… for a while at least.

SEE ALSO A PAGE on this topics. This possibly ought to be mandated high school curriculum, to spend XX hours surfing the TAGGS site of the HHS. This may also indicate for high school juniors & seniors, which university to aim for, depending on their interests. For the rest of us,this is living, breathing history. I have learned in just the past 24 hours how an institution up in Oregon has received over $118 million in government grants in the 10+ years since President Clinton told Congress to revamp its agencies to study the newest crisis, supposedly, nationwide, called fatherlessness. (For more exact wording, see my blogroll — I’ll double check the link).

 The image above is the link below:

http://taggs.hhs.gov/AnnualReport/FY2008/discretionary/top50_grants.cfm

The Fifty Recipients Receiving the Greatest Discretionary Funding Levels

FY 2008 Top 50 Recipient Dollars: $14,967,274,219
FY 2008 Top 50 Recipient Awards: 31,321

Highligh

Universities and colleges represent 39 of the top 50 HHS discretionary grant recipients in FY 2008. The University of California received more HHS discretionary grant funds for more projects than any other recipient. Five state or city health and welfare organizations are in the top 50 HHS discretionary grant recipients. Three hospitals and four research organizations are in the top 50 HHS discretionary grant recipients.

(for chart, by top 10, top 50, click on the yellow chart above.  It’s a sight to see.)

NEXT:  the “ACF”

Administration for Children and Families (ACF)

http://taggs.hhs.gov/AnnualReport/FY2008/portfolios/acf.cfm

Operating Division Grant Portfolios: 

Mission: Provides national leadership and creates opportunities for families to lead economically and socially productive lives, including helping children to develop into healthy adults and communities to become more prosperous and supportive of their members.

The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) administers grant programs that promote the economic and social well-being of families, children, individuals and communities. 

Are you curious about those $7.659 BILLION in discretionary awards.  For 2008, that is?  I am.  You betcha.

. . . . 

ACF leads the nation in improving the economic and social well-being of families, children and communities by administering mandatory and discretionary grant programs such as the national welfare-to-work program; Temporary Assistance for Needy Families; foster care; adoption assistance; Head Start; child care; child support enforcement; positive youth development programs; refugee resettlement; and services for those with developmental disabilities.

The majority of the awards go to nonprofits.  I daresay that many of these nonprofits came into existence in order to receive those awards.  

obvious, but most of us do not have $46 billion to play with or, outside the IRS et al, the ability to garnish paychecks, or to decide whether 9-5 work is or is not the standard definition of “work” when it comes to TANF.

I also might debate this in re: the ACF program, it is indeed a very broad claim.  

Just one final issue, if I may:

For additional information on ACF programs and funding please visit the ACF Web site at http://www.acf.hhs.gov.

The Healthy Marriage Promotion and Responsible Fatherhood grants are of interest.

I find it odd that we are attempting simultaneously to promote these things (where is the safe woman promotion grant?), yet the single largest one is for Head Start, which is NOT uniformly accepted as being valuable.  It seems to me that our government wishes us to:

Not have sex before marriage.

Marry a lot and not leave, even if it’s violent.

Raise GREAT children.

But, put them in child care pretty early so we (mothers in particular) can work 9-5 jobs, although these jobs are the least likely to result in bonding between mother and children, after birth, let alone nursing (known to promote both health and smarts).  The reason they are to go into preschool earlier and earlier is so they can be prepared for the school system.  

How are we going to have healthy marriages if we don’t spend adequate time with either our kids, or our spouses?

Speaking as a single mother who has tried almost every version:  9-5 single (a stable day job) and my passion (music) in the evenings weekends.  Music (my passion) daytimes, and evenings and weekends, but for nonprofits, meaning a relatively student lifestyle for several years (low to moderate income).  Add social life, communities of faith, and I was working to pay off the piano, not to play it.    I have done Married, 9-5, Married with children telecommute // stay at home (a misnomer if there ever was one!), married self-employed from home, married, work FT nights (did I mention homeschool yet?) and single, as I recall all of the above.

The only one that was 100% incompatible with us, as a two-parent, two-household situation for the girls, was me working my profession and those girls in the public school system.  It was THE most inefficient use of their and my time, resources, and energy levels (high energy/low energy times of day).  I have seen it drive two-parent well to do households nuts, in good school systems too, it definiteloy drove my low-income, single-parent self into fatigue, as well as depression at the retardation of the educational opportunities (and levels) involved.  

So, I do question the emphasis on more, better, earlier, and for longer days, as a way to promote healthy  human beings, let alone families.  That’s a personal take.  Future posts will provide other “takes,” however with the TAGGS system, you now have been introduced (if it’s a first time) to some of the tools.

Non-U.S. Citizens, pay attention, we are spreading doctrines abroad, and they do propagate.  Our birth rate may not be going up, but our rate of initiatives, studies, doctrines, programs, and presumptions about human nature up and running at fiber-optic speeds.

…