The Building Strong Families (BSF) project is a large-scale program demonstration and rigorous evaluation to learn whether well-designed interventions can help interested romantically involved unmarried parents build stronger relationships and fulfill their aspirations for a healthy marriage if they choose to wed. The central question of the evaluation is whether interventions can succeed in helping these parents improve their couple relationships, enter into and sustain healthy marriages, and enhance the well-being of their children. Sponsored by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), the project has been underway since late 2002 and involves programs operating in seven sites. This report analyzes the implementation of the BSF program in these sites and presents information on their development, operations and lessons learned, and provides context for the future analysis of program impacts on couples and their children. Specifically, the report addresses the following questions: (1) What is the context in which programs are implemented? (2) How are participants identified as eligible for BSF and then enrolled in the program? (3) What are the characteristics of couples that choose to enroll in BSF? (4) How is the BSF model put into operation at local sites? (5) To what extent do enrolled couples attend and complete BSF? (6) What is the experience of couples enrolled in the BSF program? and (7) What are the lessons learned that may be useful for other similar programs? (Author abstract)
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