National Adult Protective Services Resource Center

Adult Protective Services (APS) include interventions, programs, processes, and services implemented to insure the safety and well-being of elders and adults with disabilities who have been or are at risk of being mistreated or neglected, who are unable care for themselves or protect themselves from harm, and who have no one to assist them. Interventions provided by APS include, but are not limited to, receiving reports of adult abuse, exploitation or neglect, investigating these reports, and case planning, monitoring and evaluation. In addition to casework services, APS may provide or arrange for the provision of medical, social, economic, legal, housing, law enforcement or other protective, or emergency or supportive services. In most states, APS caseworkers are the first responders to reports of abuse, neglect, and exploitation of vulnerable adults. In recent examinations of APS programs across the country, APS administrators reported that enhancing APS investigation and response, training for APS staff, and developing best practices for interventions and program operations were significant, unmet needs. Unfortunately, these issues have consistently been reported as gaps for APS programs. Their presence affects the quality of APS service provision and indicates areas that could be targeted for development and fortification.To help address this gap, the Administration on Aging is holding a competition to establish a National Adult Protective Services Resource Center (from here forward referred to as APS Resource Center). The purpose of this APS Resource Center is to provide APS systems, agencies, and professionals with current and relevant information and support to enhance the quality, consistency, and effectiveness of APS programs across the country.The primary functions of the APS Resource Center are to:1. Identify evidence-based best practices for APS programs and interventions and determine replicability;2. Identify and promote the evaluation of novel, but unevaluated, practices developed by APS professionals that have the potential to advance and strengthen the efficiency, effectiveness, and relevance of APS work;3. Compile and synthesize research that informs APS programming and interventions and that promotes the translation of research evidence into programmatic practices and interventions;4. Provide specific and targeted technical assistance to state and local APS programs to facilitate the implementation of identified best practices and research findings with the aim of improving their organizational, procedural, and systemic capacity and service delivery capabilities.Applications must clearly describe and detail how they intend to fulfill the core functions of the APS Resource Center, including:1. How, by whom, and in what timeframe will evidence-based best practices be identified? Replicability be determined?2. How, by whom, and in what timeframe will relevant research be identified? Research findings be translated into meaningful information?3. What technical assistance will be offered? How, by whom, and in what timeframe will technical assistance be delivered? How, by whom, and by what criteria will the recipients of technical assistance be chosen and the logistics of technical assistance be coordinated and managed?4. What groups have a stake in improving and enhancing APS programming and services? How will/were they be identified, and how will they be involved in a meaningful way in the work of the APS Resource Center?5. How will the project measure its impact that is, the extent to which the quality and effectiveness of APS programs have been improved? How will the project assess the relevance of its work that is, the extent to which the activities undertaken were considered useful or important?