OCS Listening Sessions

By Julie Vandenboom, Michigan Office of Child Support Program Re-Engineering Specialist

In July and August 2023 the Office of Child Support (OCS) conducted a series of four Listening Sessions. These initial sessions were offered to individuals who expressed interest in providing additional feedback to the child support program after attending one of the OCS Advisory Council Information Sessions. Several child support professionals had the opportunity to hear the lived experiences of families served by the child support program.

Michigan’s Child Support Program Takes a ‘LEAP’

By Kim Kerns, Administrative Assistant to Office of Child Support (OCS) Director; and Julie Vandenboom, OCS Program Re-engineering Specialist

In December 2020, Michigan requested a waiver from the federal Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) to allow the use of IV-D funds to pilot and evaluate an employment program for child support payers. The program, called Learn, Earn, and Provide (LEAP), is a collaboration between the Michigan Office of Child Support (OCS) and the Department of Labor and Economic Opportunity (LEO). The waiver was granted for a two-year period which began during the first fiscal quarter that funds were spent for the pilot.

Introducing the New “Dashboards & Visual Reports” Tool -- aka Data Visualizations, aka Data Viz

By Amy Gilmore, Performance Management Specialist with the Planning, Evaluation, and Analysis Unit, Michigan Office of Child Support

Have you noticed a change to the “Application Quick Links” on mi-support lately? Need a hint?

MiChildSupport & FOCA Technology Team Providing Solutions during the Pandemic

By Sandra Vanderhyde, Muskegon County Friend of the Court & Circuit Court Administrator, and Kim Lubbers, Office of Child Support (OCS), MiChildSupport Product Owner 

What happens when partner agencies collaborate? The customer reaps the benefits.  

The Friend of the Court Association Technology Team (FOCA Tech Team) and the MiChildSupport Team have been meeting quarterly for several years to identify and implement ways to improve the customer experience. With a focus on MiChildSupport, our public-facing website, the teams have worked together to build on existing features and to generate new ideas for engaging child support customers. And then came COVID-19. 

MiChildSupport landing page.

Michigan’s Work in Behavioral Interventions – Recent and Future

By Julie Vandenboom, Program ReEngineering Specialist, Office of Child Support; and Carol Bealor, Director, Cass County Friend of the Court

In 2018, Michigan was invited to become a Behavioral Interventions in Child Support (BICS) Peer Learning Site. BICS was a five-year demonstration grant awarded to eight child support agencies across the country in 2014. Several states – including Michigan – and tribal IV-D programs that did not participate in the grant formed a cohort of Peer Learning Sites to develop, adapt, implement, and evaluate behavioral interventions to improve their own program operations. A behavioral intervention attempts to influence a desired activity or outcome by presenting choices based on how people make decisions. Readers can learn more about the basics of behavioral interventions from this previous Pundit article.

Spock or Simpson? Michigan’s Child Support Program Learns about Behavioral Economics

By Amy Lindholm, Management Analyst, Friend of the Court Bureau

Behavioral science stole the show at Partner Forum this year.

Office of Child Support Director Erin Frisch introduces the topic for Partner Forum 2018.

Child support professionals gathered at the Lansing Hall of Justice from friend of the court and prosecuting attorney offices across the state, as well as the Office of Child Support (OCS) and the SCAO Friend of the Court Bureau. Office of Child Support Director Erin Frisch introduced the day’s keynote speaker as one of her “favorite people in child support” because “he “always has an idea for how to change things and make them better.”

Make Way for Self-Service Reporting!

By Amy Gilmore, Performance Management Specialist, Office of Child Support

Business Objects database users in Michigan Friend of the Court (FOC) offices will soon be enjoying MiCSES case management data at their fingertips. Self-Service Reporting (SSR) is now officially underway with an approved charter.  The goal of the SSR project is to enable FOC workers to create, manage, and share reports of MiCSES data without having to engage central development staff for each report. SSR will help support counties moving to more data-based decision making by allowing them to obtain the data most relevant to them in a timely manner.

Office of Child Support Staff Attend Workshop on Systemic Racism

By Amy Coscarelli, Case Management Policy Analyst, Office of Child Support

Michigan Office of Child Support (OCS) staff recently attended “An Introductory Workshop on Systemic Racism,” which was conducted by members of Eliminating Racism & Creating/Celebrating Equity (ERACCE). ERACCE is an organization in Kalamazoo that provides training, workshops, consultation, and technical support on cultural competency and antiracist institutional organization throughout Michigan.[1]

‘Systemic racism’ refers to all of the policies and practices in institutions that can harm certain racial groups while helping others.