Implementing client-centered communication strategies, such as clear language and digital reminders, can significantly reduce churn in public benefit programs, ensuring eligible individuals maintain continuous access to essential services.
Implementing flexible interview scheduling in Los Angeles County's CalFresh program significantly increased benefit approval rates and reduced processing times, particularly aiding working families, students, and individuals experiencing homelessness.
Our work with Pennsylvania to implement user experience and user interface changes shows that innovation can be easier to implement than it might seem.
A brief report on our quantitative research about messages that increase people's take-up of government benefits by making them feel like those benefits belong to them.
This report outlines key lessons and recommendations from Code for America's collaboration with the Voluntary Income Tax Assistance program, which served over 800,000 clients via GetYourRefund.org.
This visualized report is a first first-of-its-kind view of the state of benefits applications across the nation from a client perspective, including information on application availability online, combined benefit applications, application completion times, as well as login and identity proofing requirements.
This guide touches on everything from Code for America’s core research philosophy, to our approach to ethics and trauma-informed research, to specific research methods. It also includes plenty of practical tips on planning and executing research, as well as how to synthesize your findings into action.
An interview with Wendy De La Rosa, assistant professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. De La Rosa discusses how the concept of “psychological ownership” can encourage people to take up benefits they are eligible for.
With the extension and expansion of P-EBT during COVID and the Food and Nutrition Service releasing new guidance, states have an opportunity to effectively deliver essential resources to children and families. Code for America built this toolkit of resources to share recommendations and promising practices around the implementation of P-EBT and to support state agencies and partners tasked with the development of P-EBT programs.
Code for America's GetCTC portal simplifies access to the Child Tax Credit for low-income families by providing a mobile-friendly, bilingual platform for streamlined tax filing.
The GetCalFresh team, the California Department of Social Services, and the California Secretary of State’s office worked together to create a simplified, accessible voter registration experience with clients. When people come to GetCalFresh.org, they are looking to apply for food assistance, so the state of California did not want voter registration to become an obstacle to the goal of getting food assistance. Thus, rather than directing clients to anther website, they offered to text clients a link to the CA Secretary of State’s voter website with directions on how to register.
Code for America’s Integrated Benefits Initiative has been working in partnership with the State of Colorado to demonstrate how user-centered approaches lead to measurably better delivery of safety net programs. This article describes their work with the state of Colorado in simplifying how clients report common life changes that can affect their eligibility.
