User’s Guide for the CCDE’s Qualitative Reports and Index
What are the Cash and Counseling Qualitative Reports?
The Cash and Counseling Reports on Arkansas, New Jersey and Florida are a collection of
stories about the participants’ experience in the Cash and Counseling Demonstration and
Evaluation (CCDE). These stories are based on in-depth interviews with CCDE “consumer
teams” comprised of consumers and their families, careworkers, and program consultants. The
stories are complemented with detailed descriptions of the physical setting and appearance of
the consumer team. Each story weaves together the voices of the interviewees to offer a unique
perspective about each consumer team’s program experience. These reports were developed
by Drs. Kevin Eckert and Patricia San Antonio from the University of Maryland Baltimore
County.
These reports exist in two different formats: a pdf format and an html format. The pdf version
contains an Executive Summary, Introduction, Stories, Discussion of Cross-cutting Topics, and
several appendices. The html version contains the same information as the pdf format.
However, the html version is organized to allow the user easy access to specific information in
these lengthy reports. For example, readers can easily find all stories about certain types of
consumers (e.g. gender, race, or age).
What is the Purpose of this User’s Guide?
The purpose of this User’s Guide is to explain how the information is organized in the html
version of the reports, so that the reader can use the reports more efficiently and find
information to serve specific needs. This User’s Guide was developed after all the reports were
written.
How are the Html Reports Organized?
Each report contains an “Executive Summary”, “Introduction”, and “Methodology” section. The
“Discussion of Cross-cutting Issues” contains a list of main themes that emerged from the
interviews. Each theme is hyperlinked to a summary, and the stories where the theme appeared
are referenced. The names assigned to the themes are unique for each state.
The Arkansas report contains the section “Guidance for the Arkansas IndependentChoices
Program” which includes summaries of several issues related to program management. This
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section is intended to guide future program planning in this state. The Arkansas report also has
a section on policy issues regarding hiring family members as caregivers and creative uses of
the cash benefit. This section is also intended to guide policy development regarding these
issues in Arkansas.
The stories are organized under several categories: consumer age, gender, and race/ethnicity.
This categorization helps the reader readily identify specific stories. An option to access all the
stories at once is also available.
How are the Stories Organized?
Each story, in the html version of the reports, is divided into chapters which summarize different
aspects of the consumer team’s experience. The main page of each story consists of a
summary of the story and a list of the chapters. These chapters correspond to the sections
under the sub-headings in the stories in the pdf version of the reports. Each chapter includes
several themes that are summarized in the section entitled “Discussion of Cross-cutting Themes
and Issues”. The user can read the complete story by reading each chapter listed on the story’s
main page. To return to the story’s main page, the user must click the “back” link at the bottom
of the page. When the user accesses a story chapter, the name of the chapter or the number of
the story is not displayed on the screen. The user, however, can be easily reminded of the
chapter name by reading the last segments of the address bar at the top of their browser. For
example, if the user is viewing the chapter ‘Scheduling around Sarah’s Needs’ in story 12 of the
Florida Report, the following last segment of the address bar will be displayed:
(…\FL\schedulingAroundSarahsNeeds.htm).
What is the Qualitative Reports Index?
The Qualitative Reports Index is a detailed list of key words that allows that reader to easily find
specific information in each extensive report and identify stories according to specific criteria. A
separate Index exists for each state report. The Index includes keywords that can identify
stories based on the type and characteristics of the careworkers, consumers, types of
consumers’ disabilities and health conditions, program operation, and many other topics. For
example, the reader can identify the stories that particularly involve an African American family
caregiver or other types of caregivers. The Index provides a reference to the story and specific
page where the key word can be found. This document is intended to be used with the pdf
version of the Report. For example, let’s assume the user is interested in identifying all the
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stories in New Jersey where the caregiver is a family member. The user can search the New
Jersey Index under the “Careworker” heading and Family sub-heading. The index indicates all
the stories with a family caregiver.
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