How We Work

Thanks to a strong bipartisan commitment at both the federal and state level to provide children and families with health insurance, much progress has been made in extending coverage to America’s uninsured, especially to children. Yet, in the United States today about 9.4 million children under age 19 have no health insurance—most in low-wage, working families without access to affordable job-based coverage. Their parents are even more likely to be uninsured; 11.6 million parents lacked health insurance. 

The Center for Children and Families (CCF), as part of Georgetown University’s Health Policy Institute, is uniquely focused on these pressing issues. We develop and disseminate research, strategies, and ideas to improve the health of America's low- and moderate-income children and families. In particular, CCF examines policies and implementation issues with respect to Medicaid and the State Children's Health Insurance Program (SCHIP), employer-based coverage, and public-private coverage initiatives. CCF works at both the federal and state level. We help states find effective policies for increasing coverage to children and families, in addition to analyzing and monitoring how federal policy developments and state-based initiatives affect the health care coverage of America's families.

CCF brings leadership and a strong, respected policy voice to efforts to improve and expand access to coverage for children and families. We accomplish this by:

• Grounding our work in research and experience.
  

  Our research capacity through Georgetown University, as well as our close, ongoing connections to state and local groups and program administrators, give us a unique perspective on how policies translate into sustainable coverage. See our research and a list of our staff.

  
  

• Combining research and policy with communications and partnerships.
  

  Central to our work is developing partnerships with federal and state groups to help promote a health coverage agenda. In addition, we implement communications strategies to ensure our research and policy work can be shared with and understood by a variety of audiences including the public and the media. See CCF in the News for media clips that reference our work.

  
  

• Finding and demonstrating real solutions that work.
  

  CCF is committed to providing solutions to ensuring more families have health insurance coverage and that the coverage provides access to the care they need. That is why we combine our federal policy work with on-the-ground efforts. By working with states on policy and implementation issues, we are able to see and share successful approaches to covering more children and families. Our State Resource Center, which provides tools to states, is an example of this work.

See Issue Areas to read more about our specific areas of work and current projects.