SOURCES SOUGHT
R -- Retaining Employment and Talent After Injury/Illness Network (RETAIN) Evaluation - Draft Statement of Work
- Notice Date
- 12/5/2017
- Notice Type
- Sources Sought
- NAICS
- 541720
— Research and Development in the Social Sciences and Humanities
- Contracting Office
- Social Security Administration, Office of Budget, Finance, Quality and Management, Office of Acquisition and Grants, 1540 Robert M. Ball Building, 6401 Security Boulevard, Baltimore, Maryland, 21235, United States
- ZIP Code
- 21235
- Solicitation Number
- 28321318RI0000014
- Archive Date
- 1/5/2018
- Point of Contact
- Brenda Monch, Phone: (410) 965-9521
- E-Mail Address
-
brenda.monch@ssa.gov
(brenda.monch@ssa.gov)
- Small Business Set-Aside
- N/A
- Description
- Draft Statement of Work This is a Sources Sought Notice. This is NOT a solicitation for proposals, proposal abstracts, or quotations and in no way obligates the Government to award a contract. The purpose of this notice is to obtain information, for planning purposes, regarding: (1) the availability and capability of potential sources that can provide the required services described below; (2) the size classification of the available and potential sources relative to the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) code for the proposed acquisition; and (3) to seek industry comments regarding a draft version of a Statement of Work (SOW). The NAICS code for this planned acquisition is 541720 and the size standard is $20.5M. Your response to the information requested will assist the Social Security Administration (SSA) in planning the appropriate acquisition strategy. Background: SSA is seeking the assistance of a contractor to conduct an evaluation of the Retaining Employment and Talent After Injury/Illness Network (RETAIN) demonstration projects. RETAIN is a joint demonstration with the Department of Labor (DOL) that will test early interventions to help workers stay at work or return to work after experiencing a work-threatening injury, illness, or disability. The ultimate policy goal is to reduce long-term disability - including the need for federal disability programs - and increase labor force participation among those individuals. Partnering with DOL's Office of Disability Employment Policy, which is broadly tasked with providing services and supports to workers with disabilities, will allow for identifying and serving such workers well before they apply for SSA's disability benefits. RETAIN is loosely modeled on several promising early intervention programs run by the Washington State workers' compensation system, including the Centers of Occupational Health and Education (COHE), the Early Return to Work program, and the Stay at Work program. These programs provide early intervention and return-to-work services for individuals with work-related health conditions. Preliminary results from COHE suggest a significant (26%) reduction in long-term transitions to SSDI. This demonstration will draw from and test key features of these Washington programs, in other states and/or for a population beyond workers' compensation (i.e., for non-occupational injuries and illnesses), and with an increased emphasis on employment-related supports. Developing and conducting a rigorous evaluation of the interventions is a key component of RETAIN. In this joint demonstration, DOL will award cooperative agreements to states to operate RETAIN projects, and SSA will provide an independent, comprehensive national evaluation of all of the state projects. The national evaluation will include a process analysis, a participation analysis, an impact analysis, and a cost-benefit analysis. As part of the RETAIN evaluation, we will analyze the impact of these programs on the following broad outcomes: • Increase in labor force participation/retention • Decrease in applications and receipt of SSDI/SSI Project Design: As designed, there will be two phases as part of the RETAIN cooperative agreements. DOL will award up to six Phase 1 cooperative agreements to revise and re-submit awardees original proposal. During Phase 1, the Evaluator will work closely with each awardee to refine the proposed implementation design and enhance its evaluability. Such activities include, but are not limited to, assistance with: 1) securing proper data sharing agreements to conduct the evaluation; 2) adjusting project-specific research designs when necessary; 3) assessing, and amending when necessary, the awardee's recruitment strategy to achieve the targeted sample size; and 4) assessing whether there is sufficient treatment/comparison contrast to detect differences in outcome measures. The Evaluator will provide awardees with evaluation-related technical assistance on recruitment, enrollment, data collection (including use of a data collection system developed by the Evaluator), and other technical aspects of participation in the evaluation, such as consistency of data collection, rationale and methods for random assignment (if applicable), and methods to avoid sample contamination. In particular, the Evaluator will work in close collaboration with the awardee to develop intake procedures consistent with the design of the intervention and proposed evaluation. The intake process involves recruitment, informed consent, and information gathering. The Evaluator will also conduct an Evaluability Assessment of each project, highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of the project's proposed design and how it can be evaluated. The Evaluator will provide to SSA and DOL its assessment of each project in order to aid the federal partners in determining which Phase 1 awardees would be best suited to continue to Phase 2, the implementation (and evaluation) stage of the demonstration. DOL will fund up to three of the RETAIN Phase 1 awardees for the implementation and evaluation of the projects. During Phase 2, the Evaluator will continue to provide evaluation-related technical assistance, and will oversee awardees' recruitment and enrollment processes to ensure fidelity to the evaluation design. The Evaluator may survey participants, either at baseline (during enrollment) or at a later point. The Evaluator will also begin conducting the analyses described above, using the data submitted by awardees as well as data collected through other methods such as site visits and, if needed, focus groups. Specific Questions: • Each cooperative agreement applicant will propose its own state-specific research design. Apart from a randomized controlled trial, what other experimental designs might the Evaluator be expected to implement and does the Statement of Work allow for these design? • What should SSA and DOL require of the Phase 1 awardees in order to ensure the Evaluator can conduct a successful comprehensive evaluability assessment under this contract? • Are there any aspects of the Statement of Work that should be altered to enhance the likelihood of finding statistically significant impacts? Response Information: In order for SSA to assess a firm's capability, firms must submit a response that provides enough detail to indicate that it can provide the services that meet the requirements identified above and in the draft Statement of Work (SOW). SSA also seeks industry comment on the draft SOW. You will need to identify the applicable section of the SOW when submitting your comments on the draft SOW. Vendor submissions of simple marketing materials or brochures, incomplete responses that do not conform to the elements of this request for information, or references to vendor websites will not be considered by SSA. With your response, please include: a. DUNS number b. Company Name c. Company Address d. Current GSA Schedules appropriate to this notice e. Type of Company (i.e. large business, small business, small disadvantaged, women owned, HUBZone, and Service Disabled) as validated via the System for Award Management (SAM) f. Company point of contact, title, phone and email address All responses must be submitted in an electronic form via e-mail to the brenda.monch@ssa.gov and kevin.muniz@ssa.gov no later than December 21, 2017. Reponses will not be accepted after the due date. Responses must not exceed twenty (20) pages. The file size limitation for e-mail attachments is 5 MB. SSA will not accept phone calls regarding this notice. Disclaimer: This notice is not to be construed as a commitment by SSA to award a contract. No reimbursement will be made for any costs associated with your submittal. SSA will not return any information submitted in response to this notice. Information received will be used in SSA's market research effort and for procurement planning purposes. The Government reserves the right to contact, or not to contact, any party responding to this notice in order to obtain further information for market research purposes. Respondents are advised that SSA is under no obligation to provide feedback to respondents with respect to any information submitted. Confidentiality: No proprietary, confidential, sensitive information should be included in your response. SSA reserves the right to use any non-proprietary information in any resultant solicitation.
- Web Link
-
FBO.gov Permalink
(https://www.fbo.gov/spg/SSA/DCFIAM/OAG/28321318RI0000014/listing.html)
- Place of Performance
- Address: Nationwide, United States
- Record
- SN04757048-W 20171207/171205231241-8fda803852a804444c09861467b2d578 (fbodaily.com)
- Source
-
FedBizOpps Link to This Notice
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