access and visitation interventions;
• Assess participant outcomes and gauge the feasibility of routinely assessing such
• programs;
• Suggest program improvements based upon the evaluation; and
• Suggest ways to improve the quality of data collected about programs and their participants.

Programs in three states were selected for each of  three major program types:

• Mediation: Missouri, Rhode Island and Utah;
• Parent education: Arizona, Colorado and New Jersey; and
• Supervised visitation: California, Hawaii and Pennsylvania.

A 10-minute telephone interview was administered to program participants an average of 17 months following service delivery. The study also included a review of child support records for 173 program participants in Arizona, Missouri  and Pennsylvania for 12 months prior to and 12 months following program participation.