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Alternative Supporting Statement for Information Collections Designed for

Research, Public Health Surveillance, and Program Evaluation Purposes

Survey of Child Care and Early Education Supply-Building and Sustainability Efforts

Formative Data Collections for ACF Research

0970 – 0356

Supporting Statement

Part A

DECEMBER 2022

Submitted By:

Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation

Administration for Children and Families

U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

4^th Floor, Mary E. Switzer Building

330 C Street, SW

Washington, D.C. 20201

Project Officers: Amanda Coleman and Bonnie Mackintosh

Part A

Executive Summary

• Type of Request: This Information Collection Request is for a generic information collection under the umbrella generic, Formative Data Collections for ACF Research (0970-0356).

• Description of Request: This is a new information collection request to collect web-survey data from Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) administrators across 50 states, the District of Columbia, and 5 U.S. territories. The survey is designed to identify CCDF Lead Agencies’ current efforts to build and sustain child care and early education (CCEE) supply, such as expanding the number of CCEE programs or slots for children within those programs. The primary use of the information from this generic clearance is to inform site selection for future case studies and evaluation design. We do not intend for this information to be used as the principal basis for public policy decisions.

• Time Sensitivity: The information collected by the survey will be used to inform the selection of case study sites and future evaluation design options in a currently active project. To stay on track with our project timeline, our goal is to begin data collection no later than February 2023.

A1. Necessity for Collection

States and territories are developing and implementing various strategies to build and sustain the supply of child care and early education (CCEE) programs. To learn more ongoing CCEE supply-building and sustainability efforts, the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE) has funded the CCEE Supply-Building project. As part of this project, the study team conducted a web scan of publicly available information and a review of policy documents on these initiatives that uncovered more than 500 initiatives across states and territories, but little information on each. To address this gap in information, OPRE is planning to conduct future case studies and potentially a future evaluation on a subset of initiatives¹. To inform these future research activities and to obtain more detailed information on ongoing initiatives, the survey proposed in this request will invite states and territories to identify and share details about two ongoing efforts to support building and sustaining CCEE supply. The success of future study components is dependent on this survey data collection.

There are no legal or administrative requirements that necessitate this collection. ACF is undertaking the collection at the discretion of the agency.

A2. Purpose

Purpose and Use

The survey proposed in this request is an integral part to the CCEE Supply-Building Project’s broader environmental scan, which is being conducted to inform ACF of ongoing CCEE supply-building and sustainability efforts that states and territories have been undertaking. As part of the environmental scan, the research team is collecting and analyzing information about CCEE supply-building and sustaining strategies in 56 states and territories. To date, the environmental scan has scanned CCDF Lead Agencies’ websites and CCDF State Plans for documented information on recent and ongoing supply-building and supply-sustaining efforts. An additional proposed method for collecting detailed and consistent information on a narrower set of current strategies is a self-administered web survey of CCDF Lead Agency Staff (i.e., the CCDF Administrator or Co-Administrator). Respondents will be asked to select and describe two strategies they are implementing that meet the goals of building and sustaining CCEE supply (see supporting statement B, section B3 for information about the criteria for the strategies to describe). They will be asked to describe the scope and focus populations, funding sources, timing of implementation, data used to track progress, and evaluation plans.

Survey findings will inform the selection of potential case study sites for the larger research project. The strategies that survey respondents identify will be the focus of the case studies and future evaluation design options for a subset of efforts ready for evaluation. As appropriate, future information collection requests will be submitted related to these case studies and evaluation.

Findings are also meant to inform ACF’s activities more broadly and may be incorporated into study reports or presentations that are shared internally within ACF’s offices or made public without identifying any specific state or territory. The Office of Child Care may use the findings as they continue to guide supports for CCDF Lead Agencies through a national technical assistance network.

This proposed information collection meets the following goals of ACF’s generic clearance for formative data collections for research and evaluation (0970-0356):

• inform the development of ACF research

• maintain a research agenda that is rigorous and relevant

• ensure that research products are as current as possible

The information collected is meant to contribute to the body of knowledge on ACF programs. It is not intended to be used as the principal basis for a decision by a federal decision-maker, and is not expected to meet the threshold of influential or highly influential scientific information.

Guiding Questions

The guiding research questions are:

• What efforts to build and/or sustain CCEE supply are CCDF Lead Agencies administering or funding?

• What are the key characteristics of those efforts?

• In what ways are Lead Agencies monitoring implementation of CCEE supply-building and supply-sustaining strategies and tracking progress toward their goals?

• To what degree do the strategies reported by CCDF Lead Agencies show promise as either potential case study sites or sites for future evaluation?

Study Design

As noted previously, this survey is one part of a larger environmental scan, that includes the following:

• A web scan,

• A review of policy documents (i.e., FY 2022-24 CCDF State Plans obtained with permission from the federal Office of Child Care),

• A literature review,

• Expert interviews with fewer than 10 respondents, and

• This Survey for CCDF Lead Agencies on Child Care and Early Education Supply-Building and Sustainability Efforts.

The survey will be administered as a census of Lead Agencies across 50 states, DC, and 5 U.S territories, so that information can be collected and documented systematically across all Lead Agencies as part of the project’s environmental scan. We propose this census survey design, instead of a sample of Lead Agencies, because we want to give each Lead Agency an equal opportunity to be considered for a future case study. Sampling would, by design, exclude some Lead Agencies from participating that are implementing initiatives that could inform our case study site selection.

Survey results are not intended to be generalizable but rather identify ongoing efforts unique to each state and territory.

Exhibit A1. Study Design Overview

Instrument	Respondent, Content, Purpose of Collection	Mode and Duration
Survey Questionnaire for CCDF Lead Agencies on Child Care and Early Education Supply-Building and Sustainability Efforts	Respondents: State and Territory agency staff Content: Identifying strategies; scope and goals of strategies; funding sources; groups involved in planning; data used to help plan; methods to track implementation of strategy; ways agencies are tracking progress and results Purpose: Collect information on select CCEE supply-building and supply-sustaining efforts that states and territories are implementing	Mode: Web Duration: 30 minutes

Other Data Sources and Uses of Information

Information from the survey will be used in conjunction with other information gathering through the project’s broader environmental scan. This includes expert interviews, a review of policy documents, and a web scan, specifically, a review of announcements and relevant publications on each Lead Agency’s website. The research team catalogued and coded information about relevant strategies in each state and territory. The web-based survey is designed to extend our understanding of strategies identified in policy documents and online resources. First, it gives CCDF Administrators the opportunity to clarify and shed new light on strategies that may now be more developed, relative to descriptions from publicly available information sources or their CCDF State Plans—the state or territory’s approved application for CCDF funds that provides a description of planned child care services and use of funds. Second, it gives CCDF Administrators the opportunity to share, in their words, about particular strategies. Additionally, the web-based survey aims to inform future research activities as part of this project, including the potential selection of CCDF Lead Agencies for case studies and a future evaluation design.

A3. Use of Information Technology to Reduce Burden

We will program and field the survey through Qualtrics, a web-based survey software platform that includes many features to minimize burden. Qualtrics allows surveys to be programmed with skip logic to avoid irrelevant questions. Information from previous responses is filled into subsequent question stems to reduce the need to recall prior responses. Responses are saved each time participants move forwards or backwards in a questionnaire, allowing participants to complete the questionnaire in stages without losing information. Respondents can save their work, close the survey, and return to complete the survey later if they are unable to complete it in one session.

A4. Use of Existing Data: Efforts to reduce duplication, minimize burden, and increase utility and government efficiency

Through our work on the environmental scan task, we have not identified other current or planned efforts to collect systematic, detailed information about CCDF Lead Agencies' ongoing supply-building or supply-sustaining strategies. This survey was designed to extend, but not duplicate, information gathered through available policy documents and public announcements and reports on CCDF Lead Agencies’ websites as part of the environmental scan. The information available in these secondary sources is limited, particularly regarding questions about timing of implementation, data used for tracking progress, and evaluation plans. This survey was designed to gather more detailed information on a narrow set of efforts underway to provide a more in-depth understanding of each strategy’s scope and focus, funding sources, administrative and implementation features, data used to track progress, and evaluation plans.

A5. Impact on Small Businesses

No small businesses are affected by the information collection.

A6. Consequences of Less Frequent Collection

This is a one-time data collection.

A7. Now subsumed under 2(b) above and 10 (below)

A8. Consultation

Federal Register Notice and Comments

In accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 1995 (Pub. L. 104-13) and Office of Management and Budget (OMB) regulations at 5 CFR Part 1320 (60 FR 44978, August 29, 1995), ACF published two notices in the Federal Register announcing the agency’s intention to request an OMB review of the overarching generic clearance for formative information collection. This first notice was published on November 3, 2020, Volume 85, Number 213, page 69627, and provided a sixty-day period for public comment. The second notice published on January 11, 2021, Volume 86, Number 6, page 1978, and provided a thirty-day period for public comment. ACF did not receive any substantive comments.

Consultation with Experts Outside of the Study

We consulted with several outside experts (fewer than 9) to better understand the range and types of efforts CCDF Lead Agencies are implementing and how we could more clearly define “supply-building and supply-sustaining strategies.” These expert engagements helped inform the phrasing of survey questions and response options. We also shared the draft survey instrument with two experts to review survey items for clarity and to test the survey length. The consultants provided us with clarifications, which we have considered, and confirmed that the survey time commitment of 30 minutes was appropriate.

A9. Tokens of Appreciation

No tokens of appreciation will be offered.

A10. Privacy: Procedures to protect privacy of information, while maximizing data sharing

Personally Identifiable Information

Individuals (e.g., CCDF Administrator or another Lead Agency representative) will participate in data collection activities on behalf of the Agency they represent. We will not request any personally identifiable information from individual respondents on the survey, with the exception of one question about the respondent’s position (i.e., CCDF Administrator, Co-Administrator, or other staff member). The responses to this one survey question will be analyzed internally as a data check, to confirm who respondents are. However, this information will not be reported out individually for each responding state/territory.

Assurances of Privacy

Information collected will be kept private to the extent permitted by law. Respondents will be informed of all planned uses of data, that their participation is voluntary, and that their responses will be shared internally with ACF. The survey team will link the resulting Qualtrics survey data file to the names of the responding states and territories, such that responses can be connected to a responding state/territory (with the exception of respondent’s work position, as described above). Write-in responses may also contain the name of the responding state or territory or the name of a specific initiative that could be traced to that state or territory. Entity-level identities (e.g., the State, Territory) with which the data are associated will be maintained throughout the study process and provided to ACF. Although respondents’ individual identities (i.e., names) will not be disclosed, ACF does know the identities of the Administrator of each CCDF Lead Agency. Further, since the participating Agencies will be identified, ACF will be able to deduce those who did not choose to participate. We believe such risks to be minimal because the subject matter of the survey does not represent a funding requirement. Respondents will be informed of the potential for Agency identification. Information that we use to recruit participants (e.g., contact information for CCDF Administrators obtained from the federal Office of Child Care) will be stored separately from their survey responses.

As specified in the contract, the Contractor will comply with all Federal and Departmental regulations for private information. Information that may be considered personally sensitive will be handled carefully and either will not be reported to ACF or will be reported with caution to avoid any reputational harm. For example, potentially sensitive information will not be connected to PII, such as CCDF administrators’ names and contact information used for survey recruitment. No public-facing documents will report survey responses identifiable at the respondent or Agency level, though survey responses may be summarized to provide context.

Data Security and Monitoring

The study team has developed a data security and monitoring plan. Urban will ensure that all its employees and consultants who perform work under this contract are trained on data privacy issues and comply with the requirements. All project staff will sign the Urban Institute’s staff confidentiality pledge agreeing to follow the Urban Institute’s guidelines for data security.

As specified in OPRE’s contract, Urban will use Federal Information Processing Standard (currently, FIPS 140-2) compliant encryption (Security Requirements for Cryptographic Module, as amended) to protect all instances of sensitive information during storage and transmission. Urban will securely generate and manage encryption keys to prevent unauthorized decryption of information, in accordance with the Federal Processing Standard. Urban will (1) ensure that this standard is incorporated into the company’s property management and control system; and (2) establish a procedure to account for all laptop computers, desktop computers, and other mobile devices and portable media that store or process sensitive information. Any data stored electronically will be secured in accordance with the most current National Institute of Standards and Technology requirements and other applicable federal and departmental regulations. In addition, Urban must submit a plan for minimizing to the extent possible the inclusion of sensitive information on paper records and for protecting any paper records, field notes, or other documents that contain sensitive or personally identifiable information to ensure secure storage and limits on access.

A11. Sensitive Information ²

We do not anticipate collection of any sensitive information. However, in open-ended survey questions, participants could reveal personal challenges and concerns. Possible risks to providing sensitive information could include a risk to professional reputation or employment should they indicate anything that could be interpreted as critical of their organization and such information is shared beyond the research team. Specifically, reputational harm could result if certain details (such as poor performance of contractors or difficulties with local partners) were shared and attributed to them. However, this is highly unlikely. Although any information shared with the research team could be shared with ACF, sensitive information will not be published in any public documents or shared widely beyond the contractor’s research team.

A12. Burden

Explanation of Burden Estimates

Exhibit A2 summarizes the estimated reporting burden and costs for this information collection request. The estimates include time for respondents to review instructions, complete and review their responses, and transmit information.

The study team expects to reach out to all 56 State and Territory CCDF Lead Agencies for this study. We anticipate the survey will take about 30 minutes to complete. This burden estimate is based on a pretest conducted with two expert consultants (see Supporting Statement B, section B3).

Estimated Annualized Cost to Respondents

All respondents are members of state or territory government. Estimates for these respondents are based on the Department of Labor (DOL) May 2021 estimates for the mean hourly wage of Administrative Services Managers in state government: $49.50 (occupational code 11-3012) https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes113012.htm

Exhibit A2. Estimated Respondent Burden

Instrument	No. of Respondents (total over request period)	No. of Responses per Respondent (total over request period)	Avg. Burden per Response (in hours)	Total/Annual Burden (in hours)	Average Hourly Wage Rate	Total Annual Respondent Cost
Survey	56	1	0.50	28	$49.50	$1,386

A13. Costs

There are no additional costs to respondents.

A14. Estimated Annualized Costs to the Federal Government

The cost of the data collection under this request totals $135,300. This includes direct and indirect costs for recruiting participants, administering the survey, analyzing the survey data, writing an internal memo to ACF with survey findings, outlining and writing an internal-facing report, summarizing de-identified survey findings as background for a public-facing report for the larger environmental scan, and briefing ACF on survey results.

Cost Category	Estimated Costs
Field Work	$63,046
Analysis, Product Development, and Federal Briefing	$72,254
Total/annual costs over the request period	$135,300

A15. Reasons for changes in burden

This is for an individual information collection under the umbrella formative generic clearance for ACF research (OMB # 0970-0356; expiration date is 2/29/2024).

A16. Timeline

Exhibit A3 shows the timeline for the study. The data collected will not be made available on ACF’s website or in a restricted-access environment. The information will be shared internally with ACF to inform case study site selection and future agency planning. A public-facing report will summarize findings from the broader environmental scan and include high-level survey findings as context without identifying specific states and territories that responded to the survey.

Exhibit A3. Study Timeline

Tasks	Date
Survey recruitment begins	Within one week of OMB approval
Survey administration (10-week window)	1–10 weeks after OMB approval
Data analysis	11-15 weeks after OMB approval
Submit memo of survey findings	8 weeks after survey closing date; 18 after OMB approval

A17. Exceptions

No exceptions are necessary for this information collection.

Attachments

Instrument 1. Survey Questionnaire for CCDF Lead Agencies on Child Care and Early Education Supply-Building and Sustainability Efforts

Appendix A. Advanced Email Recruitment Message to CCDF Lead Agencies

Appendix B. Letter of Support from the Office of Child Care

Appendix C. Survey Invitation Email to CCDF Lead Agencies

Appendix D. Survey Reminder Email to CCDF Lead Agencies

Appendix E. Follow-up Phone Script for Survey Recruitment

1 Information collection requests related to future information collection activities that are subject to the Paperwork Reduction Act will be submitted as appropriate.

2 Examples of sensitive topics include (but not limited to): social security number; sex behavior and attitudes; illegal, anti-social, self-incriminating and demeaning behavior; critical appraisals of other individuals with whom respondents have close relationships, e.g., family, pupil-teacher, employee-supervisor; mental and psychological problems potentially embarrassing to respondents; religion and indicators of religion; community activities which indicate political affiliation and attitudes; legally recognized privileged and analogous relationships, such as those of lawyers, physicians and ministers; records describing how an individual exercises rights guaranteed by the First Amendment; receipt of economic assistance from the government (e.g., unemployment or WIC or SNAP); immigration/citizenship status.

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