Helping Families with Young Children — a Closer Look at Home Visitation in California


Nancy Goodban and Dana Rapoport
February, 2002

Home visitation is an increasingly popular strategy for delivering services to families with young children. Home visitation programs seek to improve child health and development, prevent child abuse, increase family literacy and school readiness, and encourage family self-sufficiency. There is no single model of home visitation; programs differ widely by philosophy, services, target population, and staff credentials. Although home visitation programs are difficult to evaluate, rigorous evaluations show positive, but limited, effectiveness.

This article examines the benefits and challenges of expanding home visitation services, as well as unanswered questions from evaluations of these programs.